Bencredible

EV cars could change where you get your fuel

The title of this article is a bit 'duh', but with all-electric cars starting to catch on it is possible you'll be fueling up your car in new and innovative locations. Right now to fuel your gasoline powered car you must drive to a special station that has the equipment required to make this happen. The fuel itself is toxic and highly explosive so special precautions have to be made. This fuel is shipped in large semi-trucks to each facility and frankly you wouldn't want this outside your retail store.

But when it comes to pure electricity, well, most if not all retail stores already have that. Think about this for a moment. In front of each parking spot is an EV charging station, simply pulling power from the already wired building. Each station is able to take a credit card or rewards card of sorts. When you go in to shop simply plug your car in to top it off. Are you a reward program member? You get a discount on your "fuel" and if you spend over $100.00 in the store today you get your charge for free! Insert fuel promotion pricing here, it can be whatever.

Charger

The consumer gets a fueled car for however long they have it plugged in. The retailer gets an additional product they can sell and it certainly adds consumer loyalty if they start giving it away. Rather than having to tap in to a huge network of highly volatile fluids, this solution taps in to the existing energy network and doesn't cost that much to run. Now you can top off your vehicle anywhere you shop, or at least any shop owner who has the vision to do something like this.

You can even take it one step further. Add a screen on to each charging station and sell ad space. Or sponsor top-offs. Make charging your car an incentive to shop at your store as well as a way to generate some additional revenue in new and unique places.

Want to promote your company as truly green? Find a way to charge the vehicles off the grid so you're not using coal energy. Maybe a wind turbine or fuel cell of sorts. Help the planet by using all-electric cars and all green power. I have a feeling that particular marketing campaign would go pretty darned far!

Archive for

January 2011

11
To Posterous, Love Metalab