Does Las Vegas need on-demand valet services?
The addition of the 20,000-seat T-Mobile Arena on the Strip has ushered in a new era for Las Vegas — the end of free parking.
As Las Vegans and tourists alike are forced to adapt to shelling out around $10 to park their vehicles — or $20 if you don’t pre-pay for parking at the T-Mobile Arena — startup companies have jumped at the chance to provide similar parking-type services.
One of those startups, Luxe, a San Francisco-based company which just received a $50 million investment from Hertz, not only helps save time searching for parking, but it can also help with running personal errands.
How does it work?
According to Business Insider, “Luxe works as a valet on-demand. In a way similar to Uber, you tap on an app when you need your car parked, and it tracks you as you arrive at your destination, whether it’s at a restaurant for dinner or at your office for the day.”
Screen capture of Luxe app
After locating your driver and handing him the keys, he then uses the app to find the nearest Luxe-partnered garage. Through the app, drivers are then able to access a Bluetooth-enabled safe, which is secured to a wall inside the parking garage, to store vehicle keys.
As LA Weekly notes, the on-demand parking service charges either by the hour or a daily maximum rate. In Los Angeles, the rate was $5 per hour or $15 per day — a price which Luxe says you qualify for after your vehicle has been parked for a few hours.
Screen capture of Luxe app
Beyond parking your vehicle, Luxe drivers can also take care of errands for you — like filling your car’s gas tank or getting your vehicle washed and detailed.
The cost to fill gas is an additional service charge of $7.99 plus the bill for gas. For a car wash, the service charged an additional $40.
When you’re ready to go home, there’s no taking your valet ticket to a window and waiting a half-hour for them to retrieve your car. Instead, request your vehicle from the app and the driver will grab it from the parking garage and deliver it right to you — with a full tank of gas, if you opt-in for additional services.
Would on-demand parking work in Las Vegas?
Because Luxe isn’t offered in Las Vegas, it’s hard to predict what the services’ actual rates would be. With that said, LA Weekly found that its prices were lower than parking rates around the city.
Using those rates as an example, the prices would be comparable to the predicted $10 price that will soon be charged in Las Vegas. In some cases, it could be almost half the price since parking on the Strip is just a flat fee and doesn’t have a per-hour option.
But there’s one hiccup in the system that wouldn’t work in Las Vegas — the service stops operating at midnight.
A Los Angeles reporter discovered this when he requested his car at 11:57 p.m. and couldn’t reach either the driver or anyone from the customer service department.
For an additional $10 fee, the service will store your car overnight in its secure parking garage. However, that leaves you to find your own ride home.
Let us know how you feel about the service below.
Contact Caitlin Lilly at clilly@reviewjournal.com. Find her on Twitter: @caitielilly_
