Car Insurance Car

BMW Mini has always had very creative marketing. And they've had to - building a small car in an age of much larger ones - and with a (more or less) one model line-up. From the early series of numbered slogans emphasizing the fun and virtues of driving a small car to a very clever Mini on a stand with a coin slot, as if it were a child's horseback ride in a supermarket. They've usually had just the right balance of humor and positioning that I admired and advocated.

Now here's another clever idea, and another one that carshares (with a bit of budget) could use to promote new vehicle locations - placing a VERY large cardboard box with the image of the vehicle on the side.  The Mini "box" is set up as if it were a present that had just been opened.

What a perfect way to announce a new carsharing vehicle location - that is, before you have a vehicle to go there!

This Mini promotion is from the Netherlands but apparently, it's taken from an earlier RATP Metro promotion in Paris.

In another optimistic projection about the future potential of carsharing, consulting firm Frost and Sullivan is predicting 4.4 million members in North America by 2016 - that's up from about 400,000 members now.

The projections are based on a summary of two Frost and Sullivan reports (N748-18) Car-sharing: a Sustainable and Innovative Personal Transport Solution with Great Potential and Huge Opportunities and (M4FA-18) Sustainable and Innovative Personal Transport Solutions – Strategic Analysis of Carsharing Market in Europe, says that carsharing membership in North America rose by 117% between 2007 and 2009 and the growth at that rate is expected to continue over the next 5 to 10 years. This leads to the estimate of 4.4 million members in North America and 5.5 million in Europe by 2016.


(It seems somewhat counterintuitive to me that Europe would have more carsharing members than the US but I haven't seen the report yet to understand the rationale.)

This report follows on Zipcar's press release from June 2009 predicting worldwide market size for carsharing at 37 million members.

Nevertheless, even if only a fraction of these gains occur, carsharing has a very bright future ahead. The marketing departments and street teams better get to work!