Ride sharing services like Uber and Lyft has revolutionized the transportation industry and there is a lot of money to be made for participating drivers. But a ride sharing company can only succeed if they have plenty of drivers. There is a crunch in the market for drivers because a large number of them are ineligible. Various reasons are holding back many from earning a quick livelihood, such as having an incompatible car as per Uber rules or simply not being able to afford a car.
HyreCar is a transparent and legitimate marketplace that allows car owners to put up their cars for rent to those who want to become Uber drivers.
About the Founders
There are five founding members of HyreCar – Anshu Bansal, Abhishek Arora, Nate Farber, Josiah Larkin and James Ruhle.
Abhishek and Anshu have known each other for more than eight years as friends and co-workers. Nate, a former Uber employee, has extensive experience in the industry including intimate knowledge of Uber and their policies as well as personal relationships with fleet owners and drivers. Joe is a black car service owner and was a Lyft consultant who beta tested their San Francisco model and has been involved in the on-demand industry for years. James is the Head of Marketing and Spokesperson for HyreCar.
About the Startup
Drivers fuel the ride sharing industry. A ride sharing company can only succeed if they have plenty of drivers. Every month their is a new article about how Uber, Lyft, and SideCar are struggling to get drivers. “We want to make sure that driving for Uber or Lyft is easy. We want to simplify the process of driving for the premium black car, or SUV service. All of this can be done with HyreCar in our free marketplace. We want to help those ineligible drivers”, says James.
Signing up as an Uber driver, Anshu could not use his 2 door car as it was ineligible as per Uber rules. The high demand for drivers is because it is not common knowledge to use rented cars from licensed dealers. HyreCar faces competition from these “mom and pop” car lenders but their unique online marketplace model can propel an influx of drivers in the ridesharing scene much faster. Says James, “We are getting the first mover’s advantage since we have formalized the process of getting a car in a transparent way.”
The biggest hurdle the team faced was to convince old school fleet owners who are not comfortable with technology, to post their cars on HyreCar. But James is confident this is just initial jitters and with proper marketing, the service will eventually gather momentum.
About their Plans
HyreCar is not only targeting students and low income groups but also current Uber drivers who are having car issues or those who don’t want to put miles/maintenance on their own cars. The service is free for drivers but they charge lenders a small percentage of the rent they charge.
The company is planning to expand to New York as soon as possible. “We plan on being in the top 10 biggest cities in the U.S by the end of 2015”, is how James describes the company’s ambitions.
Head over to their website and become part of this on-demand economy by driving someone else’s car!
