Car Rental Survey Highlights Top Brands of 2023

A new survey found that National Car Rental was the top brand for business travel buyers again, but the industry thrived, with four of five qualifying brands improving from 2022.

According to BTN’s 2023 Car Rental Survey, National took home the top spot for the eighth consecutive year, followed by Enterprise in second place, which was also the only brand with a lower overall score this year.

Avis and Hertz battled for third place, with the former taking the podium spot after BTN was forced to extend the results another decimal place to finalize the rankings. Avis’ sister brand, Budget, fell to fifth place in the 2023 survey.

“2022 was an extremely difficult year,” American Car Rental Association spokesperson Greg Scott told BTN. “The car rental industry could not meet demand because of a lack of vehicles. About mid-year in 2022 I started hearing more and more ACRA members say that their demand for vehicles was being met or close to being met by suppliers.”

As staffing remains a concern across the industry, overall scores are still lower than 2019, but optimism is growing. Nearly 38 percent of respondents said overall car rental customer service has improved in the past 12 months, while only 10 percent said it declined.

“There are still some challenges in the industry, but if [scores] are up from last year, they’re trending in the right direction,” GoldSpring Consulting partner Neil Hammond told BTN. “Still, we have some way to go to previous service levels. Companies have lost money and went into recovery as well. We know there have been a slew of rate increases and stealth increases that are now filtering through contracts, and that factors into the equation, too.”

The survey also found that chauffeured transportation and ride-hailing companies saw dips in overall service and satisfaction scores from business travel buyers, but they improved in availability and maintenance levels from last year.