What Happens When a Nonprofit Car-Sharing Service Gets Bought By a Major Rental Company?

Car-sharing officially went mainstream earlier this year when the legacy car-rental giant Avis snapped up Zipcar in a $500 million deal. With that move, what was once considered a quirky market niche – strangers, sharing cars none of them own, to run errands! – grew into a serious industry. Of course, that news elicited the groaning that happens any time a subversive idea loses its upstart appeal. On the whole, though, when more car-sharing is available to more people, in more places (with, as companies like Avis can provide, more infrastructure), that's good news for anyone who's been behind the idea for years.

Now this week brings another acquisition that feels arguably even more bittersweet: Avis competitor Enterprise announced yesterday that it was acquiring IGO, the Chicago nonprofit that pioneered the concept there more than a decade ago. As we've previously written, nonprofits have had the room to test the limits of car-sharing with an eye solely toward the goal of advancing alternative transportation. They can experiment with ideas that might not make money, like expanding service to low-income residents, or integrating it with public transit, or structuring it around electric cars.