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The new carshare on the street, Connect By Hertz, is showing it means business. After the initial launch in Manhattan, London and Paris, Connect spent some time getting their feet on the ground. But they were busy in the spring and by this summer Connect had expanded their New York fleet to over 400 hundred vehicles - competing in Zipcar's sweetest neighborhoods all over Manhattan. The growth was facilitated by their partnership with Icon Parking, Connect now has locations from the tip of Manhattan up to East and West 90th Streets. In comparison Zip has over 2000 vehicles in several boroughs and adjacent New Jersey communities).

A recent check of the Hertz Connect web site now lists Boston, Chicago, Washington DC and San Francisco, each with one location with several vehicles. In Chicago, for example, the downtown Loop location has 4 vehicles - 2 Priuses, a Ford Escape SUV and a Camry. (The Washington DC location is at Marriot hotel corporate headquarters and could be laying the groundwork for a very interesting partnership.) Oddly Denver isn't one of the cities listed, although the Spire condo project there indicates they'll be offering residents Connect services. That would make Denver the city with the most carsharing services right now - E-Go (Boulder Carshare), Occasional Car (a recent start up with 2 vehicles) and Hertz Connect.

And Connect has added a couple of college/university campuses to its list - having taken them away from Zipcar. These are naturals for Connect since Hertz likely has a branch in the town so adding carsharing is a piece of cake.

But exactly how they're achieving this growth is a bit of a mystery - since they don't seem to be using any of the traditional marketing approaches - transit advertising, media trade outs, etc. They have done some interesting awareness campaigns using Go Gorilla Media including sidewalk logo projections, sidewalk stenciling (is that legal?) and fake "lost dog" signs (the tear offs give the Hertz Connect web site).
Hertz Connect is going after a somewhat different customer demographic - offering more vehicles on the upscale end. In addition to a Mini or a Prius at just about every location, and the usual assortment of Mazda 3s and Toyota Yaris, there are many Camrys and some locations have Volvo C70s and even a Mercedes GLK 350!

Hertz Connect is being helped in NYC by Zipcar's on-going problems with customer service. The Zipcar call center can be infuriating (I know from experience) and fleet maintenance in NYC (and other cities) apparently leaves a LOT to be desired - read a bunch of uphappy Zipcar members complaining (and very few members complimenting) on Yelp.

The London and Paris operations of Connect remain mysteries with only minor expansions of the fleet. But perhaps that's not surprising because Zipcar has been having trouble figuring out the UK market and they've been in London and LOT longer than Hertz Connect. And speaking of mysteries, Mint in New York, is another mystery - very little action since their launch.

And while I'm on the subject of car rental companies operating carsharing, it's worth nothing that U-Carshare by U-Haul has been quietly adding additional cities and a couple of schools, as well. That said, the U-Carshare marketing strategy is also a mystery - almost invisible in my home town of Portland, Oregon (although they finally had a presence at the recent Sunday Parkways event I wrote about earlier).

It's shaping up to be an interesting year in carsharing.

Note: this entry has been updated since its initial posting. - Dave


This week two significant developments in the carsharing industry were announced — the big one being Hertz' acquisition of Eileo, the Paris-based carsharing telematics supplier.

I have always had great admiration for Eileo as they had developed a unique approach to the immobilizer connection, simplifying installation of the car computer. For the past few years Eileo been adding a significant number of carsharing companies to their roster - over 20 in France, and beyond, including the UK, Australia, Israel and recently Hertz and Mind in the US. I counted over 50 "public" services support by Eileo.

And Eileo has developed some innovative capabilities, such as the ability to support floating parking locations. And it should be noted that Eileo has developed telematics in other areas outside of classic carsharing car computer and reservation and administration system. The Eileo website currently lists: a car park solution and a GPS-based fleet tracking solution. And Eileo has continued to support their "tribes" concept, providing free web hosting to encourage several neighbors to start their own informal carsharing, using Eileo car technology, of course.

Hertz has made a wise move, since other companies have demonstrated that you can easily waste millions of dollars thinking you can do a better job developing your own technology. But the Hertz-Eileo combination means that Mint Carsharing in New York City, which also uses the Eileo technology, is going to have to go shopping.

Carpooling or Carshare? Now you Can Have Both

And, in an interesting twist on the transportation alternatives Zipcar announced a partnership with Zimride , a web-based car-pooling service that uses Facebook to help identify potential ride sharers.

Zipcar says it their reservation system will allow users to automatically post the ride on the Zimride site, allowing other registered users to see it and contact the driver. The new carpooling feature, initially to be offered on the Stanford University campus, is sure to be a hit with the many other universities Zipccar serves. It's likely to be a big leg up in exposure for Zimride.

It should be noted that both the Invers and Eileo web reservation systems have long offered a ridesharing option, but only to other carsharing members using that particular service. This collaboration with Zimride will provide an interesting expansion.

Zipcar has already anticipated one potential problem: their website reminds Zip drivers that if Zimriders want to drive cars they must also be Zipcar members. And it will be interesting to see whether the Zip-Zim contributes the not uncommon confusion between carsharing and carpooling is some people's minds or not.

U Carshare Continues Below the Radar

Finally, U Carshare, the other new kid on the block has been quietly putting a few cars on the street. They've just announced Regis College and Viriginia Tech in Blacksburg coming soon. And currently they have cars at Berkeley, California ( 4 vehicles at 3 locations) the University of Wisconsin in Madison (8 vehicles at 7 locations), in my home town Portland, Oregon (see below), and the other Portland in Maine (4 vehicles at 2 locations). In Berkeley, they offer a Ford E-250 van at $15/hour or $109 per day; compared to PT Cruiser at $9 per hour or $65 per day.

In Portland, Oregon, U Carshare now has 10 vehicles, including 8 at on-street parking spaces, all with their signature PT Cruisers. But, so far, their marketing has been non-existent and I really can't figure out why. Word of mouth and free registration can only go so far in attracting new members. So we wonder what U-Haul corporate has up their sleeve - either a very economical stealth growth plan or they're laying the groundwork for something big. We'll wait and see.