From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Avis Rent a Car

Type	Subsidiary
Founded	Ypsilanti, Michigan, U.S. (1946)
Founder(s)	Warren Avis
Headquarters	Parsippany-Troy Hills Twp, NJ, U.S.
Number of locations	~4900+ (as of 2007)
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Ronald L. Nelson (Chairman) & (CEO) F. Robert Salerno (President), (COO) & (Director) David B. Wyshner (CFO) & (Executive Vice President)
Industry	Car rental
Revenue	▲ US$ 5.986 Billion (2007)
Operating income	▼ US$ -992 Million (2007)
Net income	▲ US$ -916 Million (2007)
Total assets	▼ US$ 12.474 Billion (2007)
Total equity	▼ US$ 1.465 Billion (2007)
Owner(s)	Avis Budget Group
Employees	30,000 (2008)
Website	Avis.com

A Dodge Grand Caravan from Avis.

Toyota Coaster from Avis.

Avis Rent a Car System, LLC is a car rental company headquartered in Parsippany-Troy Hills Township, New Jersey, United States.^[1] Avis, Budget Rent a Car and Budget Truck Rental are all units of Avis Budget Group.

Avis Budget Group operates the Avis brand in North America, Latin America, the Caribbean, India, Australia and New Zealand. In other parts of the world, the Avis brand is operated by Avis Europe plc, a separate company which licenses the Avis brand from Avis Budget Group. All together, Avis currently has over 4000 branch offices worldwide. Avis is one of the largest car rental agencies in the world.

The company primarily rents General Motors (GM) vehicles, such as Chevrolet, Pontiac, and Saturn, within the United States, though some locations feature other popular non-GM brands, such as Hyundai or Kia.

Avis is a leading rental car provider to the commercial segment serving business travelers at major airports around the world, and to leisure travelers at off-airport locations; many of the off-airport locations (at least in the USA) are franchised operations rather than company owned and operated, as is the case with most airport locations. Avis was the first car rental business to be located at an airport.^[2]

History

The company was founded in 1946 with three cars at Willow Run Airport^[3], Ypsilanti by Warren Avis (August 4, 1915 – April 24, 2007^[2]). It established branch operations across the US over the next few years, becoming the second largest car rental company in the country by 1953. By its tenth anniversary in 1956 it had opened its first international offices in Europe, Canada and Mexico.

Their corporate motto is "We Try Harder." It was adopted in 1962^[4] (during the tenure of Robert Townsend as its CEO) to make a more positive reference of Avis' status as the second largest car rental company in the US, at the expense of its larger competitor The Hertz Corporation. In 1981, the company instituted its system of vehicle tracking, that was coincidentally named Advanced Vehicle Identification System (AVIS).

Avis has been owned by a number of other companies over the years, along with several periods of being a public company. These include:

• 1962 - Investment group Lazard Freres
• 1965 - ITT Corporation
• 1977 - Norton Simon
• 1983 - Esmark
• 1984 - Beatrice
• 1986 - Investment firm Wesray Capital Corporation
• 1996 - HFS Corporation
• 2001 - Cendant
• 2006 - Avis Budget Group
• 2009 - Avis Colombia

See also

• Robert Townsend, Avis CEO who launched the "We Try Harder" advertising campaign

Ronald Wild Ronald Wild (1940 to 2009) was head of the Avis advertising department over the time the "We Try Harder" campaign was conceived. The premise was to create a brand conveying his strategy to have Avis compete for market share against Hertz the market leader, not by underpricing but by providing a higher level of service and thus the "We Try Harder" campaign was born and is still in use today.

Other well known brand icons created under Ronald Wild's marketing leadership include "Poppin' Fresh" aka the PILLSBURY DOUGH BOY, and the white suited MAN FROM GLAD. See RONALD WILD for a full discussion of his background, wealth of brand creation and experience.

References

External links

• Avis global homepage

Articles

• Michael Kinsley (May 16, 2007). "We Try Harder (but What’s the Point?)". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/opinion/16kinsley.html.