Mobility services, the future of dealerships?

The world is changing, and it increasingly values consuming mobility over owning a vehicle.

A report published by PWC in 2018, even before the digitalizing effect of the pandemic, stated that by 2030 more than a third of kilometers would be traveled via carsharing in the EU, 34% in the US, and up to almost 50% in China.

Studies show that there are many people who, of course, value having their own vehicle.

But a high percentage of those users would place more value on having a vehicle capable of adapting to the needs they have over time. And in the technology era, that may better cover customer needs than always having the same car, van, or motorcycle.

In fact, the international consultancy Frost & Sullivan also recently stated that in less than 4 years, 10% of vehicles in Europe will be sold on a subscription basis. This means around 100,000 units for the Spanish market.

They are still not many, but there are already dealerships offering subscription cars

Today, the current market share of shared or subscription cars does not reach 5% nationally. However, we already see players investing in offering mobility by incorporating technology into their businesses.

For Raúl Palacios, president of GAMVAN, there must be a clear winner within this emerging market: the dealerships, who "will go from selling iron -referring to cars and parts- to selling services, with data management as our main asset."

Every day, our customers will ask us for vehicles that can meet the wide variety of needs they have throughout the year. When the reality is that dealerships have the widest range of vehicles and better customer knowledge than the competition, today rental companies or banks.

In fact, the team at Bequikly, a bet by Madrid-based Dealerbest on mobility led by dealerships, conducted a study with the dealerships it was already collaborating with in February 2021.

The conclusions of this analysis identified 5definitive reasons why dealerships rushed to offer their customers shared and flexible mobility options as soon as possible. Among them, the possibility of connecting in another way with all their goodwill.

The trend is clear and dealerships must understand it that way

Subscription mobility or carsharing are a reality that all of us in the automotive industry are embracing through investments in technology.

Logically, there is still much ground to discover. However, from groups to associations, they encourage and financially incentivize points of sale to take advantage of their competitive edge as soon as possible in a growing market.