Australia’s first and largest car sharing service — GoGet — was founded in 2003 when Nic Lowe and Bruce Jeffreys noticed their Newtown neighbourhood was full of unused cars. The idea of car sharing occurred to them as a way to reduce the number of private cars on the street, reduce the community’s carbon footprint, save on the resources required to make new cars and free up space for alternative uses. On a larger scale, car sharing also has the capacity to reshape the way our cities look and function.

The average private car is parked 95% of the time. Figures from 2017 show a total of 17,158,195 cars in Australia, that’s the equivalent of or 1.8 cars per household.

GoGet’s mission statement is to “empower smarter lifestyles and to create more liveable communities”. The company implements this vision by: providing an alternative to private cars that minimises the cost for users — petrol, maintenance, insurance, registration, etc.; helping people to better understand the costs of their transportation choices for the environment and the community; and reducing the amount of people who drive in order to tackle congestion and climate change.

GoGet was created with the simple goal of reducing the number of unused cars in our communities. This idea resonated with community members with GoGet’s growth being driven by consumer demand for their service. After starting with just 12 members, GoGet has now grown to a network of 80 staff, 2,900 cars and 162,000 members.  

One GoGet on the street removes 10 privately owned cars from the road, frees up 50 metres of road space and is used by 30 different members on average.