Starting a Car Park
Parking a vehicle can be quite laborious and finding space in downtown areas can become tedious and a significant waste of time. Not to mention that certain areas are paid for. That’s why setting up a car park is a bottom-up solution for those who need to get around in a car and keep it parked, and for you, of course, who are looking for a profitable business.
The most profitable service businesses can be started here
So how do you do it? Let’s look at the next steps:
Developing a business plan
The first thing you have to do is a Business Plan, through which you will study or quote the initial investment and monthly expenses that your business will have. The first thing will depend on whether you are going to build from scratch, on an empty lot, or if you are going to buy a parking lot that is already in operation and carry it out in a new way. Monthly expenses should be taken into account by calculating taxes and expenses for electricity, water, personnel, office supplies and other necessary items.
Marketing plan implementation
Once this has been done, it is time to draw up a marketing plan that will allow you to determine how you will approach customers, and in this way determine what your target audience will be, what arguments and sales strategies you will use and what the advantages of your car park are over those of your competitors and why they should choose you.
It is important that you know the competition, so go out and investigate what they offer, what their promotions, discounts, services and everything related to what gives you strengths over other parking lots. This research will allow you to recognize and identify strengths and weaknesses you have to improve and maintain, is vital information for your growth and process in the market.
Requirements for Setting up a Car Parking
Process the Legal Permits so that your parking lot works with all the laws. Go to the state offices where you are located, fill out the forms and make the arrangements so that the formal aspect is resolved as soon as possible. Remember that the costs and processes for this type of business will depend on the regulations of the regulatory agencies and the market sector in which you are located.
On the other hand, it is necessary that you draw up a contract, disclaiming responsibility for any object that is stolen from inside the car that rents your services or the car itself, as well as for any possible damage to it. Consult an attorney to know if you should make the clients sign it or if it is enough to simply specify it with signs placed all over the car park to avoid the appearance of incidents in which you are arbitrarily blamed.
Getting the right staff
Hire staff according to the tasks you need to take care of and cover. Basically you will have to register and control the vehicles that enter and take care of them while they are parked so that another car does not accidentally scratch them, as well as take care that no one outside the Car Park or that is not one of your clients enters the place, in order to avoid theft and other circumstances that affect both the client and you as a business.
Business Modalities
A car park has four main modalities that, in turn, are subdivided according to the infrastructure and that you can offer as particular or general services:
Daytime: It is only open during office hours.
24 Hours: It works all day, 365 days a year. In this case, you need a security guard and at least one employee to attend to customers at night or according to how the schedules are arranged to be open all the time.
Per Hours: The customer can hire an hour, more or even less, depending on the time needed for the car parking service.
Monthly: The client is rented a place on a monthly basis, so he would be using the Car Park as a garage based on the schedules that suit you and the availability of space.
The other subdivision has to do with whether it is closed by a gate or open, as well as whether it is covered or not.
Advantages of Car Parking
The accelerated growth of the cities and the increase in vehicle traffic has given rise to this business opportunity that represents an advantage for the investor because the profits are high, with a low cost structure.
Although many of these parking lots are managed in a somewhat informal manner, currently, for many countries, conditions are different because parking lots require logistics, efficient management and even technology implementation.
One of the advantages of this business is that if you have your own land, the costs can be much lower and you can open an autonomous business in which the profits and decisions are all taken by the investor.
Another advantage is that you can include other services within the basic parking, charging for parking spaces or beaches, you can also add advertising space rental inside the same, valet parking, car wash service, parking by night, parking by month, among others.
Always remembering that the success of the parking business consists of implementing technology to automate, manage and control spaces safely, avoiding having to hire and be guided by the criteria of a manager
Success stories of a car park
A successful business in this sector is the intelligent parking service SMASSA, Sociedad Municipal de Aparcamientos which was set up to solve the parking problems that exist in the city of Malaga. This public company has managed to make use of databases through its analysis, to increase its operational and business efficiency in all lines of action. Aligning itself with the city’s transformation process.
Another successful company is Parclick, the Spanish car park start-up, which specializes in being an Internet facilitator comparable to the usual ones for car rentals and hotel reservations.
The company sells multi-day parking passes in public car parks located at strategic points in city centres, airports, train and bus stations, among others.
The originality of its strategies lies in having approached the digital era in a world as traditional as that of car parks, through technological development applicable throughout the world.
Creating a new market and area of mobility, through its online platform, in which, the user has, through any mobile device, information about the car parks offered for medium and long term stays, as well as services, available passes, reserving the place at a very reasonable cost, even 70 percent below the rate.
Difficulties that may arise: One of the most frequent problems that a significant number of car park owners present is incidents of theft of both internal implements and the car itself, pretending to be other people to take the vehicle later. This makes the mistrust by customers grow in a business that does not have at least one type of security devices to have a guarantee.
Final recommendation: If we focus on the previous point, the best thing to do is to install security devices that allow for the reinforcement of security inside the parking lot, in addition to creating new mechanisms and systems for the identification of the owner or the person who leaves the vehicle, in this way preventing another person from picking up or leaving something in the parked car. These are excellent alternatives for the customer to have more security and confidence when leaving their vehicle.