EV Charging Stations Benefit Businesses
Electric vehicle charging stations will improve your business and add an additional revenue stream. How? Customers will have another reason to visit your location.
Will it really? Won’t everyone just charge at home or go somewhere to charge like they do for filling up their gas tank? I think not.
Will there be multiple Level 3 Fast Charging Stations at one convenient location? Yes, of course.
One such example is the NXTGEN Clean Energy Solutions EV Café powered by solar canopies, micro wind turbines, and battery storage with solar parking lot lighting. These types of facilities will provide a wonderful place for EV drivers to charge their vehicles with a comfortable place to grab a coffee or meal with free WiFi, clean restrooms, and comforable seating. Pretty awesome right?
But a high percentage of EV drivers will also want to charge their vehicles at other locations where they will spend an hour or more. Places like the office, restaurants, shopping centers, and most certainly hotels.
This is a wonderful opportunity for businesses to take advantage of and highlighted in this article by John McAndrew.
Remember when businesses started offering internet, even before WiFi? At first, it was just the early adopters who would sit in the coffee shop, restaurant or hotel lobby to use the novel service. Some would charge for it; others would offer it free to customers. Hotels with slow or expensive connections would receive scathing reviews.
Businesses and cities that provide electric vehicle charging stations are seizing a similar opportunity.
There are not many of us EV drivers now, but those services change our behaviors. I am a regular at a coffee shop across from the intermodal ramp, which has six chargers. Since buying my EV two years ago, that’s where I’ve had 95% of my coffee. (Made some good friends there, too.) I would die for an L3/fast charger, so I could recharge in 30 or 45 minutes, instead of the L2 pace of three to five hours.
Restaurants, hotels and movie theaters with nearby L2 chargers in good working condition would surely see an increase in business, especially since there are so few chargers in Dubuque now. You can establish your reputation and EV drivers’ habits now.
Or, you can wait until everyone has them.