By 2022, there were 1 million electric cars in France, but the infrastructure couldn’t keep up and there were only 80.000 charging stations available. That meant that driving long distances was still a problem for electric car owners, especially when driving through remote places where there were zero charging stations. This generated range anxiety and made the switch from thermic to electric more difficult. The challenge for Renault was to find a solution that would make the charging network grow fast, without having to deal with the constraints and bureaucracy of building public charging stations, while still making it available to everyone.

Renault Plug Inn is a peer-to-peer app that connects electric car drivers to home charger owners. Drivers can find and book the home chargers available wherever and whenever they need it, and charger owners can make money by renting them out. It’s like an Airbnb for charging spots that solves the problem of driving long distances through remote places where there used to be zero charging stations for electric cars while creating a new business model.

Our solution comes from a data-driven insight: there are only 80 000 public charging stations for more than a million of electric drivers. While waiting for the public network to grow up (400 000 charging stations in 2030), we needed to bring a solution to the electric drivers especially off the main roads. Our main objective is to quickly offer to this audience a national charging stations network by creating a community concerned and sensitive to the electric boundaries. And our second objective is to allow people to monetize their charging stations and to try to make money with it, in a context of a decreasing purchasing power.

The Plug Inn app launch is ongoing and following 4 main steps. First step started took place for 3 days (21-23 of February) with a beta pre-opening only for selected pre-registered users & Renault/Agency employees, to test the app. Then, an initial soft launch began the 9th of march for all pre-registered users & Renault/Agency employees to gradually scale the app and test usages. Eventually, the public launch occurred the 13th of march with opening of the app to all users in Apple and Android stores. This launch was supported by a media cover (press release, organic posts, displays in Renault dealership). The final stage of the launch, at the beginning of April, is an advertising campaign on TV, press and radio, enhanced by an influence marketing campaign. Social media are also being used as a recruitment tool, supplemented by emailing and a partnership with Waze.

In only 2 weeks after it was launched, the application had 16.000 users, and had reached 107 million impressions and over 500.000€ in earned media.