Fact: it sucks to drive in The Big City. There are as many reasons for this suckage as there are drivers in this garbage can we call San Francisco (or wherever you live, it’s probably the same), and each of them has at least two or three startups trying to burn VC money and be the first to go out of business.
- Reason #78: groceries and other junk shifting around in the trunk. You just know that was the bag with the eggs in it that fell over, damn it. Associated startups: Instacart, Safeway.
- Reason #32: motorcyclists popping wheelies while weaving between stopped cars. Associated startups: none out of stealth mode, opportunity is knocking.
- Reason #4: Parking!! I hate you so much!
Any number of startups have tried to crack city parking, going all the way back to the heady days of 2001 and the big boom of making cars go boom upon request. There were companies that would put a brick on your accelerator pedal and gun it right into the bay (no parking meters there). People stood around outside of fancy restaurants with rags soaked in Dom Pérignon and Zippo lighters (only the finest for your Maserati’s final fireball). One of the most innovative companies of that time operated a chain of roaming chop shops that could part out a car in 5 minutes or less or it’s free (take that Domino’s). But repeat customers proved elusive, and simple mistakes like torching the right white Honda Civic on the wrong block could prove devasting. By 2002 it was all over.
Now it’s over a decade later, and Luxe (neé Luxe Valet) (VC $75.5mm) has a new take on this old chestnut. They aren’t going to blow-, chop-, or in general fuck-up your ride – they just want their loosely allied gang of skater punks to take your car to an undisclosed location where people definitely will not have sex in it. Most crucially as compared to their predecessors-in-venture, Luxe will even bring your car back provided that your Luxe Punk isn’t currently trying to pull off a wicked 540 kickflip, man.
Will investors make their money back? Besides the inherent risks of doing business in the volatile skater gang economy, Luxe also has a slight problem when it comes to trying to undercut businesses whose costs consist solely of repainting the lines once every ten years whether they needs it or not. You simply can’t park a car for what Luxe is charging in San Francisco, so unless they’re putting their VC money towards building a secret tunnel under the bay to Treasure Island, they may have a problem.
The clearest path to profitability is for Luxe to secretly drive these “parked” cars for Uber and then pull a Ferris Bueller maneuver on that odometer before returning them.
Should you enjoy the free ride? Uh, yeah. It’s VC-subsidized parking in cities where a dimly lit, predator-filled garage starts at $30 a day. Your car re-appears when and where you want it, using the power of skater magic. Until you can buy a car that comes with a remote drone operator and Predator Parking mode (enabling your car to hunt for parking spaces and evade meter maids with military precision), this is the best thing going.
Who is this disrupting??? Those parking lot attendants who finagle your car into a space visibly smaller than it faster than you can manage a high pitched “oh god wait”! They don’t even adjust the mirrors, it’s absurd. I couldn’t pull these moves off with a team of five people in an hour going an inch at a time.
Also, are you supposed to tip? Coming and going, or just when you pick your car up?
Investor Dumbness Quotient (IDQ) Certified IDQ rating F. Pretty smart really, as long as they’re investing other people’s money. These investors get free valet parking everywhere they go for a few years, so why not?
Obligatory puff piece (OPP) Business Insider is very excited to regurgitate exactly what Luxe told them about being pretty much almost profitable if you just look at their Excel sheet from this one particular spot in only this room.