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18 October 2020Brief Encounters
Car rental firms are raising their sights and are now offering some of the world’s finest supercars to those who want to make the most of their destination
A smart young man from the car hire company is waiting as you step from your plane. He hands you some keys and gestures to your hire car waiting right alongside the runway. It’s a Lamborghini Gallardo.
This is not science fiction. It is not even an unusual service from an exclusive specialist company. In recent months supercars such as Ferrari 458 Spiders, Aston Martin Virage Volantes and McLaren MP4-12Cs have been added to the fleets of mainstream international rental companies.
The extraordinary vehicles now available through the likes of Hertz, Avis and Europcar demonstrate how the world of prestige car hire is accelerating faster than a Ferrari.
Leading the way in this exclusive business are specialist upmarket vehicle rental companies such as Europe Luxury Car Hire.
This British-run firm is enjoying an annual growth in business of around 40 per cent. After being launched by former UK estate agent Phil Tobin five years ago in Marbella, Spain, ELCH is now looking to go global. ‘We hope to expand over the next three years into the US and to South America and certainly to have more offices covering every major international airport in Europe,’ says Sophie Severa from ELCH.
Tobin’s company is now one of Europe’s largest luxury-only car rental firms, but dozens of rivals have also joined what was once a tiny niche market. The big multi-national operators have jumped on the prestige bandwagon too – supplementing their normal Fords and Fiats with Ferraris and other supercars. This all means that the most discerning travellers are now able to arrange for virtually any vehicle they want to be waiting for them at the end of a flight. For example, you could step out of a London airport and climb straight behind the wheel of a 208mph (335kph) Ferrari FF from ELCH (europeluxurycarhire.com) or a luxuriously equipped Porsche Cayenne GTS high-performance SUV from Hertz (hertzsupercars.com).
Previously, travellers knew that finding transport after a long flight to an unfamiliar airport could be tricky. Who would want to join a queue to fill out pages of paperwork, just in order to be able to drive away in a standard hire car?
Perhaps that’s why so many more select travellers chose to use a chauffeured limousine service to take them away from the airport melée. Luxury car rental began at some European airports as a more convenient and more enjoyable alternative to using chauffeurs. It soon took off.
‘High-end luxury car rentals started in Europe and the US followed suit when people saw there was a huge appetite for it.’
‘The high-end luxury car rentals started in a big way in Europe and the US followed suit when people saw there was a huge appetite for it,’ says Zoe White from Hertz. The world’s biggest general car rental company started what White calls ‘the Hertz Supercar journey’ in a small way four years ago. At first the firm offered just one sports car – the 162mph (261kph) mid-engined Lotus Evora was available at selected European airports as an exciting alternative to the every-day Citroëns, Vauxhalls, Kias that were normally available.
It was such an immediate success that the supercar fleets have grown as fast as Hertz can buy the vehicles. For example, this year the Hertz US fleet includes rare exotic vehicles such as Lamborghini Gallardos, Ferrari F430 Spiders and Mercedes SLS AMGs. And in Europe, the Hertz prestige range is even more extensive, including a long list of McLarens, Maseratis and Bentleys too.
‘We offer a meet and greet service whereby the customer is shown to the car, given the keys and shown the driver controls,’ says White. ‘We will also drop the car off at a pick-up point specified by the driver if they so wish.’
In many cases, virtually all the paperwork is done by email in advance, so you can drive away as soon as possible.
‘There is no such thing as a paperless handover, although we are able to minimise the process considerably by preparing all the paperwork before the delivery,’ says ELCH’s Severa. ‘The client has to sign for the condition of the car at the time of delivery and must sign the credit card authorisation slip at the delivery, but the credit card payments are processed beforehand and all forms are completed in advance which means that the handover is very quick.’
This premium formula is spreading across the world. From their start in one country ELCH has expanded across Europe and recently added fleets in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.
Founder Phil Tobin likes to explain how he was sent to Monte Carlo while working for a Moscow real estate company. When he left the airport building he found a pre-hired Ferrari 430 Spider waiting for him. It made such an impression Tobin decided to set up his own business providing that service for others.
‘From that moment on I was sold,’ says Tobin. ‘It started very simply, with a mobile phone and a comfy armchair,’ but progressed fast. ‘Now we’re extremely excited to have come so far in such a short space of time,’ he says.
The exclusive car hire market is less developed in the Southern Hemisphere and Far East, but is expected to spread quickly. One of the forces driving the expansion is the huge profit possible for operators. They can quickly recoup the cost of any vehicle, however exclusive, because of comparatively high day rates. To some extent this is a business driven by standards of service, not by price.
This year the Hertz US fleet includes rare exotic vehicles such as Lamborghini Gallardos, Ferrari F430 Spiders and Mercedes SLS AMGs
The UK has a wide variety of agencies offering exotic vehicles for hire. At one end of the spectrum are the multi-nationals, such as Avis, that operates a UK-based prestige hire fleet (avisprestige.com) that includes the supercharged Jaguar XFR, Mercedes S-Class luxury long-wheelbase saloon and the latest go-anywhere Range Rover Sport.
At the other end of the scale are smaller regional operators, such as City Supercars (citysupercars.co.uk), based in the rather genteel south coast seaside resort of Bournemouth, which nevertheless can hire you a Maserati Gran Turismo for £300 a day or a Bentley Continental for £475 a day from its fleet of supercars.
‘The thirst for the luxury product and service to the level we provide has shown no signs of dipping during the recession,’ says ELCH’s Severa. ‘We foresee the desire for driving some of the world’s most fabulous cars as going from strength to strength.’
Of course, these types of vehicles don’t just appeal to high-worth customers who are taking business trips or visiting their overseas homes.
Prestige car rentals are also attracting one-off special-occasion renters – perhaps a wedding, party, anniversary or honeymoon. Some rent an exclusive vehicle just to be able to boast that they have driven a Ferrari or Lamborghini.
This is demonstrated by the naming of the newly launched Hertz prestige car service in the USA. It is clearly not aimed at business executives and affluent travellers who drive similar cars at home, it is targeting those who want to fulfil a motoring fantasy. The Hertz prestige car service is called ‘Dream Cars’.
Words: Staff
