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Hi all,

The annual Car Rental Show hosted in Las Vegas has just finished, for those of you unfamiliar with The Car Rental Show (CRS), it offers the opportunity for the industry to come together and learn from each other and help provide a closer working relationship between the usually segregated industry.

Unfortunately like you, I was unable to attend this year event, however I was able to follow parts of it via twitter, so I thought I’d show below some of the more interesting tweets I noticed.

Ful Cygler says Florida is best market for newest vehicles#carrentalshow

NB: Our own statistic’s support this as well, with California a close second.

At the marketing table: everyone here agrees that Google is the most important search engine to b aware of #carrentalshow

NB: Not exactly ground breaking news, perhaps show’s how behind car rental is.

more dealers are going to enter the market, Kushner says#carrentalshow

NB: Great for the consumer, at present approximately 4 car rental suppliers own the market, more competitors = better rates.

Chris Brown: It’s not about the rental car, its about the car rental process #carrentalshow

NB: Customer services is your best USP?

Mark Frissora, Hertz CEO: “customers are smarter than they ever have been” #carrentalshow

NB: Suggesting that customers were stupid before

Frissora says int’l travel is expected to double to $2T in 2020#carrentalshow

NB: $2 trillion!!! Wowsers…

He says that off-airport rental is a fast-growing source for leisure and business rentals #carrentalshow

NB: I believe this aimed at U.S. travellers not European

Technology is ‘Putting the power of companies in the hands of consumers’ – Mark Frissora Hertz #carrentalshow

NB: Positive or a negative?

Freeman: “we’ve only skimmed the surface of what this industry can do.” #carrentalshow

NB: Very true.

Barton: “be a fire prevention officer not a fire fighter” #carrentalshow

NB: Interesting buzz phrase.

Schalberg: keep the rental car counter free of clutter, separate back office papers from front counter papers #carrentalshow

46% of Facebook users say their travel destination was affected by what their Facebook community says #carrentalshow

NB: Does this ring true to you?

Some interesting things coming out of The Car Rental Show, although for me I’m still amazed at how slow the car rental industry moves to adopt new technology.

What do you think?

Regards,

James

Hi all,

News from Tulsa, Dollar’s headquarters in the U.S. is that they are expecting an imminent hostile takeover attempt from Hertz! 

The who will purchase Dollar Rent A Car saga dominated last years car hire USA news, as firstly Budget Rent A Car then more prominently Hertz tried to secure FTC approval for a potential buyout.

Well yesterday in an interview with Tulsa World Dollar Thrifty CEO Scott L Thompson said

Hertz is going to try again. We are calling it ‘H3. The truth is, over the last five years I can’t really tell when one attempt ended and another began.

He also added

Look, Hertz is getting close, and I’m certain that they will get regulatory approval at some time. The FTC does not care that we are not for sale. It is ready to get the regulatory process over. The issue that will decide if there will ever be a transaction is price. If Hertz is willing to pay a price that is in our shareholders’ best interest, then something will eventually happen. If not, it will just be more noise.

In a note to employee’s Thompson also stated

“The good news is that we have continued to perform very well, and that sets the bar high. As I have always told you, performance is our best defense. And performance has worked for five years.”

Sounds like Hertz must be very close to receiving FTC approval, which has cost them a pretty penny to achieve, cash that cannot be easily be written off.

I can see Hertz coming back with a strong offer that may test Dollar’s plans for 2012.

As always I will keep you updated.

regards,

James,

Hi all,

On Saturday I was sent some statistics from a PR company informing me of the most popular car colours customer select when picking up their USA Car Hire.

The most popular colour according to this document was white! Which I thought was a little strange, probably because it wouldn’t be my personal choice.

The full results read like this

1. White
2. Red
3. Silver
4. Green
5. Yellow
6. Pink
7. Gold
8. Black

Now I don’t know about you but these ranking just didn’t ring true in my experience, I’m not sure I’ve ever met a majority of people who would prefer pink to black!? or perhaps I’m moving in the wrong circles…

So to test my theory I asked our facebook friends the same question.

What’s your favourite colour for a car?

These were the results.

1. White
2. Black
3. Red
4. Blue
5. Silver
6. Yellow
7. Green
8. Pink

As you can see White was the most popular in both poll’s,  however as I kind of guessed Black did indeed prove to be more popular than pink!!

What’s your preferred car colour of choice?

regards,

James

Hi all,

From a press release dated the 16/02/12 the Massachusetts Port Authority (Massport) approved a rolling five-year program costing more than $1 billion to fund 340 projects as part of the Authority’s  improvements.

$300 Million of this cash (the largest amount to be invested) will be used to build a brand new consolidated car rental facility at Boston International Airport.

The $300 million project will enhance customer service, ease airport roadway and terminal curbside congestion and replace rental car diesel buses with alternative fuel buses and improve air quality.

Reports state that the funding for these projects will come from Massport, customer and passenger facility charges and federal grants.

We haven’t received confirmation of how the customer facility charges will be collected however historically its been via car rental companies but I will keep you posted on any announcement.

regards,

James

Hi all,

Yesterday the Dollar Thrifty Group (DTG)  released full 2011 end of year accounts and also quarter 4 details.

In a nutshell Dollar Thrifty have had another record year eclipsing last years results which at the time was also a record year!  Boosted by a buoyant second hand market DTG boasted profits of $159.6 million,  up from $131.2 million,  in 2010. Revenue rose to $1.55 billion from $1.54 billion.

Scott L Thompson, Chairman and CEO stated

“We are pleased to announce that for the second consecutive year, the company is reporting record earnings,”

“During 2011, we benefited from a robust used vehicle market, a recovering travel market with increasing demand for value-oriented product offerings, and our ongoing focus on expense control and productivity initiatives.”

What does Dollar Thrifty expect for 2012?

2012 Outlook  

The Company is providing the following guidance for 2012 with respect to key drivers of its business model:

• Vehicle rental revenues are projected to be up 3 – 5 percent compared to 2011.
• Vehicle depreciation costs for the full year of 2012 are expected to be within a range of $220 to $240 per vehicle per month.
  • The Company is utilizing a Manheim index of 124 for the full year of 2012 for purposes of estimating residual values and depreciation rates.
  • Gains on sales of risk vehicles in 2012 are expected to moderate significantly on both an aggregate dollar and per unit basis compared to vehicle gains recorded in 2011.  This decrease is the result of continued refinements of residual value assumptions to more closely align with market conditions at the time of sale.
• Interest expense is expected to decline significantly on a year-over-year basis, primarily as a result of lower overall interest rates on the Company’s fleet financing facilities as compared to the fixed rates on matured and maturing financing facilities, and the repayment of all of the Company’s corporate debt in 2011.  These decreases will be partially offset by higher rates on the newly completed revolver and the expected re-leveraging of our Canadian fleet.

Hi all,

Back in December 2009 our MD, Gavin Boswell, blogged about the top 10 items being left in vehicles, well I thought I would revisit this post and see how these items have changed in the past 2 years.

Back in 2009 the number 1 item was Sunglasses which seems pretty normal, however at the other end of the spectrum was underwear! coming in at number 10… still not really sure how you forget your underwear!?

2012 Top Items Left In USA Car Hire

Amazing that only a few years ago mobile phones didn’t even hit the top 10 now it’s the number one items left in vehicles. Combine it with iPods and mobile phone chargers and mobile technology takes up 3 of the top 10 spots.

What do you think will be in the top 10 come 2015? I’m hoping hoverboards or jet packs

regards,

James

Hi,

You can be forgiven for not having heard of the new social website on the block, as its still invite only however pinterest.com for me is going to be huge for the travel industry and here’s why…

As described on their website

Pinterest is a Virtual Pinboard. Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes.

Traffic

In the last 6 months visits to Pinterest have risen 4000%, according to TNW in one week in December they received over 11 million unique visitors. Remember they have achieved all this despite being invitation only.

Some companies are reporting greater referral traffic from Pinterest than facebook.

SEO

Search Engine Land also points out that Pinterest is a great way to improve your search engine optimisation as it allows you to back link to your own site.

Viral

The buzz word of marketeers everywhere, viral marketing refers to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increased brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives. A good example of Viral marketing was the Cadbury’s Chocolate’s, Gorilla advert, which was popular on facebook and youtube.

Pinterest’s users are loyal but more importantly, active, which increases the chance for your campaign to go viral their recent additional of pinning to facebooks timeline also adds to the viral opportunities.

Engagement

Companies should take every opportunity they can to engage with their customers, Pinterest offers a unique and simple way to interact.

We interacted with more customers in the first week on Pinterest than we did compared to the first week on twitter or facebook.

Pinterest also allows users to re-pin or even comment on the information  you provide, users don’t have to be following you or “like” you.

Shop

Remember when there were tons of independent travel agents on the high street, windows full of holiday offers. Well Pinterest can be that shop window, pin a picture of your holiday, your tour or your car hire offer and add a price to it.

but most importantly…  

Visual

Selling travel is a very visual experience, hence the use of brochures and companies investing heavily on image based websites for example; four season’s recently spent $18 million on their new website.

Pinterest allows companies to create a board based on inspiring images, these images should promote your destination, tour or even car hire.

Do customers react more to an image or to text?

Can an image say more that words?

For me, facebook, google plus and twitter are the go to sites for companies committed to social media, however I think Pinterest is best suited to travel, I for one wont be surprised when a whole host of companies get on board.

You can visit the usrentacar Pinterest board here, for those of you who aren’t on Pinterest yet, but are interested, we still have some invitations left, see our previous post.

regards,

Gavin

Hi all,

Today Alamo have agreed to remove their peak season surcharge for all new bookings collecting in July and August 2012 for a limited time.

The removal of the peak season surcharge will reduce usrentacar.co.uk Alamo peak prices by around £25 per week.

Frank Williams Director of Communication said

We are delighted that Alamo Rent A Car have given our customers the opportunity to hire a quality product during peak season without the extra charge.

The new peakless rates are ready to book on our system right now and can be secured with a £50.00 deposit.

Please note once this offer has ended, if you have not secured your rental on usrentacar.co.uk, a peak season surcharge may apply.

regards,

James

Hi all,

With car manufactures getting more and more advanced with their technology offerings, (see our post technology and car rental) the american automotive authority believes the time is drawing near when we’ll get in to our hire cars and not know how to even start them!

Facebook integration, keyless cars and even vehicles run on electricity are becoming the norm, if you’d mentioned this 10 years ago to the average Joe they would have thought you’d gone mental.

Here at usrentacar.co.uk we believe in being prepared, so before you drive out of the parking lot here are 5 things we believe you should know.

1. All drivers should know how to start the car, it use to be straight forward, stick the key in turn it and hey presto, these days its not so simple, take the Prius for example, to turn on the engine you insert the key, push down the brake pedal and press the “power” button….simples.
2. How to Turn on the lights, last thing you need is to be driving in a foreign Country fiddling around the dash board trying to figure out how to switch the lights on after along day at Universal Orlando!
3. How to Switch on the Windscreen wipers, again you don’t want to be caught in a sudden storm and not know how to quickly turn the wipers on.
4. How to open the petrol cap and where its situated on the car.
5. How to disengage the hand brake. (this one came from our facebook page, via John Young) ”I remember sitting trying to figure that one out for ages the first time we hired an SUV. The parking brake release was a button on the dash”.
6. How to operate an automatic, for UK drivers we generally all drive “stick” then change to automatic can briefly throw you, get use to the controls before leaving the car park. (suggested by Adam Robertson via facebook)
7. How to remove the key from the ignition, some vehicles require a push or a reverse twist to remove the key, better to figure this out before you’re miles away from the rental office. (suggested by Paul Bevan via facebook)

Hi all,

Here at usrentacar.co.uk we like to stay on the cutting edge of social media, so today we will begin to trial the use of Pinterest.

Pinterest is a new social website based around the “pinning” of images and items of interest to your own custom notice board.

Although Pinterest is still in beta (invitation only) it has already exceeded 6 Million users.

We will use our pinterest account to “pin” items we think will be of interest; including pictures of car’s collected by our customers, great theme park info or pic’s and anything we think is inspiring or just cool.

You can follow us on Pinterest at http://pinterest.com/usrentacar/ (follow us and we’ll follow back).

If you haven’t got a pinterest account yet we will send invitation to the first 50 users to either post their booking reference number below or on our facebook account, or email me at jamest@usrentacar.co.uk.

regards,

James,