I spent this morning with David Cummins, VP at ACS, a Xerox Company, in their offices in Germantown, Maryland. It was a wide ranging conversation, but let me highlight a bit of it.
David was pointing out that off street parking is just beginning to use technology to track its daily customers. New ‘apps’ and pay by cell phone charging allows operators to track their daily parkers and after trends are seen, there is the potential to reach out to them to propose attractive rate and other benefits of frequent parking.
Think of it. What if you could change your rates based on when a person parked, how often they had parked, how long they were going to park, and notify them in advance of the rate changes.
David thinks that such a database would allow owner/operators to auction off prime spaces (say next to the elevator), and reach out to daily customers when spaces are available (your favorite spot on floor four next to the elevator is open, Mrs Jones, Shall we reserve it to you. It will be charged to your credit card. Just text xxxxx to xxx xxxx when you arrive and the gate will open. Have a nice day.)
I always thought that reservations were a solution in search of a problem. With this twist, I am becoming a believer.
David’s company focuses on ‘on street’ operations, but he is excited to see smaller companies using technology to pull the off street operations into the 21st century.
Having data is great, but knowing what to do with it, now that’s something.
JVH
