You're driving down the steep California road enjoying the sunset in your newly purchased red sports car. Everything is perfect: The weather is just right, the radio is playing your favorite songs and the engine in your new car sounds perfect. Suddenly, the car breaks down and you come to halting stop. You realize that your car's transmission isn't operating properly even though you overpaid for the vehicle and worst of all: You're stuck in the middle of a road with no sight of civilization for miles.
Fortunately there are plenty of cool companies working to improve the automotive industry for consumers. Here are the top three hottest automotive companies of 2015 that are trying to improve your driving experience:
1. Getaround
Founders: Sam Zaid, Jessica Scorpio, Elliot Kroo
HQ: San Francisco, California
About:
Getaround is a community marketplace for underutilized personal vehicles. Rent by the hour, day, or week. Complete insurance is included. Our patent-pending Getaround Carkit, iPhone app, and web app enable consumers to carshare anywhere.
Review:
Commonly referred to as the Airbnb for Cars, Getaround is the ultimate peer to peer marketplace for short-term car rentals. From the Tesla Model S to a Honda sedan, Getaround has thousands cars available for rent. Some key reasons why Getaround beats its competitors include the wide variety of cars available for rent, the convenience of signing up and the most amazing part: each rental comes with insurance and 24/7 roadside assistance. Talk about getting the bang for your buck!
As a car lender, Getaround puts your idle car to work by claiming that "active owners" can earn $10,000 per year per car. Lenders have the flexibility to choose when to share their car and are covered by $1,000,000 primary insurance with each potential driver being screened to ensure a safe driving record.
Perhaps the coolest thing I love about Getaround is how users get access to the cars: There's no physical key involved and lenders do not even have to interact with users to borrow the car. Getaround allows users to rent and unlock cars from their intuitive mobile app. Getaround is available for Android and iOS -- visit their website to start borrowing cars or lending your own vehicle instantly.
2. BuyAutoParts
Leadership: Dara Greaney, Matt Glauber, Chris Struempler
HQ: San Diego, California
About:
Buy Auto Parts has the top resources in the automotive industry. We can provide you with information and automotive parts that even your dealership cannot. Furthermore, we offer to price match all of our competitors' prices, free shipping on all orders over $50, and extended warranty options to ensure that all our customers are completely satisfied with us.
Review:
As a long time follower of BuyAutoParts, they've certainly stayed true to their mission statement to "make it easy to buy auto parts." Not only is buying any automotive part incredibly effortless on the website but BuyAutoParts also offers a cheapest price guarantee -- a testament to their belief in excellent customer service.
Another part of their website that stood out was their "Live Chat" feature. It is refreshing to see a company that uses modern tactics of customer service with live chat agents while operating in a relatively "traditional" industry of automotive parts. Especially in today's ever-changing business landscape, the companies that can quickly adopt new technologies and techniques will survive -- BuyAutoParts is the quintessential example of this.
From AC Compressors to Turbochargers and Fuel Injectors, BestAutoParts has all the auto parts you need; not to mention, their customer service is impeccable.
3. Unhaggle
Founders: Andrew Tai, Neal Shah, Radek Garbowski
HQ: Toronto, Canada
About:
At Unhaggle, we want to be: The Smartest Way to Buy a Car. This is our mission and our motto. Our company was founded in 2011 out of the personally frustrating inefficiencies of the traditional car buying process. Since then, we continue to refine our offering so that our customers are left with a positively unforgettable experience.
Review:
Buying a car is a hassle -- the hostile negotiations with sleazy salesmen, the constant commute from dealership to dealership and the fear of getting ripped off by hidden fees. The Toronto based startup "Unhaggle" is looking to solve all this with its online car purchasing platform.
Here's how Unhaggle's online platform works: you customize your dream car (Model, Colour, Interior, Extra Features), then you receive an average price and dealer cost report, finally you pay a $99 fee to get local dealers to compete to give you lowest price.
Instead of spending hours haggling at car dealerships, Unhaggle has dealers submit their lowest bids in a reverse auction for a guaranteed best price! With over 500,000 users and over $175,000,000 saved on new cars, Unhaggle is a no-brainer for any new car purchaser.
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