Tiny Northland town becomes centre of ‘impressive’ low petrol prices

The opening of a Gull station in September sparked competition, driving prices down by 20 cents. Photo / RNZ, Dan Cook

By Jeremy Parkinson of RNZ

The small beachside community of Mangawhai is traditionally associated with surfing and a legendary pub, but in the last few months of 2025, it became New Zealand’s petrol price hotspot.

The Northland town has never been a cheap place to visit, let alone live, but residents and visitors have, over the past few months, been treated to some of the lowest petrol prices in New Zealand.

Mangawhai is home to a number of petrol stations, a Mobil near the town’s New World Supermarket, another closer to the heads, a G.A.S station and a new self-serve Gull across the road from the town’s museum.

According to the Gaspy App, which monitors fuel prices across the country, since the self-serve station opened in September, the price of 91 has sat at $2.33.9 except when dropping for discount days.

The director of Gaspy, Mike Newton, says the town is a bit of an outlier since the Gull station opened in September.

“They’ve had it really good, pretty much since then. They’ve just steadily been 20 cents lower than that national average, which is pretty impressive, especially for Northland, I don’t think they’ve generally had it that good.”

AA spokesperson Terry Collins said this type of competition shouldn’t be limited to Mangawhai.

“What we’re seeing here is a perfect example of competition driving prices down. The Commerce Commission has talked about it from time to time, about how when we do see lower prices, we see them in areas with the most competition.”

‘A lot of discounting going on’

The day First Up visited Mangawhai, the average price of petrol across the country was $2.55.9 per litre. Mangawhai’s Gull had the third lowest price at $2.33.9 per litre – only bettered by the Allied pump at Opua Marina and Westgate’s Costco.

Newton said the months of lower prices at the Gull forced Mangawhai’s other stations to compete, but the lower prices were not usually as sustained as they have been since September.

“If those other stations don’t compete, they won’t get any business. When the price is that much lower, if they’re sitting across the road and their price is 20 cents higher, why would anyone go there?”

Collins said they saw fluctuations in prices depending on demand during an average week.

“What we’re tending to see lately is a lot of discounting going on, people chasing on particular days, Tuesdays and Thursdays kind of thing, before the weekend and after the weekend where the demand is slacking and because they want volume they’ll make these discount offers to drive sales.”

As for Mangawhai Gull station’s other products, Newton said they were not as much of a bargain. “It’s really only the 91 price that is the significant outlier, diesel and 95 are pretty much tracking the national average, there’s really not much to be saved there”

He said the price of petrol nationwide has been pretty steady. “We haven’t seen any of the huge shifts we saw like when Russia headed into Ukraine, those sort of global [events] which see massive price changes, it’s really been steady as she goes.”

As for Mangawhai’s low prices, Collins said it was all good. “I’m not sure if they’re doing it in this case to encourage tourism, I think basically it has been ignited by the arrival of Gull and the competition it brings, but no, long may we enjoy it.”