Abstract
Without any doubt, coronavirus disease slumped global economies in an unparalleled crisis, one of the worst downturns since 2008. COVID-19 not only affected negatively the tourism industry but also other service sectors. To some extent, governments have adopted two different dispositions against the virus. While some nations imposed a strict lockdown, others privilege the consumption and domestic circuits of payment. In its history, the tourism industry has never faced a crisis of this caliber, and its impacts remain unsure even to date. Although the interests and studies evaluating the impact of COVID-19 have captivated the attention of countless scholars, less attention has been given to the rent-a-car industry, which occupies a central position in the tourist system. As substitute competitors of train, bus, and airplanes, the rent-a-car organizations seem to be a quintessential actor of the tourist system. Of course, because we live in a world without tourists, empirical-based studies do not abound these days.
TopIntroduction
On December of 2019, The Socialist Republic of China experienced a new virus outbreak, in the city of Wuhan –to be more exact. Originally the situation was trivialized by authorities leading the world to an unexpected and global crisis. The virus rapidly disseminated to the four continents forcing governments to close their borders and cancelling all flights. To the date, CO-SARS-v2 (known as COVID-19) infected almost 23.472.214 persons causing 815.262 fatal victims (last updated on 08-24-2020). The most affected countries include the US (180.788 victims) followed by Brazil (114.913), Mexico (60.480), India (58.546), the UK (41.433), Italy (35.441), France (30.528), and Spain (28.870). The pandemic affected seriously the Health system in Spain, Italy, the UK, the US and France, as well as other less developed countries. At a closer look, in the mid of the pandemic, the WHO (World Health Organization) was widely criticized by the lack of response to give a standardized plan of contingency, leading each nation to react differently to prevent the contagion. Doubtless, the industry of tourism and hospitality, as well as the global commerce slumped down before the COVID-19. This generated an unparalleled economic crisis worldwide. Today, scholars –in the constellations of tourism fields- divided in two clear-cut poles. Those worried for developing new methodological toolkits to understand tourism in a context of new normalcy (Wen et al. 2020; Miles & Shipway, 2020; Zenker & Kock, 2020; Verma & Gustaffsson, 2020), and those voices who enthusiastically envisaged the opportunities to create more resilient and sustainable destinations. De-growth tourism, for them, exhibits an interesting point of departure for the next decades (Gossling, Scott, & Hall, 2020; Gallego & Font 2020; Higgins-Desbiolles, 2020; Prayag, 2020; Galvani, Lew & Perez, 2020; Crossley, 2020). The fact is that one of the problems of these studies associate to the lack of an empirical basis to understand the dimension of the economic crisis. What seems to be more important, tourism-based research has systematically ignored the important role of rent-a-car industry (subsector) in a configuration of a resilient tourism industry. To fill this gap, the present chapter explores empirically the real economic and socio-cultural effects in a rent-a-car company which is geographically located in Argentina. As a substitute competitor of trains, buses or airplanes, rent-a-car organizations are a key-player of the tourist system. In the first section, we explore the effects of COVID19 in the tourism and hospitality industries. Secondly, we proffer a discussion on the importance of cars or automobile as alternative means of transports as well as its historical background in the inter-war period. In third we review the importance of adopting resilient recovery plans to face new virus outbreaks. Last but not least, we analyze the effects of the pandemic in a well-known rent-a-car company in Argentina.
At a closer look, the history of the rent-a-car industry goes in a similar direction. Although the specialized literature in rent-a-car subsector does not abound (Korstanje 2011), it is important to delineate the first steps of rental cars organization in the US. The historical roots of rental cars date us back to Germany (1906). The company Sixt Authofharen und selbsfahrer [Sixt Car Cruises and Self drivers] was established by the end of 1913. The model was rapidly adopted by Joe Saunders in Omaha, Nebraska by 1917. His innovation led to expanding to almost 50 cities in the next years importing what American historians dubbed as “Saunders system”. The company was finally bought by John Hertz in 1923. Meanwhile, the UK Godfrey Davies (a young visionary man) borrows Saunders system to create a company which will become in Europcar. The end of WWII set the pace to new transport means which revolutionized the tourism industry while replacing the trolley and horse. Today, this subsector offers plenty of car classes which are allocated throughout the globe, in cases, at least as an ideal option, substituting mass transport forms as the commercial airlines, the train or buses.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Rent-A-Car: Sub industry within service and tourist sector that offers the renting of cars to clients and drivers.
Labor Relations: This refers to an academic field that often studies different inter-personal relations in working conditions.
COVID-19: New virus outbreak originated in 2019 in the city of Wuhan China, and rapidly expanded to the world in form of a new pandemic.
Tourism Management: It consists in a net of techniques and disciplines oriented to keep the tourist system functioning.