Every rental kart track owner has probably asked himself this question at least once: when is it right to change the supplied rental kart fleet? The answer is not that easy and we can say that there is not a fixed rule; simply because every racetrack has its own prerogatives. But there are a few indications that every owner should know and monitor.
Thanks to this simple guide, which is the result of some international market research that took place in some indoor and outdoor rental tracks, we would like to provide you with the most important data to consider in order to change your rental kart fleet at the right time.
Basically there are 3 objective parameters to monitor and consider to understand when it is the proper time to change your fleet:
1) Payback times
With the actual financial instruments at our disposal, such as bank loans and leasings, go-karts are considered like real capital goods for the racetrack business. After the initial investment, each operator can draw up a business plan in which he estimates the hours of use that generate income for the racetrack itself and the resultant times to return this investment.
Changing your karts before they are self-paid with their work is generally not recommended. But at the same time, we must say that a racetrack with a good turnout of public, is able to cushion the initial investment within the first 15-24 months. This time becomes a bit longer when talking about full electric fleets who have a higher initial price, but which is soon largely offset by the absence of fuel costs.
When considering this financial evaluation, the value of your used go-karts fleet must also be taken into account especially for the fact that if you decide to commute them within 3 years from their purchase, they will still have a high value on the market.
So, if we can give you a piece of advice, it would be this one: first of all cushion your initial investment, then you can start evaluating all the advantages of purchasing a new fleet.
2) Extraordinary maintenance
CRG Centurion and E-drenaline rental kart fleets need very low routine maintenance, most of the time limited to washing the vehicles and changing tyres. The braking systems do not need to be checked for hundreds of hours and the safety devices, in addition to protecting the driver, also help to offer protection to all the accessories, as well as the chassis, from the possible damages caused by contacts. The engines have a programmed use without any kind of interventions that exceeds 600 hours for what concerns internal combustion engines and even more for the electric powertrains.
We can consider as extraordinary all those interventions which are needed after nearly 1000 hours of use of the go-karts and after this time, if the vehicles are cushioned and the flow of customers still constant, it is possible to evaluate the idea of changing the fleet. By doing that you would avoid a lot of important revisions of the vehicles and you should remember that even the value of the go-karts, in case of an exchange, would not be too depreciated.
Obviously if you have low quality rental karts, all these parameters are upset and the considerations on how much you can save in spare parts with a quality fleet, become a reason that speeds up every decision-making process. The advice is therefore to keep the maintenance of your vehicles under control and change them, if possible, before major overhauls are required, especially as that would involve additional costs for all spare parts and labor.
3) Marketing reasons
Some research carried out on a sample of over 100 international tracks has shown how, from a marketing point of view, it is effective to promote the arrival of a new fleet of karts at your track. The data indicate an average increase of 30% of customers in the first month of activity with new karts and about 20% for the first quarter, with positive effects on the business throughout the first year of activity. New go-karts are a good reason for customers to go to the track more frequently and take advantage of the balance of the performance that karts with the same wear level can offer for challenges with friends.
A few social promotional campaigns will be enough to make sure that the word of mouth works peoperly to get new customer to try your go-karts. What we do suggest in this case is to always monitor the income charts and customers’ feedbacks to understand when it is the right time to offer them the added value of a new go-kart fleet.
These 3 simple parameters are always meaningfully compared between customers and thanks to tools such as trade-in and leasing programs, the team of CRG consultants is able to guide the customers in a path analysis of their specific needs in order to being able to offer customized solutions.
For additional information please contact our staff: rental@kartcrg.com
