Our History
Starting out in 1957 as Executive Leasing, the business was based on our founder Jack Taylor’s visionary idea that customers would see the benefits of leasing automobiles rather than buying them. Conventional wisdom said otherwise, but Jack’s commitment to personal service won through.
By the late 1960s, Jack was opening operations outside of St. Louis, Missouri. Along the way, he introduced our distinctive ‘e’ logo that’s still used today, and renamed the company in honour of the U.S.S. Enterprise aircraft carrier on which Jack served in World War II.
In 1974 an enterprising rental manager in Orlando started a new pick-up programme that provided customers with a free ride to the rental office. As this innovative service quickly spread to other branches, it set a precedent for other people seeing their own great ideas being taken company-wide.
By the end of the 1980s we had over 800 locations nationwide, a fleet of 100,000 vehicles and a new name, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, to go with our $500 million revenue.
In 1993, we introduced the Enterprise wrapped car, symbolizing our dedication to customer service, which quickly became an icon. Soon after, we expanded into Canada. The 1990s were a great time for us, as Jack and his son Andy were named Ernst & Young National Entrepreneur of the Year ® and we were listed in Fortune Magazine as one of the ‘100 Best Companies to Work For’.
And now here we are, with over 6,900 locations worldwide, a fleet of over 879,000 vehicles and an extended family of over 64,500 enterprising employees with over 3,400 in the U.K and over 190 in Ireland. All of this growth and expansion comes from Jack’s personal philosophy that if you take care of your customers and employees first, the profits will follow.
More than anything, he recognised that customer retention is more important than anything else. To this end, employees have always been empowered to make decisions that directly affect their customers. By allowing branch managers to run their location as if it’s their own business and base a portion of their pay on branch profits, Jack has seen his personal Enterprise grow to more than $9 billion in revenue.
