The black Ford Escape, dusted in dirt and groaning with a lifetime of belongings, sidled up to pump No. 9 on a hazy May morning.
Its owner, Elaine LaPlaca-Heston, was headed 40 miles south to San Diego, a city she had romanticized in her younger days when she made it her home. But now it seemed to be greedily siphoning away her Social Security. At 69 years old, she managed the inflated cost of living by cobbling together gig work — staffing events, manning registration tables, assisting travelers at the airport.
“I have to watch every dime that I spend these days,” she said.
So Ms. LaPlaca-Heston had pointed her 10-year-old car here, to Horizon Fuel Center, an unlikely mecca in the foothills of north San Diego County that showcases an elusive jewel: cheap gas. Or relatively cheap gas, at least.
Of course, this is California, the state with the highest gas prices in the nation. But Horizon’s rates — listed at $5.39 that day — tend to undercut competitors that aren’t on tribal land, sometimes by nearly a buck.
The cost of gas has long served as a sign of the times; any stress we may have about filling our tank is often a reflection of our current quality of life. Recent months have been downright punishing, with the war in Iran causing prices to spike.
Consumers have turned to price comparison apps like GasBuddy to find any place that might offer some relief. Stations like Horizon have seen an influx of customers, many of whom plunk down the exact cash for what can get them through the week. Such gas stations have become terminals for the budget-conscious, catering to strangers who are on vastly disparate paths but in search of the same savings.
For Ms. LaPlaca-Heston, the need to stick to $35 at the pump was a harsh reality. She had once been the director of sales for a charter bus company and raised two children in a five-bedroom house with sunset views. But a divorce had forced her to downsize, and her car was crammed with possessions on their way to a storage facility.
Her new home was an apartment complex for seniors. “I look in the mirror, and in my heart I’m still in my 40s,” she said and laughed but then found herself wiping away tears. “It’s not fun growing old by yourself,” she added before driving away. She had a job that night as an usher at a Major League Soccer game.
Minutes later, just after 9 a.m., Jeff Bauer pulled up in a tan Toyota Tacoma laden with a vacuum hose, a pole and a crate of chemicals. He was servicing swimming pools in the area, a career he stumbled into nearly four decades ago when growing up in nearby Escondido. Being outdoors suited him. (Once, when he passed a call center with rows of cubicles, he thought, “Man, that is death right there.”)
Mr. Bauer, 59, had come for his usual: a tank of gas filled up three-fourths of the way, enough for his weekly route of 270 miles. The total: $92.03. Not terrible, but not great.
An independent contractor, Mr. Bauer is mindful of saving for retirement, knowing that the physical demands of his job will catch up with him soon. Gesturing to a brace on his left knee, he said the pain would have to linger during the busy season. “Going into summer, I prefer just to try and hang on,” he said as he hopped back into his truck. “Elective surgeries you do in the winter.”
By then, Horizon, a 24-hour operation, had already served several hundred customers, many of them a cross-section of the middle and working class that live in Valley Center, a rural community made up of farms and ranches and curving country roads set against a backdrop of mountain peaks.
There is the mother who cleans houses for a living and often has to say no to her son’s request for toys and ice cream. The Border Patrol agent who spends $175 to fill a diesel truck that is on a six-year payment plan. The 77-year-old retired electrician who gasses up his motor home in stages when preparing for a trip to the Eastern Sierra.
“We try to do the best we can, right?” said David Martinez, 29, a mobile mechanic who arrived in a 2005 Chevrolet truck. Having survived a ruptured intestine last year, he tries to take things like his rising business expenses in stride.
A young woman sitting at an outside table contemplated her own journey as she ate Cheetos on her lunch break. “When I first started working here, I was pretty crazy — I just had a really bad attitude and bad outlook on life,” said Molly Garcia, 20, a supervisor at the station’s convenience store, where she earns about $25 an hour.
Her mother died when she was young, and she lived in foster care while her father was in prison. The experience hardened her. “But I’m like a completely different person,” she said. “Working here, I’ve become so much more empathetic.”
Ms. Garcia is a descendant of the San Pasqual Band of Mission Indians, which owns Horizon and the land on which it sits, allowing the business to be exempt from state taxes and fees. Its fuel supplier is a Native American-owned company that serves only stations on tribal trust land or reservations. All of this accounts for Horizon’s low prices. (The station’s status also permits it to sell flavored tobacco and flavored vapes and to hand out free plastic bags, otherwise mostly prohibited in California.)
The tribe opened Horizon five years ago, and it has proved to be a successful economic tool — and with a much smaller footprint than its casino. It has plans to open another station across town. A number of other tribes in Southern California also have newer fuel centers, including the Pauma Band of Luiseño Indians whose station, 10 miles north of Horizon, offers stiff competition.
“I’ll have my tribal members over at Pauma, they’ll take a picture, and they’ll email, ‘Pauma’s gas is cheaper than ours,’” said Stephen Cope, chairman of the San Pasqual tribe, with a shrug and a grin.
But Horizon is the station of choice for David Dickerson, who rolled in around 2 p.m. in a blue big rig as the day’s heat peaked at 80 degrees. The owner of an enterprise that hauls sand and gravel, he had just finished a delivery that brought his 160-gallon tank to near empty.
“I crossed my fingers, like ‘I hope I make it,’” he said as he slathered hot sauce on a slice of pizza, his first meal since he woke 12 hours earlier.
Mr. Dickerson, 51, had already paid $600 for diesel that day and planned to spend $400 more. The business he bought from his father-in-law a year ago has been a grind.
“As long as we stay busy, we’re barely making ends meet,” he said. Horizon, he estimated, helped him save about $500 a week to put toward bills, groceries and insurance. After a quick break, he started off for home in Corona, more than an hour’s drive north.
Inside the convenience store, the incessant line was moved efficiently along by Raychel Johnson, a cashier whose wave and call of “Next in line!” was as familiar to regulars as the blue eye shadow she wore to match her Horizon button-down.
“You still work here?” a man said as he slapped down a six-pack of beer. “Man, you been here forever.”
Ms. Johnson, 36, had arrived at 10 a.m., and witnessed the usual flow of a weekday. The construction workers who stopped in for snacks, the after-school stream of teenagers who idled at indoor tables, the post-work crowd happy to be done for the day, the parents who rushed children to soccer practice.
Around 6 p.m., near the end of her shift, Ms. Johnson began balancing her register, looking forward to hugging her 7-year-old son at home. “That’s what gets me through most of my days,” she said.
But she likes the work and feels good about being a dependable employee. Recently, a secret shopper with the local Indian clinic came in pretending to be a customer while evaluating the station and tried to buy tobacco without showing proper identification. Ms. Johnson denied the sale and received a $25 gift card as a reward.
She spent it immediately. On gas.
