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FutureFolly

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2014
Messages
141
Expanding the demographic of electric vehicle owners is a goal of mine. One of the major resistance factor of electric car ownership I've noticed is that BEVs aren't considered by people that don't have access to a second vehicle for longer or unexpected trips. Usually it's a long term car/truck or a spouse's ICE daily driver, but I've wondered if structured access to a rental car would be a good enough replacement. There are a few different business models I could imagine working to some degree. The major benefits to GM would be a wider potential customer base. This would basically be GM setting up a Groupon type deal with a rental car company. Like Groupon the assumption would be that a significant number will go unclaimed.

Rental Car Credits: Something like free access to a compact car 2-4 weeks per year for 3-5 years. Probably sold as an optional extra, but possibly bundled into the car like OnStar. Insurance and upgrades would cost extra.

Very Good Rental Car Coupon Book: Something like 50-100 coupons with everything from free subcompacts to $20 three-row vehicles. Rental cars are already cheap, but this would be designed to be significantly better than just a deal you found online. It would probably have to be free because no one is going to wants to buy coupons.

Membership Pricing: Basically just preferential pricing slightly better than you could find online. Nothing special, but they could market it as never needing to cost you more than $10-20 per day.
 
Nissan did have something like this for a little bit w/the Leaf. It wasn't well advertised and seemed a bit YMMV. I don't recall when it formally started and ended.

See https://web.archive.org/web/20130517185123/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=11160. (MNL is down right now.)

Fiat had (has?) something similar: http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2013/06/buy-a-fiat-500e-electric-get-a-free-rental-car.html.
 
cwerdna said:
Nissan did have something like this for a little bit w/the Leaf. It wasn't well advertised and seemed a bit YMMV. I don't recall when it formally started and ended.

See https://web.archive.org/web/20130517185123/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=11160. (MNL is down right now.)

Fiat had (has?) something similar: http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2013/06/buy-a-fiat-500e-electric-get-a-free-rental-car.html.
I would guess the average person would need/use 10 or less days per year. I think even a membership to one of the rental car VIP programs would help people get over that fear of being limited to 85 mi a day
 
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