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Key lessons from a
world wide car club tour
Section one - Europe
Summary of notes made by Jo Taylor, Carplus Director, in Autumn 2003 following a tour funded by the Winston Churchill Memorial Fund.
Germany
Parking
and financial problems
There is good news and bad news from Germany. Operators are struggling financially due to two main reasons. Firstly the previously offered discounts to public transport uses have been too costly to clubs so had to be reduced. This has meant that a number of members have left cancelling out the normal membership growth. The second reason that growth has been restricted is due to a lack of parking spaces. On-street parking is not allowed by law for car clubs even though some local authorities would like to offer it.
An early study suggested that Germany has 2.5 million potential car sharing members. It currently has 60,000. Without a change in the law, it is suspected that 10 - 15% annual growth will be achieved - towards about 250 - 300,000 car club members in 20 years. Growth could be quicker if political conditions were more favourable. The Target Project in Bremen is setting up mobility centres where the car club will be on-street as part of a combined bus stop, taxi rank and information point, (Mobil Punkt stations). They are pilot projects to be assessed and reviewed with a view to making on-street parking possible.
Operators would like to expand into new towns but all towns with more than 200,000 inhabitants already have car sharing. Towns with less than 200,000 inhabitants are up for grabs but do not make money. Larger companies use profits from larger towns / cities to subsidise activity in smaller towns.
Public transport
On the other hand there is positive news about modal shift of car club members. Bcs, the German equivalent to Carplus has learned that public transport operators earn new customers through car club link ups. Existing PT customers increase their PT use, new customers are won and customers who would have left PT and purchased a car are retained. Car club customers spend more on public transport and buy higher value tickets e.g. monthly / annual season tickets.
Research in Munich suggests that the effects of moving miles from the car to public transport continues for 3 to 5 years. Members who, as private car owners drove 13,000km had reduced to 2,500km after 5 years as a car club member. They substituted car km for PT (majority), walking and cycling.
Bcs have tried to build a formula for PT gains from car club integration. Their research suggests that car club members spend an extra Euro 25 - 75 per annum. Bcs approached a public transport operator in Dresden and negotiated a contribution of Euro 1.25 per month for each member using public transport to the car club operator.
In one town, Wuppertal (350,000 inhabitants) the public transport provider has actually taken on the operation of the car club.
Typical car club member profile
Data shows that membership is split 66% male, 34% female although 50% of enquiries are from women (who may be enquiring on behalf of the household). The average member is 34 years old, university educated, has an above average income, and at least a vague interest in environmental issues. They are still catering to those with environmental 'feelings' - hasn't become mainstream service. A second, but significant group in Dresden are people who do not earn enough money to own a car.
Corporate membership has only really taken off in the last 2 years. Cambio Aachen have 35% of members from business. Some public transport operators use car sharing for employees as it gives a better image if they arrive to see clients in car share vehicle rather than a private car.
Operational issues
Dbcarsharing
launched a booking system where the further in advance you booked
your ticket the better the price. This failed and they returned to
the previous system where you get flat rate 50% fare discount. They
think customers like price certainty.
Ustra the operator in Hamburg found high up front (joining fee, membership fee, deposit) costs were a barrier to joining. To reduce this barrier they waived the deposit and membership fee and offered lower joining fee (E50 from E129) but with higher hourly (and mileage charges. This offer was exclusively for holders of annual season tickets. Their survey showed that 12% of car club members who have season tickets got rid of a car, and a further 30% would have bought a car without the offer.
Cambio favour larger car stations rather than more smaller ones. One station in Cologne has 40 cars in a multi-storey car park adjacent to the railway station. They noticed better customer satisfaction and utilisation rates with car stations larger than just one or two cars. The experience was that when they merge one or more smaller stations, that a few customers will be upset because you have closed the station near their home. But annual customer feedback reveals that customer satisfaction and utilisation rates increase. This suggest that it builds confidence that there will be a vehicle available and the visual impact is greater. Car stations are one of the best marketing tools.
Out of hours booking calls for Cambio are taken by a taxi company. There are issues of quality of service and investment in training though as there is a high turnover of staff.
Holland
The
government set a target of 400,000 members by 2010 which is the
equivalent of all those who match the car club profile in Holland.
They are therefore assuming all of those will join.
Currently there are 4,000 members of "autodate" of which 85% are from Greenwheels. Autodate is the "sexy " new brand image that the National Foundation for shared car use gave to all car clubs. There are 50-90,000 informal car sharers, depending on which research figures are used.
The government spent E1 million on promotion last year but with no input from the operators or Foundation for Shared Car Use. They blew it all on one TV advert which was unclear about car clubs and was negative about used car salesmen. This campaign was not successful but free post cards in retail and entertainment outlets brought more membership.
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