CINCINNATI -- Ashland Oil Co., Kentucky's largest corporation, is negotiating for the purchase of locally-based Tresler Oil Co., company officials confirmed.
Ashland, with yearly sales of $7 billion, currently is a wholesale supplier for Tresler, which markets gasoline, heating oil and other petroleum products and owns a chain of service stations.
'We've been doing business with them for almost 40 years,' said Tresler President George Panuska.
The purchase could improve Ashland's gasoline sales by ensuring that Ashland would be Tresler's only supplier.
Ashland, the nation's largest independent refiner, has been plagued in recent years by reduced demand for its petroleum products.
Officials of neither company would divulge details of the merger talks.
