Like his fellow Lawrence residents, Nathan Judd is paying record prices at the pump. But as a delivery driver for Yello Sub, he’s not ready to eat the difference between rising costs and unwavering reimbursements.

“You can beg more tips off people, if you know what you’re doing,” said Judd, between deliveries over lunch Wednesday. “It’s all customer interaction — you know, they ask how your day’s going, and I’m like, ‘Oh, man, I just filled my car up. It’s so expensive.’ And they’ll give you an extra buck sometimes.

“You have to work for it.”

But Judd is finding it increasingly difficult to make the sale, as sandwich buyers, transportation managers and virtually everyone else who works and lives in town faces unprecedented numbers on service station signs in Lawrence.

The average price of a gallon of regular, unleaded gasoline in the city peaked Wednesday at a record $2.225, up 4.4 cents from a day earlier and 53.4 cents from a year ago, AAA said in its ongoing Fuel Gauge report.

“That’s the highest recorded price in Lawrence,” said Kim Mathewson, a AAA Kansas spokeswoman in Topeka. “Ever.”

Diesel prices also climbed to a record $2.34 a gallon, as crude oil continues to sell for more than $50 a barrel, driving fears that prices will continue to climb as the summer driving season approaches and U.S. gasoline demand follows its annual growth rate of 2 percent.

Mathewson said that AAA — which has 142,400 members in Kansas, including 10,600 in Douglas County — concurred with industry projections of continued price increases through the summer, but not to the point of convincing many people to curtail their travels.

“We’re not going to run out of inventory,” she said.

As a delivery driver for Yello Sub, Nathan Judd gets paid for each delivery and get tips from customers but also has to pay for his own gasoline expenses. As gas prices go up, Judd's profit decreases. Judd was preparing to make an afternoon delivery Wednesday from the Yello Sub on campus, 624 W. 12th St.

But businesses are taking stock of the situation.

Dave Old, manager of Midwest Transportation in Lawrence, said that rising fuel costs were becoming too much to bear. The company has more than 50 taxis, airport shuttles, visitor buses and medical transports.

Company officials will huddle Monday to consider boosting prices for the first time in years.

“We go through so much fuel it’s pathetic,” Old said. “I’ve been real adamant about staying where we are, but with prices at this point, we can’t do it much longer. I’m going broke on a daily basis here.”

Even so, Old said, it could be worse.

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“My brother called me and was griping about paying $3.08 (a gallon) in California,” he said. “I’m always thinking positive.”

Gary Bennett, general manager of Laird Noller Automotive in Lawrence, said that this week’s prices would be cheap compared with those during the price panics of 1974. An oil embargo triggered rationing and other measures that — if adjusted for inflation — would be far more painful than today’s prices.

“People were trading in their Dodge Chargers, Olds Cutlasses — big, V-8 American cars, because they weren’t as efficient,” he said, recalling his early sales days. “It was a panic thing.”

These days, Bennett is busy answering customer inquiries about Ford’s new Escape hybrid, an SUV that offers improved gasoline mileage through use of electric and gasoline power. He had his first one sold before it ever made it on the lot, and one of the two more he’s secured since then from other dealers also has a buyer.

Yello Sub driver Nathan Judd delivers an order Wednesday. Judd's wages are suffering from the increase in gasoline prices.

With gasoline prices staying high, he said, the interest should continue to accelerate.

“We get people in here every week,” Bennett said.

Judd, meanwhile, will continue to fill up his 1999 Ford Escort, hoping that customers will add to his tips. He figures he makes about 17 deliveries a day, and the profit margins are starting to put a crimp in his style.

“It used to be I could take my tips and fill up my car with gas and buy a candy bar and a pack of smokes or whatever,” said Judd, a Yello Sub driver for nearly five years.. “Now it goes to cover the gas prices. … It makes it quite a bit tighter on the pocket.”