Faced with soaring fuel prices, motorists are getting organized.
The search for the cheapest service stations is intensifying and carpooling is emerging as a good solution to lower the cost of travel.
Over the last four weeks, BlaBlaCar has recorded 40,000 new registrants per week in France, many of them drivers.
"It continues to increase, we find the record levels of strikes at the end of 2019", welcomes Nicolas Brusson, general manager of BlaBlaCar.
After the strong slowdown in spring linked to containment, the restart was fairly rapid this summer, with a downside: not enough drivers to meet demand.
“Since September, we have had a majority of motorists offering seats and this is completely correlated with the increase in fuel prices,” underlines Nicolas Brusson.
A trip of 300 km brings in 45 to 50 euros
On average, a trip of 300 km with three passengers brings in 45 to 50 euros for the driver, which allows him to cover the costs of his trip.
"The All Saints' Day holidays
(from October 23 to November 8)
will reinforce the phenomenon", anticipates the CEO, who specifies that "the more the offer of journeys is rich the more it attracts the demand".
BlaBlaCar Daily, which manages daily trips ranging from 20 to 40 km, also sees its attendance soar.
“We went from 1000 to 5000 registered in less than eight weeks.
We will soon return to the level of 10,000 registrants that we had reached at the end of 2019, notes Nicolas Brusson.
These drivers, who often do not have a very high salary, have no choice but to use their cars and are taking the full brunt of rising fuel prices.
On average, people make 10 to 12 trips per month by carpooling, alternating as driver and passenger.
A subsidy of 500 euros per employee with the sustainable mobility package
The mobility professional expects a lot from the sustainable mobility package, resulting from the Lom law and whose implementing decree is in the process of being published. “It will allow companies to subsidize carpooling up to 500 euros per employee. Some companies did not wait to put it in place and we are working with them to facilitate the implementation, details the general manager of BlaBlaCar. It is a real shame that we do not accelerate on this tool which corresponds to the needs. The increase in fuel may be part of a lasting trend. We need long-lasting tools to respond to them. "
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France is not alone in facing this fuel crisis.
"Many countries, in Brazil or Spain for example, motorists face the same difficulties and there are 350,000 to 400,000 new registrations per week worldwide", notes the general manager of BlaBlaCar who has just passed the bar. of the 100 million users worldwide, more than half of whom are outside Europe.
