Car-sharing to get away from the pandemic, according to Turo users
Have you started going for short drives to nowhere in particular, just for a change in scenery? If so, you're not alone. According to new survey data from Turo, the peer-to-peer car-sharing platform, 39 percent of its users turned to the automobile just to get out of the house during the COVID-19 lockdown.
The coronavirus pandemic has been blamed for the perilous position in which traditional rental-car companies like Hertz have found themselves. But surprisingly for Turo, things haven't been quite so bad. Or at least, they weren't bad for very long.
"Before the pandemic hit, the company-in terms of bookings-was growing by about 50 percent year over year," said Steve Webb, Turo's VP of communications. By mid-March, as shelter-in-place orders were issued, things started to drop off to the point that, by early April, the business was looking at a 75-percent decline in year-on-year growth. But within a couple of weeks, that trend started to reverse. "As of last week, we are growing again YoY for the first time since 3/18. In March, we did not think the business would rebound this quickly," Webb told Ars.
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