Entrepreneurs: How getting tanked up at home can cut the traffic congestion caused by petrol stations

There’s something a bit Jeremy Clarkson and James May about these two founders. Laid back, both in jeans and working from a garage in Wandsworth, Reda Bennis and Romain Saint Guilhem are two young petrolheads having a good time.

They sell fuel, a natural pastime for these lads given that they used to race go-karts, and have been making engines ever since they were eight.

Bennis, who’s the chief executive and the talker, says: “I used to race cars at an amateur level and Romain built engines. I don’t have the time to race now and it’s an expensive hobby. But Romain is still a bike guy.”

Nevertheless, if their business, Zebra Fuel, keeps growing at its current rate it might not be that long before they can retire and go racing full time.

Zebra Fuel was founded in 2016 by the two friends fresh out of Hult Business School and Bennis says it is already on course to break even this year and hit £10 million in revenues in 2019.

The business is simple. The company delivers diesel which it sources from the refinery directly to customers’ cars at home, eliminating petrol station visits. All the buyers have to do is leave the fuel cap open — so there is no need to be around when the delivery is made.

Bennis explains: “There’s a cool metric that we have which is that 100% of first-time users are present on the first delivery. Everybody is excited, intrigued. But what’s amazing is you never see them again. They immediately trust you.”

One Zebra Fuel van can fill up 30 customer cars and it is three times faster than filling up at a petrol station, Bennis says. The vans and drivers operate from a central hub in Wandsworth, which is also where the Zebra Fuel head office is located.

Bennis believes the business can help to alleviate congestion in the centre of London.

“The effect of queuing at a petrol station can have consequences of up to five to 10 miles, so there is decongestion when people start using Zebra. Instead of having multiple vehicles on the road going to petrol stations, we have one vehicle that dispenses to cars that are parked on the street. So you’re eliminating a lot of transit time.”

In the early stages Bennis and his partner’s biggest worry and cost was developing a fuel tank that could be put in the vans and which would be deemed safe by the regulators.

The tanks are built from aircraft aluminium designed to prevent leaks and fires and have been crash-tested. Bennis says: “The biggest cost at the beginning was the R&D. It’s like a Formula One pit stop for your car — and everyone’s seen pit stops go wrong. We don’t want that to happen in the middle of Chelsea.” Bennis gives his partner Guilhem, the chief operating officer who dips in at the end of the interview to introduce himself, the credit for building the tanks, describing him as the mad scientist behind the design.

In February Zebra revealed a $2.5 million funding round and is securing more funds, demonstrating that these two aren’t hanging around.

The cash injection was led by Robin and Saul Klein’s LocalGlobe, with participation from Brent Hoberman’s Firstminute Capital, Alex Chesterman, the Zoopla founder, and Anthony Gutman, the co-head of Goldman Sachs’ UK investment banking business.

The money will be used to pay for more fuel delivery vans, increasing the fleet from 20 vehicles to 40 within the next five months. The company has 40 employees and the workforce is expected to double within a year.

Zebra Fuel wants to become a one-stop shop for all car services.

Bennis says: “Who’s in charge of the MOT, who’s in charge of the fuel, who’s in charge of the tyres, who’s in charge of servicing it? We want to be the platform that aggregates all these different services. But the first product we are focusing on right now is the energy side.”

Despite their easy demeanours these 25-year-olds have sacrificed a lot. Bennis, who was born in Morocco before attending boarding school in Switzerland, says he has no social life, no girlfriend and has not seen the sun for two years.

“I had a girlfriend before the company but in the early stages you really have to devote yourself entirely to the company,” he says. “You get out as much as you put in. For me, a holiday is a milestone within the company. I was born in Africa and I miss the sun but I’ll go on holiday later.”

He quips that all founders sleep like babies: “We sleep, wake up, cry and go back to sleep and cry again.”

These two lads might not be sleeping properly but at least they’re having some fun.