Why I was wrong about Lime Scooters

When Lime Scooters first launched in Melbourne, I was convinced that they would fail. We’d seen the absolute demise of oBikes, the bicycle rental system that was widely loathed by locals in 2018. The Singapore parent company behind the bicycle rental company wasn’t quite ready for non-compliant Melburnian pranksters who’d purposefully dump bikes in very weird spots including the Yarra (42 found within 4 hours), on top of buildings, on street signs, in trees, dangerously on train tracks and, most annoyingly, in clusters outside my house. (P.S. This is a brilliant and insightful read about oBike’s woes from a Melbourne criminology lecturer and avid cyclist.)

So when Lime Scooters launched earlier this year in Melbourne, I distinctly remember having several conversations where I loudly declared that their days were numbered. But then the opposite happened. Lime Scooters thrived. So much so that now some are calling Lime Scooter users pests. In hindsight, here’s why I was so wrong about Lime Scooters.

The ill-fated oBikes were entering a heavily mature product category in a city full of enthusiasts. Melbourne is the most bicycle friendly city in Australia, and cyclists here are a keen bunch who have spent a pretty penny on bikes to their liking. This is NOT the audience that either oBikes or Lime Scooters are going after. This audience won’t want a heavy, dirty single speed bike. If they aren’t with their bike, they’re probably not somewhere they’re keen to cycle to or from (e.g. on a fancy outing and ready to book an Uber).

Therefore regular and passionate cyclists are not our core demographic.

Somehow getting someone who is a casual or newbie cyclist to consider hiring a cheap bike to explore doesn’t seem sexy or fun. Something about getting onto a single speed oBike and manually pedalling around feels like exercise, and that’s a hard sell. Stepping on an e-scooter and having it do all that work for you is completely different. This completely removes one big barrier of oBikes. Plus e-scooters can be less intimidating than bicycles. Not everyone can cycle, and even out of those who can, not everyone is comfortable doing so. Scooters can appeal to a wider audience. (Although honestly to me still absolutely feels like a death trap.)

I also noticed a lot of the early adopters I spotted on Lime Scooters were actually people out on a big night, dressed to the nines. Gals in heels and fancy dresses, dudes in suits. Compared to ride share bikes, the e-scooters meant to people’s clothes weren’t coming into direct contact with large parts of dirty bikes that had been left in the rain and you were crumpling your outfit to sit down and pedal.

And lastly, there’s a novelty factor to the Lime Scooters. Riding around on very daggy bright green e-scooters feels like something you can do with a group of mates (helped by the fact that they always seem to be found in clusters) and something that would be fairly funny to post as an Instagram Story.

In other words, oBikes felt like they were trying to be another genuine bicycle option, but targeting knowledgable cyclists with very easily vandalised, basic bikes is a very hard task. E-scooters came in as a completely fresh category, filling a very different need.

So Lime Scooters, sorry for doubting you. But I’ll still never get on one of you.