Chris Brown

Jan 7, 2025 | autorentalnews.com | Chris Brown

The car rental industry has finally exited the roller coaster of the post-pandemic years. That's a welcome development, as vehicle supply is no longer an issue, and fewer irate customers are waiting in the lobby for cars. Travel demand is relatively strong: According to U.S. Travel’s forecasting, leisure trips have already surpassed 2019, the pre-pandemic marker year, and will continue to increase over the next three years.

Aug 24, 2024 | autorentalnews.com | Chris Brown

While car rental companies are enjoying unexpectedly high used car values, rental fleet allocation remains tight and new car prices are high. This has forced rental operators to plan fleet more conservatively and buy opportunistically, with local car dealers increasingly holding the cards. Wholesale High Flying In the first half of this year, the big story was the used car market and how it had not backed down from historic highs brought on by the disasters in Japan in March 2011.

Aug 24, 2024 | autorentalnews.com | Chris Brown

Could the trumpets be any louder? The domestic automakers have declared very publicly that decreasing incentives, low-margin sales to rental fleets and vehicle repurchase programs will help return them to profitability. For the auto rental industry, this means no more government cheese. What are the car rental "Big Five"—Hertz, Avis Budget, Dollar Thrifty, Vanguard and Enterprise—doing about it? And how will their actions affect the independent car rental operator?

Aug 24, 2024 | autorentalnews.com | Chris Brown

The car rental industry was birthed and nurtured by entrepreneurs. To be sure, the industry went through ebbs and flows of ownership by auto manufacturers, financial holding companies and multinational corporations for which car rental was a convenient investment. And today, the majority of the industry has settled into a corporate structure befitting of a $24 billion business in 2013. It wasn’t always like that.

Aug 24, 2024 | autorentalnews.com | Chris Brown

Your personal driving style can negatively affect your fuel economy — by up to 33%, according to government estimates. You probably knew that but didn’t pay much attention, because it’s not related to your driving. But today, technology allows us to measure everything. And if you can measure it, you can improve it.