Ed Trudeau was thwarted when he tried to fill up an 8,500-gallon tanker truck with cheaper fuel. Trudeau, a 35-year veteran of the gas station business, said two competing stations owned by multinational gas corporations weren't playing by the rules. Wisconsin's minimum markup law requires stations to charge 6 percent above invoice price or 9.18 percent above the average wholesale price, whichever is more.
Stations can charge less to match competitors.
The driver, Jim Rathmann, and John Johnson scrambled on top of the tanker while Trudeau turned on the gas. After about five minutes, clerks said he had to stop, but Trudeau continued pumping until the workers shut off the gas. When Burlington police arrived, they told Trudeau he had to leave, though he wasn't doing anything illegal. They don't have to sell you gas,'' said Sgt. The markup law, which dates to the 1930s, was intended to prevent multinational oil companies' stations from slashing prices below cost to drive smaller competitors out of business.