Yes, there were video surveillance cameras in the 1980s, hooked into VCRs for playback. And many places used them, including stores and gas stations. That's how gas stations could track down people who filled up and ran. Toll booths had them too.
Even before VCRs were cheap enough, there were film-based surveillance cameras. https://archive.org/details/armedrobberyoffe0000macd/page/22... from 1975 gives examples, including at a donut store.
(And it mentions a bank where they pressed the button to film a robbery, then after developing the film found it had taken pictures of the Christmas party months before, when the button was pressed by accident.)
I mean, we had webcams by the mid 1990s. It's not like Exxon couldn't afford something better for their stations.