<p>When booking a car, car rental companies do not guarantee that a specific model will be available. Normally they can only guarantee you'll get a model in the same category (or above). For example, you book category B and get a Golf, Corsa, Megane, or something like that.</p>
<p>How does that make business sense? Couldn't they just buy all Golfs for their category B? It would be easier to maintain the vehicles, they could get a bulk discount when buying every car from the same manufacturer, and they would not annoy the clients, showing a picture of car X but delivering car Y.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-03-23T21:25:07.203Z
I’m voting to close this question because it seems to be off-topic for this site.
jmbejara
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2021-03-24T06:10:18.397Z
@jmbejara: I don't think this is off-topic. There could be some economic explanation through use of concepts from horizontal product differentiation.
Dayne
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2021-03-24T06:14:42.257Z
@QuoraFeans: Say you don't like Golf. Then you would not *certainly* the go to the rental company which only has Golf in that category. But if in the other rental company which has both you have a *chance* that you get, say, corsa, which you like (suppose getting car of your choice is subject to availability). So by variety company is able to manage a variety of customers. Of course there maybe some other explanation too but this can be one too.
Dayne
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2021-03-25T18:46:51.713Z
Let's imagine the Golf is the perfect car or Category B.  So you buy a bunch of Golfs and keep buying them.  Eventually some other car is the perfect car for Category B.  Do you keep buying Golfs forever or do you replace your entire fleet of Category B vehicles at one time?  Probably not, so you're going to end up with a mix of vehicles in each category over time.
chicks
<microeconomics>
Why car rental companies have different models in the same group?
Quora Feans
# Why car rental companies have different models in the same group?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-03-23)

When booking a car, car rental companies do not guarantee that a specific model will be available. Normally they can only guarantee you'll get a model in the same category (or above). For example, you book category B and get a Golf, Corsa, Megane, or something like that.

How does that make business sense? Couldn't they just buy all Golfs for their category B? It would be easier to maintain the vehicles, they could get a bulk discount when buying every car from the same manufacturer, and they would not annoy the clients, showing a picture of car X but delivering car Y.

**Tags:** microeconomics

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: I’m voting to close this question because it seems to be off-topic for this site.  
> **username_2**: @username_1: I don't think this is off-topic. There could be some economic explanation through use of concepts from horizontal product differentiation.  
> **username_2**: @QuoraFeans: Say you don't like Golf. Then you would not *certainly* the go to the rental company which only has Golf in that category. But if in the other rental company which has both you have a *chance* that you get, say, corsa, which you like (suppose getting car of your choice is subject to availability). So by variety company is able to manage a variety of customers. Of course there maybe some other explanation too but this can be one too.  
> **username_3**: Let's imagine the Golf is the perfect car or Category B.  So you buy a bunch of Golfs and keep buying them.  Eventually some other car is the perfect car for Category B.  Do you keep buying Golfs forever or do you replace your entire fleet of Category B vehicles at one time?  Probably not, so you're going to end up with a mix of vehicles in each category over time.  

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