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The Hertz Co. has upped the number of electronic vehicles it plans to cut from its fleet.
In its first quarter earnings statement released last week, the Estero-based rental car giant said it would now sell off 30,000 of its electric vehicles — 10,000 more vehicles than what it originally announced in January.
The selloff comes almost two years after the company made a big splash announcing it was buying 100,000 cars from Tesla, buying 65,000 from Swedish automaker Polestar and installing 3,000 charging stations nationwide.
The company was so gung-ho on its transformation that it hired now-retired NFL quarterback Tom Brady as a spokesman to pitch its EV offerings.
Hertz did not say in the earnings statement why it was increasing the number of electric vehicles to be sold off. But in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing in January, it said the reason it was culling the fleet was to eliminate a “disproportionate number of lower margin rentals and reduce damage expenses associated with EVs.”
The quarterly earnings statement is the first under the company’s new CEO, Gil West, who replaced Stephen Scherr April 1. West is Hertz’s fifth CEO in the past seven years.
Hertz’s revenue increased 2% to $2.1 billion in the first quarter when compared with the same period last year.
According to the earning statement, there was “a $195 million charge to vehicle depreciation” in the first quarter for writing down the value of the electric vehicles for sale and to recognize the losses on vehicles sold during the quarter.
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