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Wait For Perfect or Charge
Forward? Lessons From Lyft's
Controversial NYC Launch.
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JULY 30, 2014
Knowing exactly when to make your move is
sometimes more difficult than knowing what
your move should be.
That San Francisco-based peer-to-peer
ridesharing app Lyft would move into New
York City is hardly a question. The Big Apple is
the largest city in the United States where a
huge swath of the population lives without
owning a car.
Whether Lyft entered New York City at the
right time, however? Thats debatable.
Lyft made a big announcement that it would
bring its service to New York City on July 11,
complete with Brooklyn launch party. Just
hours before takeoff, Lyft did a U-turn and said
its plans were on hold as the New York State
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weeks later, Lyft announced that it had
reached a temporary agreement with city
regulators, agreeing to utilize only drivers
licensed by the NYC Taxi and Limousine
Commission.
Related: Ride-Sharing Startup Lyft Is Coming
to NYC (Yes, For Real This Time)
In celebration of its soft launch, Lyft offered its
"Pioneers" -- the ridesharing companys name
for its first users -- two weeks of free rides on
its service. Hundreds of drivers completed
thousands of rides over the first weekend,
according to Lyft. Exact numbers were not
disclosed.
But there were not enough drivers to meet
demand. People took to the Twitterverse in
spades to voice their complaints about not
being able to get a ride with Lyft or to
complain about their poor experience with the
service. Users waited for a long time or
couldnt get a ride when they needed one.
The facts: The Lyft launch was late, an
amended version of what it initially had
promised, and left would-be riders unable to
get a ride when they wanted one.
Should the West Coast car-sharing app have
waited a bit longer before launching in New
York? Perhaps with more time, Lyft could have
had the regulations already worked out and
had more drivers ready to go. Or is a bumpy
launch part of the game when you are bringing
a new, innovative technology to a huge market
with existing stakeholders firmly wedded to
the status quo?
The answer to both of those questions,
depending, of course on who you ask, is yes.
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science, said Dean M. Schroeder, a business consultant and co-author
of The Idea-Driven Organization: Unlocking The Power In Bottom Up
Ideas. An awful lot of management decisions when they go into new
areas are mistakes. Thats just a given.
The key, though, is being able to move quickly and adjust to
unforeseen circumstances when they come up. Schroeder says that
while Lyft may very well have been prepared to enter its largest
potential market yet, it still underestimated the complexities of
working in New York City. The political infrastructure of New York, the
regulators, the existing taxi services are all very entrenched in the Big
Apple. What works in Chicago won't necessarily just scale to work in
New York, Schroeder says.
Its easy to fault Lyft for being unprepared. But its also true that if Lyft
waited for New York City regulators and drivers to welcome them with
open arms, the San Francisco company may have never entered New
York City.
Entrepreneurs whose business success depends on regulators
embracing new rules and individuals adopting new social norms (your
mom did tell you growing up to never get into a car with a stranger,
right?) cant always wait for perfect. Airbnb, the peer-to-peer
apartment-rental site that is no stranger to legal battles and skeptics,
would never have launched had its founders waited for everything to
fall into place, co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk has said. He believes
that with any new technology comes resistance, and the only way to
force change is to jump in the deep end.
Related: Lyft's NYC Launch Party Goes Off Without a Hitch. The
Launch? Not So Much.
One way Lyft could have minimized some of the frustrations it has
caused in New York City is to have launched more slowly, says
Schroeder. Inviting a small number of people to initially use the service
could have given Lyft the opportunity to quietly stress-test the
technology and then roll it out over a month or longer. Launching
shotgun-style in a massive, complex market like New York City may
not have been the best plan, he says.
What really matters now is what Lyft does going forward. With
competitor Uber already positioned to capitalize on Lyft's fumble in
New York City, Lyfts best play may well be a mea culpa. The company
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problems quickly enough.
Launching early and then backstepping, admitting to your customers
that you may have been trigger happy is a classic Mark Zuckerberg
move, notes Tony Marino, a business expansion strategist. The reason
Zuckerberg gets away with boldly charging ahead is that Facebook is
transparent and apologetic when it does get ahead of itself. I think
the company can make lemonade out of lemons, he says. People
love to hear 'I am sorry.'
Lyft is taking steps to make amends with customers. It has assured its
Pioneer riders who havent been able to get a rides in New York City
that it will re-issue their two weeks of free rides, and says it is working
to get more drivers as fast as possible.
According to Lyft, the hurdles it has faced in New York City so far are
not exceptionally out of the ordinary, nor are they deal breakers. We
have encountered challenges before and we have always been able to
find a path forward through conversations with regulators, said Erin
Simpson, the company's director of communications. We are
confident that we will have a path forward.
That may be so, but time is of the essence for Lyft to get back in New
Yorkers' good graces. This is a chess match -- a high-speed chess
match, says Schroeder.
Related: Lyft Is Hurrying to Catch Up With Uber
Growth Strategies Expansion New York City Uber Lyft
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