Understanding the barriers

It’s not surprising to hear that a leasing company wants to encourage people to think about leasing vehicles, but LeasePlan seems to have a genuine desire to make a difference to the environment by helping people see the benefits of greener motoring.

Neill explains that LeasePlan’s recent campaign ‘Electric Moments’ all started with the desire to encourage more people to make the switch to electric vehicles. LeasePlan wanted to know what was holding people back – particularly when switching clearly has many benefits – so they carried out in-depth
research into the barriers facing drivers and businesses.

Neill says, “We took our research findings and we built our campaign around it. We called it electric moments, because it celebrates the ‘lightbulb’ moments when people realise the benefits of electric cars or discover that something they were worried about isn’t really an issue after all.”

Research findings

So, what did LeasePlan learn? Neill explains that many people are now realising that electric cars can go a lot further on a single charge. But this hasn’t got rid of a potential roadblock. Instead, the ‘range anxiety’ that people used to have is being replaced by ‘charge anxiety’ – even though there are far more charging points these days as well.

Another challenge is that electric vehicles are seen as more complex, even though they are actually more straightforward in some ways. After all, they have, on average, 20 moving parts – compared with 2,000 moving parts in a petrol or diesel vehicle. 

However, the big finding from the research was simply that people have lots of questions about electric cars – and want to know much more about them. 

Neill says, “Our research revealed that for many people thinking about making the switch to an EV the barriers are no longer about range anxiety – it’s change anxiety”.

Information and guidance

To answer these questions and help people experience their own electric moments, LeasePlan created a new hub on their website that’s designed to give drivers and fleet decision-makers more confidence when choosing EVs. 

It’s full of insights and ideas, with everything from ‘getting started’ guides and road-tests to news, podcasts and FAQs. There’s also a selection of tools that anyone can use to help with specific challenges, including:

  • an EV driver assessment tool, gauging individuals’ driving habits, mileage and journey types to determine EV suitability
  • a business EV readiness tool, featuring a free, bespoke implementation roadmap consolidated by email advice
  • a van qualification tool to help commercial fleet managers understand EV viability
  • a charging-cost calculator, comparing different EV makes and models

On top of this, LeasePlan worked with Fully Charged to create a series of short videos featuring experts talking about key topics, plus interviews with real people discussing their experiences of switching to electric cars. 

Neill explains, “By highlighting these drivers’ personal lightbulb moments, our goal was to explore the benefits of electric vehicles without the hard sell. In fact, that’s the main aim of Electric Moments as a whole. We want to provide unbiased information about electric vehicles, so people can make the right decision for them and their lifestyles, without any pressure.”

Discover if an EV could work for you by searching LeasePlan Electric Moments or visit leaseplan.com