This week I came across an interesting article questioning if new startups in the carpooling and ridesharing space would convince Americans to carpool. The article compared the European carpooling market for long to mid-distance carpooling with the American market and came to the conclusion that for Americans sharing their car was still an afterthought—mainly because of cheap car prices and convenience. The argument was made though, that carhailing technologies like Uber and Lyft have acclimated users to the idea of sharing rides with paid drivers and that this might have an effect on carpooling. Lyft for example, has made carpooling the default function in its San Francisco based fleet. The article also pointed out that each technology had to come at the right time and that early carpooling technologies like Zimride would have been successful had they been launched today (the founders of Zimride later launched Lyft).
Interestingly, the article never looked at other market segments like carpooling for kids. When evaluating Americans’ openness to set up carpools for children the stats could look quite different. According to our own market research, 90% of parents already carpool—getting to and from birthday parties being the number one reason and sport events the second most common reason. Considering the fact that 30% of all traffic is generated by parents driving their kids to school, it seems logical that new generations of parents—precisely those already using Uber, Lyft and public transportation apps—will be looking for new solutions that help them share children’s transportation needs. “After all, shared mobility and transit create a robust network of choices that can help reduce household transportation costs, lessen congestion and greenhouse gas emissions, and make it possible to live well without owning a car,” said Sharon Feigon, the executive director of SUMC, a national public-interest organization working to foster collaboration in shared transportation. Ms. Feigon was commenting on the a recent multi-city study which confirmed that the more people used shared modes of transportation the more likely they are to use public transit, own fewer cars, and spend less on transportation overall.
The new carpooling technologies are making progress in the adult carpooling space. Among them are Scoop, a year-old San Francisco company that’s struck partnerships with big Bay Area employers who don’t have great public transit access, and Hovee a San Francisco based technology which matches carpools with commuters who are connected through social media. We are excited to see these new companies target the commuting carpooling space but are convinced that parents will lead the way in making carpooling even more popular using new apps and technologies to connect. Parents are carpooling already today and technologies like GoKid will make the setup much easier. The less parents have to drive, the more time they have for their kids, family life, and yes, work too.
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