March 2004 —A folding bicycle delivered to your hotel? That’s the concept of Bike Rental Barcelona, delivery service in Barcelona, Spain. Putting a spin on conventional bike rentals from a shop, Bike Rental Barcelona delivery service brings the bike to the customer and then picks it up taking reservations either online or by phone. 

“We want to make it easy for our customers. By bringing the bike to them, they don’t have to waste time looking around for a shop”.

Introduced in November 2003, Bike Rental Barcelona, has already seen a lot of success. Besides convenience, accessibility is part of the key to its successful strategy. Bike Rental Barcelona is open 360 days a year, 7 days a week, 10 hours a day, with a website and a telephone hotline for reservations and service. The rental fees include Dahon folding bikes plus  delivery and pickup service; they come with a city map, lights, and a lock delivered in a zip-up bag and mechanics are on-call to assist with any difficulties.

But why folding bikes? Folding bikes make sense in a big city. They give you freedom of mobility without having to lug around a bulky bicycle. If you get tired you can just fold up the bike, which only takes 15 seconds, and put it in the back of a taxi or bring it on the train. You can take the bike into a restaurant or tapas bar, and it’s a lot easier and safer to store in your hotel room or apartment.

This is good news for companies like Dahon. Bike Rental Barcelona rents Dahon folding bikes, choosing the Boardwalk series for its city touring features, along with its price points. Dahon founder Dr. David Hon is excited about the arrangement and its positive side effects. “Customers renting our bikes in Barcelona have fallen in love with our portable bikes and this has translated into new sales for us and will continue to do so,” he says. Another reasoning is underscored by the fact that London recently implemented a congestion charge requiring cars to pay £5 to enter the city center. “Urban cycling is the obvious solution to reducing traffic. By giving people on their holidays the opportunity to ‘test ride’ a folding bike, we might be able to turn these people into daily bicycle riders at home. We’re seeing very positive results out of this in London and we hope other cities will follow suit,” he adds.