Essar Oil halts expansion program after reaching 1,700 outlets

Essar Oil Limited, India’s biggest private sector fuel retailer, announced that due to the volatile oil retail business, it will stop its retail expansion drive once the goal of 1,700 outlets had been reached. Essar Oil now has 1,640 outlets, of which 1,388 are fully operational while 252 are still under construction. In an interview with the Business Standard, CEO-cum-MD of Essar Oil, Naresh Nayyar, said that the company would wait for stability in fuel prices before expanding beyond the goal of 1,700 outlets. For the second quarter of this fiscal year, Essar Oil posted a net loss of Rs1.66 billion (US$31.4 million) compared to a net profit of Rs1.30 billion (US$24.6 million) for the same quarter during the previous year. (November 2, 2011)