Top 50 Indie Park Garage Group is discovering interesting buying behaviours of customers charging their cars at its Blackpool forecourt which will help it shape its planned loyalty app.
A key revelation from what is its first EV charging hub has been that EV drivers appear to be planning in their charging in the same way they would their weekly grocery shop. Many using the site’s three chargers are repeat visitors, with a surge in charging taking place on Sunday afternoon or evening.
“It is funny and unexpected because Sunday is generally a quiet day for us on fuel sales,” says operations director Hemant Tandon, who runs the 77-strong forecourt business with his cousin Manoj Tandon. “But people are charging their cars ready for Monday, and their habits of charging their car are almost as habitual as grocery shopping. Car charging is very much a planned, pre-routed visit.”
The Croydon-based business, which operates nationwide, plans to launch the first part of the app to encourage charging loyalty in the first quarter of this year.
It has numbered the six charging bays, and it has been working with chargepoint management platform Fuuse to analyse the purchasing habits of customers since the chargepoints went into operation in August.
The loyalty app will be expanded to tie in shop sales later in 2025 and will include food to go – its preferred brands are Creams, Subway and Starbucks coffee – to encourage EV drivers to spend more on site during their charging dwell time.
It might be that customers are rewarded to use the chargepoints during quiet periods, or that special deals are offered on packed lunch items, for instance, on the busy Sunday periods as motorists prepare for the next week.
“None of us drive EV cars, so for us it is understanding the market more and more and what benefits and negatives drivers are experiencing, to understand their mindset and take on board the most important four or five key things ready for when we introduce EV charging elsewhere,” says Tandon.
He adds that the business has been pleased with the use of the Blackpool Park & Charge facility, with nearly 20,000 kilowatts of electricity a month being purchased in total from the three chargepoints. The cousins have been surprised by a far lower use of chargecards than they had anticipated to pay for charging, and also they have seen a greater level of shop purchases than expected.
Tandon claimed that this initial site, which will be used as a template for others, was “the highest spec” in the UK when it launched. It represented a £1 million investment, including the installation of a sub station, and it has a roadside pole displaying the cost of charging, as well as 480kW chargepoints with wide wheelchair access bays, and an overhead, lit canopy.
This year another four or five Park & Charge hubs could be introduced, with the first likely to make an appearance at Park Garage Group forecourts in Mogadur in Surrey and Maidstone in Kent. And the business is working on a Gridserve-style all-electric concept, with café, at Kings Langley in Hertfordshire, which Tandon says is a project for the future and will take a “good couple of years to get off the ground”.
With such a huge cost involved in introducing EV charging Tandon says that the business is more focused on getting its offering right before rolling it out elsewhere.
“We are in no rush. Everything is in place at four or five sites which are ready as soon as we want to push the button,” he adds. “We are talking about a brand new market which is still in its infancy, and at such a large investment we have to ensure we have things right.”
