In the past, traveling in a city meant you hailed a taxi to take you from place to place. That has completely changed with travelers now using apps to find an Uber or Lyft driver in the area that quickly picks them up and takes them where they need to go.
Well, those same services are now starting to work their way into the school transportation market. Still think no problem?
Services like HopSkipDrive, Kango, Zum and others are marketing to busy parents to offer them the same type of convenient transportation services to move children from school to their activities. The services operate much like Uber and Lyft in that they are app-based, their drivers have had fingerprint and background checks and you can subscribe to these services on an on-going basis.
If these services aren’t in your neighborhood yet, look at the bigger cities around you and you’ll likely find them or something like them all targeting busy parents and even busier kids.
So are these services a threat or an opportunity? They can be both. You need to be aware of them and how they operate. Understanding your competition is critical. You also need to educate parents and children about the safety features of the yellow school bus and how they are safest in those buses.
Parents don’t realize the different safety aspects of moving their kids from the yellow school bus to these types of services, they are simply focused on convenience.
Bottom line, we in the industry know that children are safest on the yellow school bus, but part of our job has to be educating those we serve to be sure they know it, too.
Ronna Weber is a former executive director of the National School Transportation Association that represents the interests of private school bus contractors across North America.
