Hardly any brand loyalty
The fact that new cars are too expensive to be feasible for most private individuals is certainly not news in the Netherlands. This applies even more to electric cars, but private leasing appears to make driving an electric car possible in many cases.
The Electric Drivers Association (VER) draws this conclusion in the annual EV and driver survey. A remarkably large share of the 4,800 respondents in this study – 58 percent – drive privately, often via a private lease construction. Of those private leasers, almost three-quarters say that a private lease construction was decisive in the choice to drive electric. Only 20 percent of them indicate that they would have succeeded without a lease construction.
It is of course not surprising that private leasing is necessary for many private drivers to be able to drive electrically. This research also shows that the electric car owned by private individuals is on average much more expensive than the previous, often used, petrol car. The higher monthly costs due to a lease construction are probably (partly) offset by the usage costs, which are considered very important by those surveyed. What is called: if the motor vehicle tax is calculated as for petrol cars, more than half say they will stop the EV adventure again.
In general, EV drivers are still very convinced of their choice: 87 percent say they will not go back to petrol. That is slightly lower than last year, when 90 percent vowed never to purchase a car with a fuel tank again.
Hardly any brand loyalty
In the category ‘striking, but not unexpected’ we also find the conclusion that brand loyalty hardly exists in the (electric) car market. Only 19 percent of those interviewed by the VER drive a car of the same brand as the previous one. Moreover, the majority of that small group actually says that this is a coincidence, because 53 percent of them would also have gone electric if that was not possible with their ‘own’ brand.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl