I think the most “duhhh” moment was moving the headquarters. Of course they lost a ton of experienced and qualified staff when they moved the headquarters to Florida. Why wasn’t this seen coming?
The Story of Hertz Going Bust
51–60 of 120 posts
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#52I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
I had the unfortunate opportunity as an Accenture consultant to work on the Hertz redesign. It was a shit show and hands down the worst project I've ever been on. I left Accenture but not sure how much I'm allowed to talk about it.
Needless to say, leadership across ALL disciplines (mobile, front-end, backend, etc) was a fucking joke and they didn't listen to the red flags we brought up in literal sprint 1.
Sorry to hear about your Hertz experience.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#53I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
2014 - its interesting this is when headquarters moved from NJ to Florida. Its a bit like SV - are California/North East expensive because its worth it? I'm not sure if Hertz went downhill because of the move or you just can't run a smart company from Florida.
You can probably run a smart company from Florida if you start there but can you transplant a company from New Jersey to Florida and expect it to survive?
These corporate HQ moves don't seem to work out well (e.g. Boeing)
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#54I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
The company is bankrupt, but Hertz is a success story for the executives who got rich and got out.
The incentives encourage destruction through short term value extraction at the expense of long term health.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've always rented from Hertz because they've historically been the least hassle, if more expensive than Enterprise. I live in downtown Toronto and don't own a car. I use car sharing for local needs, but the traditional car rental companies for when I need to leave the city. Enterprise has been consistently terrible. On multiple occasions I've had to wait hours past my scheduled pick-up time due to either understaffi…
I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen Sixt in North America? They’re definitely one step above the rest here in Europe
They have locations at larger US airports. I've used them a few times and never had a bad experience.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#56I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
I had the unfortunate opportunity as an Accenture consultant to work on the Hertz redesign. It was a shit show and hands down the worst project I've ever been on. I left Accenture but not sure how much I'm allowed to talk about it. Needless to say, leadership across ALL disciplines (mobile, front-end, backend, etc) was a fucking joke and they didn't listen to the red flags we brought up in literal sprint 1. Sorry to…
For the most part, all that I've heard of Accenture seems to match what you are saying.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#57I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
> "we had a great team and incompetent senior management."
Whether or not it's true, I think you'll find this sentiment from any engineering level alum from a big company that died.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#58I think the most “duhhh” moment was moving the headquarters. Of course they lost a ton of experienced and qualified staff when they moved the headquarters to Florida. Why wasn’t this seen coming?
$$$
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#59I am Hertz Alumni, 2011-2016. We had a great group of engineers and product people, many of us far too talented to be in company like what hertz turned into. We were under the leadership of an incredible division head and most of the folks in our group felt a deep sense of loyalty to her. Nearly all of us, including that division head, are gone now, mostly laid off. If you poll any random Hertz alumnus, the story you…
It's interesting to hear both sides.
> Sidenote, the work we were doing was replaced with Accenture consultants, who couldn't handle it, screwing up so bad they ended up in court [3].
And elsewhere...
> I had the unfortunate opportunity as an Accenture consultant to work on the Hertz redesign. ... Needless to say, leadership across ALL disciplines (mobile, front-end, backend, etc) was a fucking joke and they [presumably Hertz?] didn't listen to the red flags we brought up in literal sprint 1.
Re: The Story of Hertz Going Bust
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've always rented from Hertz because they've historically been the least hassle, if more expensive than Enterprise. I live in downtown Toronto and don't own a car. I use car sharing for local needs, but the traditional car rental companies for when I need to leave the city. Enterprise has been consistently terrible. On multiple occasions I've had to wait hours past my scheduled pick-up time due to either understaffi…
What I liked about Hertz was being able to choose a particular from a collection of models in the chosen size category, which allowed me to get the combination of CarPlay and rear camera that I liked. As for the article blaming their fleet for sticking with sedans for too long, to me as a European traveler, this is a feature . One time, I rented from a different company, which "generously" stuck me with some monster…
> As for the article blaming their fleet for sticking with sedans for too long, to me as a European traveler, this is a feature. One time, I rented from a different company, which "generously" stuck me with some monster SUV, and I mostly hated the experience.
I also like sedans, particularly small ones that don't use much fuel. And all of the rental companies have sedans in their fleets. The issue is that they depreciate quickly because of Americans' preferences for trucks and SUVs.
I'm gonna make up some numbers here, but they illustrate the point. A Toyota Tacoma that costs $30,000 new might retain 75% of it's value after 3 years and 30,000 miles (these numbers are approximate). So you sell it for $22,500 and you take a $7,500 depreciation hit.
Meanwhile, an Hyundai Elantra that costs $21,000 retains 55% of it's value over that same period, so you can sell it for $11,500 and take a $9,450 depreciation hit.
As a general rule, trucks seem to retain their value very well, followed by SUVs and then sedans (at least in the US). Luxury sedans devalue the most.
The issue that Hertz had is that they bought a bunch of sedans and then the market preference shifted heavily to SUVs (with oil prices being low). So their initial calculations showed that they'd be able to sell their cars on the used market for price $X, but then they ended up being worth a lower amount, $Y, when consumer preferences shifted.