In 90's the mode of travel for a common man is train or bus forlong-distance; flights are only for rich few and government servants. Aftergetting down at the destination, a bus or auto-rickshaw is a common last mileconnectivity option. For those going on pilgrimage or for people touring otherplaces for pleasure (rare though), the options for comfortable travel were lessand a few were expensive. Travel in the new millennium has become so commonthat even going abroad is not a big deal anymore. In the entire travelexperience, leaving aside the mass transport like flights, train or bus, rentalcar has become the most important aspect. With airports becoming large and international, they are inevitablytransferred to the outskirts. Transferring self from residence to the airportis itself a challenge.
With travel to nearby places out of interest and passion becomingcommonplace, week-end getaways turned into routine. Most of the times, a rentedcar is preferred over the personal for convenience and comfort.
Going around in the city for shopping, sight-seeing or even tosocial meetings is not uncommon these days. Given the chaos and madness oftraffic in Indian cities, a chauffer driven car is considered a better option,if possible.
Thousands of 'Tours & Travels', who operated rental cabs locallyhave done so to win the loyalty of the local customers and get repeat business.Talk to anyone who travelled by a rental cabs, the chances of hearing abouttheir awful experiences is highly probable. International players like Hertzand Avis have entered India pretty early but were catering mainly tocorporates. Local city taxi services were preferred by public but there was nocross-country brand with reputation that has won the hearts of people. EasyCabsand Meru partnered with Airports in offering better services, but there areenough unhappy customers. If one looks for local travel agencies and privatecar operators there are thousands of them all over the country.
There are umpteen business models existing within this car rentalbusiness and the cab driver is yet to see many incentives apart from a 'job' inthis service. Just like in any other industry, they are the important cogs inthe wheel and their significance can only be realized when the wheel stops.This industry is quite fragmented and in spite of presence of numerouse-commerce companies in this space, there is no brand which has anacross-the-country image yet.
With this background, there are a few companies which are setting-upoperations across the country. They seem to build a nation-wide brand withreputation. Two such companies are OlaCabs and Savaari. One can go to theirsites, search for a required car rental package and make online payment for theservice. While OlaCabs is operating primarily in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore,Savaari service seems to be available for 10s of cities in India.
Interestingly, 'cheap', 'low-cost', 'driver' are not the wordspresent in these e-commerce sites, rather they seem to use the words 'chauffer'and 'quality'. Hopefully, the 'chauffeur' does not get a raw deal while thebranded company makes its millions !
Can people expect a clean car, timely service and a no-nonsensechauffeur from these companies?
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