Roof box hire.

[WHARTY]

Hi everyone. Just come back off holiday and borrowed a roof box off my father in law.

I was considering buying one but it didn't seem a good deal considering I would only use it once a year and my father in law wants me to keep it at my house to save space as they are so big.

This got me thinking about buying 4 or 5 and seeing if I can hire them out.

It seems a lot of people are doing it ( not in my area) and there is a market for it.

Have any of you been in this business before or have you hired one?

I would like to hear your thoughts good or bad.

Also noticed there seems to be s market for bike rack hire too!

Thanks, Lee.

 

[beasty]

Call your business Rack n Roll
Its a good idea IMO, i think logistics would be tough, i can think of a very quick and easy way to get big coverage.
The name is free

 

[WHARTY]

Thanks @beasty. Love the name! I was thinking people would come to me for the fitting or I charge to fit at a location that suits the customer? What's your idea for big coverage?

Thanks.

 

[PipeTen-Carl]

If you created a website/service where you are just providing the legal/contact framework (deposit or insurance or liability schemes) to put box owners in touch with possible renters, I can see possible traction. It otherwise sounds like a PITA/lifestyle business to me...

 

[Alan]

I agree that it probably is a PITA business.

Hire rate seems to be around £4 / day £28 / week.

I think it only really has 'legs' if you use it as a way to gain traction for selling them ( and other motoring accessories )

 

[WHARTY]

I only work 3 days a week at the moment so it's fine as a lifestyle business. Just a bit of extra income for a few hours of my time.

I gather it only takes 20 minutes to install and a little less to take off so not too bad if the customer comes to me.

 

[MikeJ]

The rack could be a problem. Mine has a moulded foot to match the contours of the car roof, but I think you can switch the feet on the rack. So you'd need a wide range of feet to suit the different cars.

I use mine a few times per year (last weekend and this weekend, by chance, but that's the first time this year I think) and have room to store it. But the idea is sound. You'd need to watch damage to the car's roof during fitting.

 

[MikeJ]

A look here...

http://www.roofbox.co.uk/roof-bars/

shows you the different types of mounting systems you need to cope with. I think once you've got that sorted, the boxes are pretty straightforward.

 

[beasty]

I would like to add, in Australia I would call this business Rack Off

 

[MikeJ]

When the bars go on my roof, I always step back and say "Nice Rack!"

 

[Karimbo]

Thanks @beasty. Love the name! I was thinking people would come to me for the fitting or I charge to fit at a location that suits the customer? What's your idea for big coverage?

Thanks.

You're serving customers who have cars, don't forget that, they can come to you! Offering mobile service is a bad deal for you. You will have to go to each customer and fit tthe product for them, which comes with problems.

I got my car windscreen replaced by a mobile repairer. Due to the nature of the work the repairer has to come to me. He told me how bad the job had become in London in the last few years. 5 years ago he could do 5 or 6 jobs per day. Now he can only do 3 jobs, 4 if he's lucky. It's down to traffic he can't get around London and keep a sensible out of work life. To do 5 jobs in a day he'll need to be doing 12 hr days.

Plus when he does turn up client is in the bath or gone off to the shops or something. It's a pita and suck your time.

To scale a business like this you need to have the customer come to you.

 

[LongStory]

If you go for Thule then they will fit most racks and cars. It's the foot packs you need to have loads of.

 

[Alan]

I do think that if they come to you then you also have a opportunity to earn more than just the hire fee.

So they are probably going on holiday. Are they Euro Legal, i.e. First Aid Kit, Warning Triangle, Spare Bulb Kit, Fire Extinguisher, French Breathalyser, beam deflectors, reflective jackets, even Snow Chains (hire or sell). The ports make a fortune out of motorists about to embark and realising they are not prepared.

You don't need to hold a lot of stock, but if you sell £50 of accessories making £25 gross profit on a weeks hire of £27 that is a massive extra for you.

The selling is easy, when you are fitting, you just chat about their trip find out they are going overseas and give them that prepared leaflet you made 'driving abroad - what you need to know on one side, and the products you have on the other.

 

[Dan Izzard]

Nice add ons from @llocally there. Maybe add in satnav ready for foreign companies, maybe even approved breakdown cover in European companies, DVD entertainment systems for the kids etc etc.

In terms of why people would need the extra space I think there's probably a few lines that you could pursue. You always see cars absolutely crammed to the roof with the occupants unable to move, kids cocooned in layers of bedding, bodyboards and wetsuits stuffed up against windows! It can't be safe!

I'd imagined that your marketing materials would take the form of a cartoon similar to in-flight safety cards, but maybe I'm thinking too much into this!

 

[beasty]

Ideally you would put the kids in the roof box and keep the bedding in the car
Would that be IN THE BOX thinking?

 

[WHARTY]

Thanks for all the replies so far, some really good stuff here. The box and rack seems fine it's the foot packs to fit each car that I think will cost a bit.

From what I have researched it's family's with dogs that are the big users, so maybe I could sell doggy stuff too!

Seems like a good lifestyle business to me. Buy 5 boxes and see how it goes I think.

Maybe get a small website and get myself on the local selling pages and I reckon I could rent them out.

Seems ski racks, bike boxes and snow chains are rented too.

 

[MikeJ]

We've got ours because the dogs fill up the boot. However the dogs are in the boot a lot, so I'd not be impulse buying other dog stuff when looking at a roof box.

Our bars are lockable, so you could decide whether to hand over the keys or not. When we visit the inlaws, I take the box off but leave the bars on while we're there.

 

[GraemeL]

My concern would be the financials as it would be very seasonal (say 12 weeks a year?). Suspect it would need several years hire from each box to recover capital outlay. If this was viable I think Halfords would have already done it.

 

[MikeJ]

I'd agree if this was a straight rental vs purchase decision. However the reason people don't want to buy these is they take up so much room for the other 50 weeks per year. You could recoup the outlay over 5 rentals.

One thing we're going to use is those "vacuum bags" that you use a hoover to suck the air out of. The bulky stuff like dog blankets will be much easier to move in one of those. That would be an easy sell.

 

[MikeJ]

Oh, and also consider a storage/rental option. Store people's boxes and racks, rent them out to others on their behalf and take a cut for the storage fee. Less capital outlay for you.

 

[beasty]

You are never going to take something that belongs to someone and rent it out to Joe Public, they will damage every box left with you and you will have to compensate the owners.

P.S i

LOVE your signature, the number of people who write, I am after some advise drives me crazy too!

 

[WHARTY]

I agree @beasty. What about those go pro cameras, maybe I could rent them too? Maybe I could target the same crowd who would rent ski racks and snow chains?

Some great ideas here @llocally @Dan Izzard @PipeTen-Carl @MikeJ thanks,

 

[beasty]

Safety packs based on where they are going

Warning triangle, Hi Viz jackets, France
Snow chains

Did you know over 80% of people do not know the emergency numbers in europe!
Stick that info in there too!

I would ask AA, RAC etc if they want to slap an advert on there and pay a rate per days hire, also sell their euro breakdown as a broker, there is a bunch of stuff you can do, there are business opportunities everywhere