Submitted by Katie Hellmuth on | 0 Comments
We love reading entrepreneurship stories about how other companies are maneuvering their growth. Recently, the story about hot app Uber piqued our interest, because all of the pieces and their responses to a series of bad press stories didn't add up. When the General Manager of Uber, Josh Mohrer tweeted back at Sabina after she declared that she was leaving Uber and going to rival Gett, we were puzzled at his tweet, and tweeted back a request asking for an interview. Then we emailed the same request. He didn't respond. So we're having an "Open Interview" (as opposed to an "Open Letter") with Josh, putting out the questions we would have asked him. Josh: We'll take your answers anytime. Put them in the Comments below or email us.
If you're not aware of this story, the taxi industry in this country was disrupted a few years ago by the app market, allowing one to hail a cab straight from your smart phone. Uber is considered a major disruptor of the taxi industry in this country, bringing the call-a-car model to your fingertips in the form of an app and instantly charging your credit card or PayPal t(hat they keep on file). There is a base rate of $7 or so dollars (yellow cab base rates are $2.50), and a supply-and-demand tax referred to as a "surge tax". What does this mean? If it's raining, on a holiday weekend, etc, the cabs can cost more.
Taxi drivers all over New York City, were up in arms when the City forced them to have credit card machines in their cabs, and now here came a tech giant to make it even harder for them to A. get cash from a rider, and B. get a rider in the first place.
In January 2014, Valleywag ran a story claiming that top management at Uber were feeling threatened by an up-and-comer taxi service Gett, a rival app-based black car taxi service. Uber mounted a campaign to not only pump the system with fake reservations for a taxi, making it harder for people to reserve a car, but potentially caused frustration to drivers who are in pursuit of what is soon to be a canceled ride. The article claimed that folks at Uber then texted these drivers, who they may have assumed were frustrated with their employer after so many canceled rides, in an attempted to poach them from Gett, and come to Uber.
Here are the questions we want to know from Josh, based on his tweet above, in which he stated that Valleywag "didn't get the piece quite right":
KATIE:
With regards to the Valleywag article, you tweeted to my business partner Sabina Hitchen, that Valleywag didn’t “get it quite right” with their story. Can you elaborate on that? What did they miss besides the screenshots that they mentioned, and their claim that among other top brass at Uber, you yourself reserved and canceled 20 rides in a span of 15 days?
JOSH:
KATIE:
Is Gett that much of a threat to Uber? I thought they were newbies, but after reading a HuffPo article about the top 11 Israeli startups right now, I saw that they are all over Israel, the U.K. and Russia. Seems to be that the major difference in your business models is how you each tax your riders for supply and demand. If there is strong demand for a cab on New Year’s Eve, or in a rain storm, Uber charges more for the cab, sometimes 3x as much. Gett on the other hand, also taxes the rider, but with a flat rate, perhaps saving the rider some cash, and that might be easier to stomach than “three times as much”. Is Gett a threat?
JOSH:
KATIE:
I want to ask you about “Lead Generation”, this term that I hear used by marketers and corporate level people who make decisions based on numbers and reports, and less on people and their reactions to things, and is a term you used to explain the reserve/cancel tactic you employed. When you have an idea, that is murky at best, and flat out dishonest at worst, does it get validated and approved when you tack on a term like “lead generation” when pitching to top levels?
JOSH:
KATIE:
It’s curious to me that you took this aggressive method by causing aggravation to riders and drivers of Gett’s service, when just this past Christmas season, Uber marketed what I thought was an ingenious idea by delivering Christmas trees to those who ordered one. So smart. So why go down the road that “crossed a line,” as you admitted?
JOSH:
KATIE:
I've "gone country" now, having moved out of New York City and up the river to Beacon, NY, so I'm not in the taxi world anymore. It surprises me that so many are using these ride app services when the ride itself is so much more expensive that using a yellow car or the traditional black gypsy cab. Is the taxi-app experience really that much better? I used Uber once in Chicago when we were staying in a section of town not frequented by cabs. I did love watching the cab's progress on it's way to me in my app. What makes it so great?
JOSH:
If anyone has any more questions, or if Josh wants to answer these, please put them in the Comments below. Because of the amount of spam comments we get, we have to publish each one, so you may not see your comment right away.
