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Comment by nick007 | Hacker News Reader

Hi, I'm one of the founders. Happy to answer any questions!

Why did you choose to go after the customer market directly? This seems like the kind of thing that could work being sold directly to companies with large workforces in office parks. That way you bill the compnay for the service, and the individual only for the cost of the fuel. Yoshi could then save money by sending a single fuel truck to a location to fuel multiple cars in one trip. The company then gets the benefit of a unique(ish) perk to offer to employees.

Full disclosure: I don't drive that often, bike to work and probably fill my gas tank once a month or less

What is your USDOT number showing you're authorized to commercially carry hazardous materials, like gasoline?

Actually that's publicly findable information:

USDOT 2724248

Yoshi Inc., Sunnyvale, CA

Types Transported:

- Liquids and Gases

- Haz-mats

[1] http://transportation-services.findthecompany.com/l/3180484/...

I actually think this is a pretty good idea, especially if you can also handle the annoying, piddly maintenance stuff, like tire pressure, fluids and perhaps oil changes for me.

> fluids and perhaps oil changes for me

You're wanting a full service mechanic to come out to you. That's not what this service is (nor do I think you can commercially change oil and other fluids in random parking lots).

Here you are, on HN, saying why things aren't possible. Yet these guys are out there making them work. Food for thought.

> Here you are, on HN, saying why things aren't possible. Yet these guys are out there making them work. Food for thought

Just because someone has an idea doesn't make it a sound idea, nor legal. Changing vehicle fluids commercially in random parking lots is not allowed in a lot of places, for fairly obvious reasons.

And frankly, the company this thread is about even acknowledges the legality of what they are doing may be shaky. Driving around town with hundreds of gallons of fuel is likely to make certain regulatory bodies unhappy.

In another article, the San Franciso fire department stated fuel delivery services were not permitted[1].

[1] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-02/gas-delive...

Easier to apologize later than to get permission first.

If you disagree, and it sounds like you do, there are plenty of other sites.

> nor do I think you can commercially change oil and other fluids in random parking lots

YourMechanic seems to offer that: https://www.yourmechanic.com/services/change-oil-and-filter

Yep, it's not mentioned in the article but we actually air-up your tires and service them (if needed) as well through a recent partnership we made with Firestone. Depending on the market, we're also offering oil changes and other maintenance things too. Working on expanding these wider.

So you're taking into account proper inflation(it differs, even per axle) for each make/model? How do you plan on changing things like oil when cars hoods are locked? Jacking up cars with alarms?

We let you set the PSI that you want your tires set to. We'll show your the factory default, but you can adjust it to whatever you'd like.

Don't want to share too much about oil changes yet, as we're still trying to figure out a lot of the details ourselves and are only testing this in a very limit scope right now.

What type of gas options are there? All Octane levels, Ethanol free? I actually go out of my way to find the latter.

We offer both regular (87 octane) and premium (91/93, depending on the market) grade. Not ethanol free but it is high quality ("top tier" in most markets).

Stocking racing gas would be awesome. (Sunoco SS100 is street legal in California, too.)

Yes actually we've gotten a surprising number of requests for this

Sounds like a niche that might work for you guys. I'm guessing the people who need that kind of fuel intersects nicely with "people who don't have time to fill up" and are willing to spend some extra money for convenience.

Plus there are very few stations which carry that fuel -- maybe 6 in the bay area.

Do this and charge extra - anyone wanting this won’t complain at the higher price.

> regular (87 octane) and premium (91/93)

Mid-grade (89) is just a mix of the two - it shouldn't be hard to implement.

Usually additives are added to premium which wouldn't be in mid-grade (not a huge cost difference, though). Usually this stuff gets mixed at the rack (along with ethanol, etc.), although there are older gas stations and cheaper stations which mix high and low on-site at the pump for medium.

> Usually additives are added to premium which wouldn't be in mid-grade

That's the perception (and they are happy for you to think that), but I don't believe it's actually true.

And in any case, if it is true, a mix would simply have a lower level of additives for midgrade and that seems right to me.

> although there are older gas stations and cheaper stations which mix high and low on-site at the pump for medium.

I'm almost 100% certain that almost all gas stations have just two storage tanks and the pump mixes them.

See: https://blog.gasbuddy.com/posts/Gasoline-pumping-from-the-st...

http://hyperbear.blogspot.com/2006/05/dirty-little-secret-ab...

Ah, it's apparently 90% have two tanks. The remaining 10% have 3 and have pre-mixed, because they had leftover tank from when they did leaded gas, and by doing this they don't need to upgrade the pumps. So it's probably old/cheap/un-upgraded stations which have 3 tanks.

In theory a drain plug could be designed that will allow draining the old oil and then filling the new from under the car. Changing the filter might be trickier, since not all filters are accessible from the underside (but most are).

I was skeptical about the business when it was on-demand gas delivery (when David told me about it), but I really like this pivot. The friction of filling gas will vary greatly from person to person (and many will have already figured out how to minimize that friction in their weekly routines), but services and check up are painful for nearly everyone -- especially since they're infrequent and relatively unfamiliar tasks. Kudos.

Is there any way to use the service if your car is kept in a private garage at home and work?

Yes it's possible. If you sign-up with your address our team will be in touch if we need more info or there's an issue.

I can't imagine a $15/month consumer offering working. But I could see a company-sponsored offering to fill up a parking lot full of cars with cheap gas to the employee.

Hey, love the website! Nice, clean, and straightforward.

Just a heads up, I noticed a typo on the membership page: "No need to even look at the gas gauage anymore"

This could be a great service for electric cars. More over in cities where there are no plugs at the streets.

Are you thinking about that option?

Is there a back story to the name Yoshi?

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