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| Updated: 2/20/2012 9:50 pm |
Published: 2/20/2012 8:02 pm |
LITTLE ROCK, AR -- Heading into a busy wedding season, Tammy Murphy arranges and delivers flowers for a living. The arranging part she likes, but the delivery side of the job hurts her pocketbook.
"Our delivery fee that we have to charge barely covers our gas and the insurance for the vans to deliver," said Murphy, who is co-owner of Crocus Flowers.
Right now, she charges about a ten dollar delivery fee, which is already affecting customer behavior.
"When they start looking at paying a $12 delivery fee or I'm going to pay a $10 delivery fee, they aren't sending as many flowers," said Murphy.
AAA says the current average cost of a gallon of regular gas is up to $3.56. Even more frightening, analysts say prices could be well over $4 a gallon by summer.
If gas prices don't go down, Murphy fears the worst.
"We will have to increase our prices or make it to where we can't deliver anymore," said Murphy, "It's sad, but that is the way it is. We are getting charged from our local suppliers. Every time they deliver to us and then in turn we have to do the same thing."
