By Ed Pierce, Contributing Editor

Despite the disruption in business caused by last year’s pandemic, the fundamentals of the UK fleet industry, like the US, remain strong, says Martin Brown, Managing Director of Fleet Alliance headquartered in Glasgow, Scotland.

As in the US, highlights include the rapid growth in EV registrations; advances in telematics and its integration with 5G and artificial intelligence (AI). The UK’s long-standing commitment to environmental concerns is helping to shape fleet decisions, too.

Founded in 2002, Glasgow-based Fleet Alliance Ltd. manages just over 30,000 vehicles with a combined asset value of about £1 billion. In line with the industry’s strength, Martin is pleased to report that Fleet Alliance is heading for a potential record year.

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By Steve Bender, CEO, Fleet Street Remarketing

The last year has been hard for fleets, that’s for sure.

And for allied service providers like Fleet Street, equally as challenging as well. From dealing with a virus that has threatened people’s well-being, to embracing a new world of protocols that changed the way we do business, let’s all hope the worst days of the pandemic are behind us.

Perhaps worse than anything, the pandemic has caused all of us to lose that critical “human connection” that all of us crave, and that was so vital to our wonderfully vibrant industry.

For fleet, the changes have been stark, and real. From working tirelessly to ensure top service to going without seeing our customers, colleagues and friends at great events like AFLA and NAFA, the past 15 months has been a tumultuous time virtually none of us could have imagined outside of a Hollywood soundstage.

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By Mike Sheldrick, Senior Editor

The Covid-19 pandemic may have emptied roads, tanked the oil market, and resulted in somewhat cleaner skies.

Nevertheless, astonishingly, despite the reduction in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the U.S. in 2020, deaths increased: from just over 36,000 in 2019 to 38,680 in 2020, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). This translates into a 23% increase in fatalities per million miles traveled.

These numbers generally agree with earlier estimates in March from the National Safety Council. The reasons, according to NHTSA: Risky driving behaviors, including failure to wear a seat belt, speeding, and drinking while driving.

For fleets, the question is how long these conditions will persist even as we are vanquishing Covid-19 and how to combat all the factors that lead to the kind of driving behavior that, in turn, resulted in these numbers. It requires renewed emphasis on the importance of safety.

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No matter the technology, there is no better time than now to have technology be the catalyst to drive social change, to improve the outcomes of our use of vehicles while allowing us to continue to use them to help our economies grow.

By Aron Solomon, Esquire Digital

The CDC Report on Global Road Safety is some remarkably sobering reading. According to the report, the leading cause of death for people under 55 is automobile accidents. While passenger vehicles are something that we now take for granted in the United States, they literally drive economic development around the world.

The threshold issue is why we still have so many accidents, particularly fatal ones.

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The Drive

Automakers are starting to ramp up production after more than a year of COVID-19 and supply chain-related kerfuffles, but operations won’t be at 100 percent for some time to come. In turn, used car prices are still climbing.

Data from Car Gurus indicates that the average price of a used car listed on its site has increased 29.6 percent since this time last year, a number which shows no signs of slowing any time soon. In fact, Americans are spending as much as 43.6 percent more on certain vehicles than they were just last year.

It appears that pickup trucks are most affected by the price hike, shooting up in value more than 43.6 percent in the past year.

Read the article at The Drive

Car and Driver

Ford is about to rekindle compact-truck fever with the soon to be unveiled Maverick. Compact trucks have gained full-sized capabilities—and prices. The Maverick promises to reset the clock and bring back the affordable small pickup.

The Maverick vows to be enough truck for enough people. It won’t be macho, because unibody pickups just aren’t but it’ll be useful.

Did we mention inexpensive? There’s a purity of purpose in a cheap truck, because you don’t feel bad about using it like a truck. Throw your tools in the back and scratch up the bed.

Read the article at Car and Driver.

IIHS

Hundreds of people are killed and thousands are injured each year in crashes involving stopped or disabled vehicles that may not have stood out enough to alert drivers to the danger they pose.

Impact Research estimated that 566 people were killed and 14,371 injured each year over 2016-18 in crashes on all types of roads involving a disabled vehicle in which visibility was likely a factor.

“These crashes illustrate the potential value of stopped-vehicle-ahead warnings, which are already provided by some navigation apps and could be integrated to work with advanced driver assistance features and more advanced driving automation,” David Zuby, EVP and chief research officer at the IIHS, says.

Read the article at IIHS.

By Ed Pierce, Contributing Editor

Fleet Management Weekly caught up with Bob White, President, Holman Fleet & Mobility, who took time to answer our questions regarding the opportunities and issues impacting the fleet industry in the coming year as well as how Holman and ARI are positioned to serve its fleet customers in the post-pandemic business environment.

FMW: What are some of the key trends/challenges/opportunities in the fleet sector for 2021 and beyond?

Bob White: As we begin to emerge from the pandemic, there are several challenges – and opportunities – that we continue to monitor closely.

With interest rates still hovering near historic lows and many businesses looking to maintain financial flexibility and to diversify their liquidity options, we’re seeing a growing number of organizations embrace leasing as a key component of their vehicle acquisition strategy.

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By Ed Pierce, President of ITA Communications. Fleet

According to HubSpot’s OrgChartHub, there are an average of 8.2 key stakeholders involved in business’ decision-making process – up from 6.8 in 2016.

It’s clear that more complex decision-making makes it harder than ever for sales and marketing to contact all of these key stakeholders and communicate with them in an effective manner.

Decision-makers involved in a particular process come to your product or solution from different points of view. Yet, advertising and public relations must be targeted to deliver results.

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By Ed Smith, President, Agile Fleet

In early 2020, the management team of Agile Fleet developed core values for the company.

These core values are a timeless set of guiding principles that define the behaviors the FleetCommander providers expect from each other and from their partners, clients, and associates.

They define the culture and guide business decisions. They define what makes Agile Fleet different and unique.

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