Greenstone completes purchase of Shell in New Zealand

The new boss of Shell’s fuel retailing business, which was recently sold to Kiwi owners, says the decision to rebrand it or stick with Shell is tricky. Greenstone Energy Chief Executive Mike Bennetts was in Christchurch, New Zealand, meeting the staff of the formerly Shell-owned petrol, diesel and fuels business. Greenstone completed the purchase on April 1. Rebranding would cost “tens of millions of dollars,” Bennetts said. Greenstone Energy had purchased the right to use the Shell brand for three years and could pay to continue with the brand after that. The turnover of the Shell business was A$2.5 billion (US$2.3 billion) a year, with about half that being sales to the aviation, marine, fishing, transport and corporate market and the rest of the sales at the retail pump. (April 14, 2010)