A rent a car firm, also known as a car rental or hire car firm, is a business that specialises in providing hire cars for a limited period – usually from a day to around a month – for a fee for use by customers. People will hire a car for many reasons. The most obvious is inter state or international visitors to an area who have flown into an area and then wish to drive around once they are there. Another is people whose cars are in the repair shop due to a crash or an accident. Finally, another group of people, especially in the United States where hire cars are extremely cheap by Australian standards, are those who take advantage of cheap car rentals because they can some times, on occasion, work out cheaper than taking one’s own car when travelling long distances. Check this link https://www.ucar.com.au/adelaide/ if you are looking for Uber car hire.
The first rent a car firm was established in 1915, although for almost as long as humans have been travelling in horse and cart there have been examples of horses being offered for rent by stables and by inn keepers. In the city of Omaha in the American state of Nebraska, a real estate agent who was left bitterly disappointed when he had to wait several weeks for his car to be repaired following a break down had the idea of offering cars for rent. He charged at first six American cents per mile, and by late 1916 he was totalling over a million United States dollars in rentals per annum, a staggering figure considering the time. At this first rent a car agency, only Model Ts were for hire – today, of course, a wide range of vehicles are offered for hire by rent a car agencies, from premium luxury convertibles to economical city hatch backs to mini bus hire. Originally, car rentals were aimed at people that could not afford to own their own car, rather than travellers, and being involved with one was seen as somewhat gauche and déclassé. At first, many rent a car firms would charge extra for such things as gear shift cars, or those with an automatic ignition.
Somewhat foreshadowing the current situation where the busiest office for any rent a car firm in South Australia would be its Adelaide Airport car rental desk, so called rail drive, where business people and holiday makers would catch a long distance train to their destination and then hire a car from a depot located at the railway station once they arrived for driving around at their destination, became increasingly popular. As early on as 1926, this method of car rental was being advertised for use by rich holiday makers travelling from San Francisco to Californian beauty spots. Of course, as would be expected, the advent of the second World War severely curtailed the development of rent a car firms.