Clean is the New Safe
Clean is the new safe
There was an interesting article recently in Fast Company written by a futurist who sees this pandemic as a very real turning point for transportation in the future. The article goes on to describe all the great lengths transportation businesses will need to take to make their business models work. Of particular interest to me was the part about ride-hail companies. Think about it for a minute. The hail-model of transportation–from a germ standpoint–is fraught with peril. They move random people who come in and out of the vehicles with no duty of care, no insurance of sanitizing protocols, no quality control. Now, think about the chauffeured transportation industry. We have ALWAYS had vehicle cleaning protocols between runs. It’s not a big deal to add a few new kinds of procedures to what we are already set up to do. The article mentions new technologies such as touchless doors but just how in the world is Uber or Lyft going to be able to deliver that product consistently? On the other hand, our chauffeurs handle the doors so for our part this is easy to ensure.
My final takeaway from reading this article (and others similar to this) is that we have a golden opportunity to reclaim the lost “mid-tier” market of business that went to Uber and Lyft simply for being who we’ve always been—high end services. CLEAN is the NEW SAFE. Coming out of this mothball, more consumers will be frightened by interactions with strangers. We have the upper hand here. Our chauffeurs are not random drivers. Our clients know where to find us. We can easily prove our cleaning protocols. Let’s imagine that somehow, we limp through this terrible time only to find what is waiting for us is a new world of consumer consciousness that opens doors for us. Envision you are talking to travelers who do not feel safe (yet) to fly but are willing to travel by vehicle to get from place to place and they (or their employer) chooses YOU over a ride-hail company because you can prove your service is clean therefore, safe. Clean saves lives. This is our new reality and our industry is better poised to sell “cleanliness” than any other transportation vertical in the world.
In the meantime, Silicon Valley is already fast at work for new technologies for the ride-hail industry to include in-vehicle cameras that see in advance who else is in the vehicle pool, including thermal cameras that detect if other passengers have fevers or other indications of disease. Talk abut Big Brother! If our clients are uncomfortable with the drive cams mounted on our windshields, just think how they’d feel getting into a car loaded with virus sensors and backseat cameras? I argue that the tech world’s utopia is our client’s dystopia.
As the markets begin to re-open (the governor of Georgia is opening up the state this weekend), we must start to really imagine the opportunities before us. On this note, we will be offering free webinars, beginning in May. Our first one will be a training video on vehicle sanitation procedures. More on that next week. I love the emails from everyone. Please keep ‘em coming!
Sara Eastwood-Richardson
