CNN Reports: https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/11/business/hertz-tesla-selling/index.html
Hertz, which has made a big push into electric vehicles in recent years, has decided it's time to cut back. The company will sell off a third of its electric fleet, totaling roughly 20,000 vehicles, and use the money they bring to purchase more gasoline powered vehicles.
Electric vehicles have been hurting Hertz's financials, executives have said, because, despite costing less to maintain, they have higher damage-repair costs and, also, higher depreciation.
"[C]ollision and damage repairs on an EV can often run about twice that associated with a comparable combustion engine vehicle," Hertz CEO Stephen Scherr said in a recent analyst call.
And EV price declines in the new car market have pushed down the resale value of Hertz's used EV rental cars.
[...] For rental car companies like Hertz, which sell lots of vehicles in the used car market, depreciation has a big impact on their business, and is a major factor when deciding which cars to have in their fleets.
SoylentNews previously reported when Hertz was expanding their EV fleet.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday January 31 2024, @08:57PM
Ah I see like legacy media, processed foods, fast food, and frankly everything else, a very small number of companies own almost all the brands. I was under the illusion car rental was a relatively competitive market, but its more of the usual...
I am kind of surprised the markets for "travel" and "moving" haven't merged as they are in the same line of work, more or less. uhaul should be able to rent me a civic and enterprise should be able to rent me a giant moving truck but AFAIK they don't interoperate.
I have always owned "fast" little commuter cars and two seaters and similar and about once a year I rent the Home Depot truck to haul home a couple thousand pounds of nonsense and at least once a decade I rent a giant moving truck to move a minicomputer or metal lathe or some similar item. I don't even do it often enough to justify owning and registering a mere trailer much less owning a giant truck.
I prefer to think of it as metric percent...