In October, The Information reported that Bird was spending $551 per scooter with a goal of reducing that cost to $360. At the time, I said that meant Bird needed five rides a day on a $551 scooter for 5.25 months just to recoup the initial cost.

The picture painted by the Louisville data is even worse. Transit enthusiast Nathan Stevens also analyzed the Louisville data for Aug. 9 through Nov. 30, and I'm going to pull in some of what he found to back out scooter economics in Louisville:

Utilization

• 663 scooters in circulation
• The average trip was 1.63 miles
• The average trip lasted 18 minutes
• The average scooter did 3.49 rides per day

Revenue

• Both Bird and Lime charge $1 to unlock a scooter and $0.15 per minute
• At 18 minutes, the average trip generated $3.70 in revenue (note that this, based on three months of data in Louisville is nearly identical to the $3.65 in revenue per ride Bird reportedly told investors it was averaging as of June)
• At 3.49 rides per day, the average scooter generated $12.91 in revenue per day

General costs, based on reporting by The Information

• Bird spent $1.72 per ride on charging costs
• It spent another $0.51 per ride, on average, on repairs
• Credit card fees cost $0.41 per ride
• Customer support adds $0.06 per ride
• Insurance is $0.05 per ride

Louisville-specific costs, from dockless vehicle policy (pdf)

• $2,000 for a probationary license (required for the first six months of operation)
• Additional $1,000 to receive full operating license
• Annual $50 fee per dockless vehicle
• Daily $1 fee per dockless vehicle
• $100 fee per designated group parking area

Louisville daily scooter economics

• A scooter generates $3.70 in revenue per ride
• Deducting per-ride costs of charging, repairs, credit card fees, customer support, and insurance, leaves $0.95 per ride
• Multiplied by 3.49 rides per day is $3.32 in net revenue per scooter per day
• Minus the $1 daily fee leaves $2.32

Our scooter company walks away with $2.32 in revenue per day from the average scooter in Louisville. As we said at the beginning, Louisville data indicates that the average scooter was around for between 28 and 32 days. That means the typical scooter generated something like $65 to $75 in revenue for the company after most operating costs over its lifetime.

https://oversharing.substack.com/p/shared-scooters-dont-last-long