Growth and expansion
Between 2011 and 2013, the company expanded from 5 employees to 22, grew to seven business markets (Chicago, New York, Washington, D.C., Boston, Baltimore, Newark, and Milwaukee) and opened an office in New York City.[14] By August 2015, SpotHero serviced 5 additional cities: Denver, Minneapolis, New Orleans, Philadelphia, and San Francisco.[15][16] In July 2016, the company expanded to Los Angeles,[17] and in January 2017 added 13 additional cities, including Austin, Indianapolis, Miami and San Diego.[18] In 2020, the company was recognized as the fifteenth-largest privately held consumer marketplace.[19] As of November 2020, the company services over 400 cities in North America with a network of over 11,000 facilities.[20]
SpotHero for Business was launched in March 2017, as a business-focused service with features and tools for paying, managing and organizing parking expenses.[21] The company also launched a free developer platform to help businesses integrate parking reservations into their existing apps.[22] In May 2017, SpotHero announced a partnership with commuter employee benefits administrator WageWorks allowing users to pay pre-tax dollars for daily parking near their places of work.[23]
In 2018, SpotHero was named to Time magazine's inaugural list of 50 Genius Companies that are inventing the future.[24][25] According to Time, "By allowing users to reserve a spot rather than circling dense city centers, apps like SpotHero can help stem congestion and pollution."[24] That year, SpotHero purchased 500 Waze beacons for $15,000 and gave them to the Chicago Department of Transportation to install in the lower roads of downtown Chicago, broadcasting an open signal so GPS will work properly.[26][27] Following an integration of its technology with Google Assistant and Hertz rental cars, SpotHero announced that it had readied 500 parking facilities in Chicago for driverless cars.[28][29]
In March 2019, SpotHero partnered with transit app Moovit to offer drivers the chance to view and book off-street parking near transit stations in San Francisco, to help ease road congestion in the Bay Area.[30][31] In June 2019, it was reported that SpotHero was partnering with Waze, a GPS navigation software app owned by Google, to link their navigation and parking into a unified user experience.[32]
In 2023, the company launched Flex Rates, a customizable dynamic pricing product allowing operators of parking garages or lots to adjust prices based on real-time data.[33]
