Just as Washington takes time to get to know his customers, they often remember him. He says there isn’t a place he can go from Waldorf to Hyattsville where he doesn’t bump into someone who recognizes him from the gas station.
‘‘Clayton pretty much does everything for me,” customer Troy Proctor of Rosaryville said. ‘‘I don’t have to get out of the car, which is nice in the cold.”
It’s the friendly and personalized customer service that owner Don Emshwiller said brings customers back again and again. Emshwiller, of Accokeek, has owned the shop since 2002, but it originally opened in 1950. He bought it because it was like the old-fashioned full-service stations he remembers from his youth.
‘‘As teenagers we all worked at gas stations,” Emshwiller said. ‘‘I haven’t seen one [like this] since I was 18.”
Paul Fiore, executive vice president for the Bowie-based organization Service Station Dealers of America, said many gas stations will pump gas for disabled customers or check a car’s oil if asked, but the stations that still pump gas regularly are ‘‘few and far between.”
‘‘This is a regular Mayberry gold mine,” said Emshwiller, referencing the setting of the popular 1960s sitcom ‘‘The Andy Griffith Show.”
Though Emshwiller provides an extra service at the pump, customers don’t pay any extra charge. He tries to keep his prices even if not a few cents lower than the local competition.
‘‘You make no money on gas anyhow,” he said.
Instead Emshwiller and his team of three mechanics, including his son Tony, try to cultivate more business in their service center from the gas service. They’re busy enough as it is, with Emshwiller putting in about 80 hours a week into the business.
‘‘We’re cheap and honest, and there is no such thing as a cheap and honest mechanic,” Emshwiller said. ‘‘I let [the business] sell itself.”
E-mail Andrea Noble at anoble@gazette.net.
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