A person with a bicycle in their garage is an archenemy of the modern economy indeed; you don’t have to visit gas stations, you don’t have to pay pollution tax due to decreasing the quality of the atmosphere, and almost no mechanic can benefit from your vehicle. Although bikes are popular among several families, many guys lack a personal one but are willing to use them for a short duration.

Have you heard about the term “bike rentals” and how they operate? Make sure you have gotten the full answer to these questions;

What is a bicycle rental service?
Is it profitable to start bicycle rentals?
How to start a bicycle rental service?
Finding a bicycle rental near me

What is a bicycle rental service?

Bike rentals are founded to rent their bicycles to customers for a short period, like several hours. Most bike rentals are provided by bike shops as a sideline to their main sales and service businesses, but some shops specialize in rentals.

Starting a bicycle rental service company is much easier than you may have experienced before, and by reading the following paragraphs, you will find out how to fund bike rentals and make them functional.

Is it profitable to start a bicycle rental service?

Many governments are suffering from extensive costs of carbon fuels and pollution-related disadvantages; therefore, they prefer people to utilize a better method of transportation through the cities in order to minimize the size of the budget allocated to national environmental concerns.

As a result, governments are persuaded to allocate several bank facilities programs to the startup companies scheduling for starting bike rentals throughout the country. Furthermore, there are several methods that can help you with increasing the revenue of your new bicycle rental service program, including;

Cooperating with biker’s clubs
Targeting tourists
Maintaining inventory and setting up repair schedules
Seasonal discounts and promotional activities
Targeting employees in organizations

Top bicycle rental service startups

Successful business people are always eager to learn from their rivals, so you need to know the best in your bicycle rental service field and read their success stories. Here, we have collected the top eight global most successful bike rentals which can make your brain start vaporing;

Yulu

Yulu is an application-based bicycle rental service that provides better conditions for moving between Indian locations. The company is equipped with GPS and Bluetooth-enabled bicycles& e-bikes for rent via a mobile application. The user can view nearby and available bicycles on their app and scan the QR code on the bicycle to unlock it and ride.

Year of foundation: 2017
Headquarters: Bangalore (India)
Total assets: $20,000,000+

Donkey Republic

Although it seems to have a rural title, Donkey Republic is one of the most famous bike rentals in Europe, providing service for hundreds of green people out there. The mobile app is available for both Android and iOS users, and the rented bike is fitted with a digital lock that can be unlocked even with an offline phone.

Year of foundation: 2012
Headquarters: Copenhagen (Denmark)
Funding: $6,500,000+

Wheels

For the American people, Wheels maybe is a well-known bicycle rental service in the country. The company partners with city administrations, campuses, and enterprises to provide a high-quality service for the urban environment with dockless electric bikes. Wheels have an application compatible with Android and iOS devices to facilitate the process of bike renting.

Year of foundation: 2017
Headquarters: Los Angeles (United States)
Funding: $94,000,000+

Mobycy

Mobycy is an app-based Indian company offering e-bike, e-scooter, and bicycle rental services. Users can enjoy a compatible application allowing them to locate different models of electric bicycles in mentioned rental stations.

Year of foundation: 2017
Headquarters: Gurgaon (India)
Funding: $4,500,000

Mobike

Asian populations are also fans of urban biking, so that you can see a Chinese bike rental service on our list. The platform enables its users to find a Mobike nearby on the online map and rent bicycles through the mobile application. The operating bicycles can be tracked via GPS, and the users are charged based on the distance driven.

Year of foundation: 2015
Headquarters: Beijing (China)
Funding: $926,000,000+

JUMP Bikes

Another American bike rental program enables users to find, book, and unlock the vehicle with a practical and useful mobile application. At the end of the ride, users need to leave the GPS-enabled bicycles at designated parking spaces.

Year of foundation: 2010
Headquarters: Brooklyn (United States)
Funding: $19,500,000+

Pony

Are you interested in dockless bicycles? So Pony is here to rent these bikes in selected European locations. The rental service is accompanied by a practical application so that users are allowed to locate an available vehicle in the vicinity and scan the QR code to lock/unlock it.

Year of foundation: 2017
Headquarters: Oxford (United Kingdom)
Funding: $2,000,000+

HumanForest

HumanForest is one the best you can find as an app-based bike rental in a super-crowded city like London. As a user, you are allowed to find and unlock your desired bike with a few clicks on the application. Furthermore, you will be amused with brilliant offers, including variant payment options, free minutes to unlock the vehicle, etc.

Year of foundation: 2019
Headquarters: London (United Kingdom)
Funding: $9,500,000+

How to start a bicycle rental service?

Once you have enough evidence to start a new bicycle rental service, it is time to learn how to create it. Although the process of founding a new company is a little bit different among countries, you can follow the backbone of your adventure by following these steps;

Plan your bike rental business

First, you need to plan a roadmap to map out the specifics of your business and discover some unknowns. Maybe you need to answer the questions like “what are the startup and ongoing costs?” and “how much can you charge customers?” in your portfolio.

Form your bike rental business into a Legal Entity

Different structures of businesses are available in the financial world. Still, in this case, it is better to set your bike rental program as an LLC or corporation to protect yourself from being held personally liable if your bike rental business is sued.

Register for taxes

As a business owner, you have to pay several types of state and federal taxes, so you will need to apply for an EIN for your company.

Create your website and application-based service

Modern public services need an official website and mobile application to represent their brand and make everything easier for their customers. According to this statement, you need to establish a web-based hub and a simple app for your bicycle rental service.

Get the necessary permits & licenses for your bicycle rental business

Any public service and corporation need to get the required permits and licenses to keep itself from hefty fines and being shut down by the government. The main certificates necessary for your business can be listed as “state business licensing requirements,” “Liability Waiver,” and “Certificate of Occupancy.”

Define your bicycle rental business brand

Once you have made the fundamentals of your company, you must create a shiny brand in the national atmosphere to absorb customers like a powerful magnet. You need to create a log with a QR code, so they will help your business stand out from competitors.

Set up your final business system

Once you have established the previous steps, then you just need to gather your team and employees to start money-making. Enjoy your business!!!

What are the costs involved in opening a bike rental service?

Bike rentals are known for “economic startups,” so you don’t have to provide a chest of gold coins for your dream company. On average, a bicycle rental service will cost between $5,000 and $8,000 at the beginning. All you need is to buy a collection of 20 bicycles (with the cost of $250 each) and a home station ensuring that your customers will bring back your bikes to the same place. If you have an idea of providing supplements for your bike rentals (like helmets and bike locks), you need to spend an additional cost of $2,000.

How does a bike rental service make money?

The main profit-making pathway in managing a bicycle rental service is the principle you can get from the title; most bike rentals rent their transportation appliances at the cost of between $12 and $18 per hour, and will customers appraise your business if you decrease the hourly rental fees if the rental duration exceeds the average period.

You have noticed that most bike rentals are suffering from being “anonymous” and alien to people, so it is better to establish as many relationships as you can with other public gears to boost your business; you may need to sign a contract with local companies to choose your method of transportation for their staff, or cooperating with bike stores and share your customers to gain percentage from their selling program.

How much profit can a bike rentals business make?

Bike rentals are highly profitable compared to their maintenance costs. An efficient, popular bicycle rental service can make a profit of up to $80,000 per year, which is too enormous to be easily measured.

Note that the more extensive your bicycle rental service business is, the more bucks you have to pay to your employees, and your expenditure will start mushrooming. Hence, locating your business in a specified area of the city is recommended, or you have to run some auxiliary packages and selling programs to keep your profit still high and significant.

How to find a bike rentals near me?

Finding bike rentals near me is not a big problem think about. Since we are living between the internet wavelengths everywhere, many websites can help you find suitable bike rentals for your daily activities. For example, you can use;

Listnride.com
Yelp.com
Uber.com
Takewheels.com
Spinlister.com

For your purpose. Just insert your location, and you will find a list of bike rentals waiting for you in the local area.

Summary

Thank you for reading. Bike rentals are somehow a new opportunity for those young people willing to both enjoy their day and make money simultaneously. To start a bicycle rental service, follow the instructions explained above, and you will surely benefit from your corporation as soon as you get your first customer.

How to find a bike rental near me? Turn on your device and search for nearby bike rentals on the mentioned websites in the article. Make sure you have chosen the best rental service with the lowest rental fee.