Thanks for posting @fornerdan ! We were planning our PH debut for next week, but I guess you can't plan these things :)
The idea behind WaiveCar is to provide free to low cost, clean transportation alternatives for cities. We cover our costs with ad revenue via a digital display mounted on the roof of the vehicle.
The displays are not just a computer monitor - besides for being military grade, the screens are smart - they can display ads dynamically, including geolocated ads - very cool for on street, hyper localized ads.
For now, we're using the Chevy Spark EV. We have 20 cars and they get about 80 miles of range on a charge. Our first market is LA, starting in Santa Monica. From there we're planning on expanding the LA fleet to 200 vehicles.
Rentals are completely FREE for the first 2 hours. We just take need to check your drivers license and have a CC on file. After 2 hours, it's $5.99 / hr (not to make money, but to ensure trips are short and the system can be used by all).
We launched on Monday. If you're in Santa Monica, please download the app, stop by, and rent a car for free!
@bentossell We're not exactly sure how our users will use WaiveCar, but we designed the system for short errands (under 2 hours) that you would usually need to take a few Ubers, Lyfts, or cab rides for. We're also cheap enough so that if you do want to take it for an afternoon, you can do that and it's still way less than any ride service ($5.99/ hour).
One of our early users, Sean, told us he used it to "go to a taco stand a make a trader joes run" - we're pretty sure most of our users will use it for something like that.
Super interesting. This reminds me of Wrapify, a startup that pays car owners to advertise on their car. I'm curious and skeptical about the business model though. Are advertisers paying enough to compensate the free price tag and enough for WaiveCar to generate meaningful revenue, @isaac_deutsch?
Also, has Uber or Lyft experimented with this? Doing so would likely hurt their branding (it feels a bit cheap to travel inside an ad -- the opposite of Uber's original black car service -- but as a rider if the fare is cheaper, I'd love it). cc @chrismessina
@rrhoover When researching the business, we looked at the comps. What we found was that digital advertising on taxis generate more than enough revenue to cover the cost of the car, maintenance, and upkeep. You are spot on with Uber and Lyft. They don't want to damage their brand. Also- these displays can't be slapped on any car. They need to be custom engineered for each car model, and go through a rigorous safety testing- so it wouldn't really work for them in that way.
@zolihonig where does taxi ad inventory come from? Where will yours come from? Are you comparing taxi ad rates in the same geography or looking at national averages? Like @rrhoover I'm curious about the business model -- particularly because taxis in dense urban environments have a lot of surface area (a large fleet of cars with advertising space). 20 vehicles is a pretty small fleet, so how many vehicles would you need, and how often would they need to be driven, in order for your economics to work out?
@chrismessina good point about the density. Many brands/companies won't bother with small ad buys that reach less than a million+ people, which may make it more challenging to get something like this started.
@rrhoover To answer your question and relation to Wrapify - Car wraps (which we have, currently sponsored by Oscar Health Insurance) cost about $2,000 per wrap - and they can't be changed easily. Our platform is designed to have ads change many times per day - including based on specific geographic areas (Ex Invision might only advertise with us when our cars are in the Silicon Beach area). Makes the ad platform a lot more flexible than just a vinyl plastic wrap.
In addition, part of the logic behind 2 hours free and the low electric range is to ensure cars stay in the city and don't end up in an empty driveway somewhere - that isn't very useful for advertisers.
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Suggest you add an "Advertising" link on the page somewhere. We book billions of $ of advertising in the USA each year. How do we talk?
My initial reaction is: this is brilliant! But then... so many questions. Others have pointed out whether the advertising revenue really does cover cost, maintenance, repairs, free rides, etc.
But I have a couple of specific questions. Can I leave the car anywhere, or are there specific spots that I have to leave it at? What if a user parks at a spot illegally and gets a ticket, how is that handled? Any plans for NYC? Best of luck, this is a very interesting angle in a crowded space.
@j_ceniza Right now, rentals need to start and end in Santa Monica. As our fleet grows, you'll be able to pickup and return anywhere in LA. In terms of return locations - If you have more than 25% battery remaining, you can park it in any legal parking spot thats valid for the next few hours. One of the awesome things about Santa Monica (besides tons of EV chargers) is that you can park at any metered spot for free if you have the cleanpass sticker (ours are in the mail!)
If a ticket or some other damage happens during the rental, we investigate to see who was at fault. Generally after a rental we double check the car was left in a safe location. We then have a fee schedule if we determine the customer was at fault.
Re: NYC - Hmmm, interesting idea 😉
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this is awesome! If the business model proves effective, it might become a game changer!
I'd suggest using account cards to unlock/lock the cars though, saves the customer the hassle of returning the keys.
I think @DriveNowUSA does an extremely good job at this, might be worth to take a look at.
All the best for your launch, I'll keep an eye out for you ;)
@zolihonig@louis_sugar haha nice work! the music doesn't really convey the simplicity which the video is supposed to show, but it sure gets you stoked for driving a waivecar ^^
For a second I thought the cars were solar powered by looking at the picture. Then I remembered you need a lot bigger solar panels and that was just the ad.
Is there ride sharing built in? It feels like people would be more willing to give rides to other people when their own ride was free.
Have you thought about setting up a newsletter where folks in Austin, or let's say NYC ( :) ) can be notified when WaiveCar is available in their area? Or even a national survey to assess interest to inform where your next city will be?
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