Avis 2013 Annual Report Download - page 16

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We see significant growth opportunities related to our Zipcar brand. We expect to increase our
Zipcar membership base by growing the number of businesses, government agencies and
universities that Zipcar serves within its existing markets, as well as expanding the brand into new
markets where our existing car rental presence will help enable the introduction of Zipcar’s car
sharing services. We expect that such growth will include making more Zipcars available at
airport locations, offering one-way usage of Zipcars at certain locations and cross-marketing
partnerships through our well-established corporate and affinity relationships.
We continue to focus on addressing the need of the deep-value segment of the vehicle rental
industry with Payless and Apex and look to increase our profitability in this segment as we grow
our revenues.
• Strengthening Our Global Position. While we currently operate, either directly or through licensees, in
approximately 175 countries around the world, we have strengthened and will continue to strengthen and
further expand our global footprint through organic growth and potentially through acquisitions, joint
ventures, licensing opportunities or other relationships:
In countries where we have Company-operated locations, we will continue to identify
opportunities to add new rental locations, to grant licenses to independent third parties for regions
where we do not currently operate and/or do not wish to operate directly, to strengthen the
presence of the Avis, Budget, Zipcar, Apex and Payless brands (including by multi-branding
locations), as applicable, and to re-acquire previously granted license rights in certain cases.
In countries operated by licensees, including our joint ventures in Brazil, China and India, we will
seek to ensure that our licensees are well positioned to realize the growth potential of our brands
in those countries and are aggressively growing their presence in those markets, and we expect
to consider the re-acquisition of previously granted license rights in certain cases.
Zipcar represents a substantial growth opportunity for us as we believe that there are numerous
geographic markets outside the United States, particularly in Europe and Asia, where Zipcar’s
proven car sharing model can be utilized to meet substantial, currently unmet transportation
needs.
• Enhancing Customers’ Rental Experience. We are committed to serving our customers and enhancing
their rental experience, including through our Customer Led, Service Driven™ initiative, which is aimed at
improving our customers’ rental experience with our brands, our systems and our employees. Following
an extensive review of the ways, places and occasions in which our brands, our systems and our
employees interact with existing and potential customers, we have implemented actions that we expect
will improve the service we provide at these customer “touchpoints.” For example:
Over the last two years, we have launched Avis Preferred Select & Go™, a vehicle-choice
program for customers, revised our rental agreements and receipts to improve transparency, and
significantly expanded customer-service-oriented training of our employees, achieving significant
increases in customer satisfaction.
We continue to upgrade our technology, to make the reservation, pick-up and return process
more convenient and user-friendly, with a particular emphasis on enabling and simplifying our
customers’ online interactions with us.
In 2013, we also made Avis and Budget rental agreements available in French, German,
Portuguese and Spanish, as a courtesy to our customers at participating airport locations across
North America.
We expect to continue to invest in these efforts.
• Controlling Costs and Driving Efficiency throughout the Organization. We have continued our efforts
to rigorously control costs. We continue to aggressively reduce expenses throughout our organization,