Self-Parking Cars Survey: Drivers Lack Trust in New Parking Features

As automotive manufacturers work toward developing autonomous vehicles, consumer remain wary. But there are some other high-tech features that drivers can potentially use to get a taste of self-driving cars without having to give up all of their control right away. For instance, some cars include self-parking features that drivers can use to do things like parallel park. However, according to AAA, drivers still don’t fully trust those features either. So what do consumers think about self-parking cars? We asked 1,000 respondents about their thoughts on these automotive features.

Self-Parking Cars

In Ask Your Target Market’s latest online survey, 74% of respondents said that they currently own or lease a vehicle. But of those consumers, just 7% said that their vehicle has the ability to park itself. Though only a small sample of 48 respondents, 65% of those who have self-parking cars said they’re at least somewhat satisfied with the feature.

Consumer Trust

In general, 62% of drivers said they feel at least somewhat confident parallel parking on their own. Just 32% said that they would trust a vehicle to parallel park for them. And even fewer, just 25%, said that they would potentially trust a vehicle to drive for them.

Future Buyers

Looking forward, 52% of respondents said that they’re likely to purchase another vehicle at some point in the future. 31% of those respondents said that they’re likely to purchase a vehicle that has a self-parking feature. And 87% of those who plan to buy self-parking cars said they’re likely to actually use that feature regularly.

Key Takeaways

Most drivers seem to be more confident in their own parking abilities than in those of a vehicle parking itself. But there are some consumers who plan to really look for self-parking features in their next vehicles. And those consumers seem pretty likely to actually use those features regularly. In addition, consumers are a bit more likely to trust self-parking cars than they are to trust self-driving cars. So for the companies that are developing autonomous vehicles, getting more consumers to trust self-parking features could be a huge benefit down the road. For now, demonstrating those features and maybe even spurring some word-of-mouth marketing campaigns with satisfied customers could be a good way for auto companies to increase interest in those features. You can view the complete survey results in the widget below and be sure to click “Open Full Report” to take advantage of all the chart and filter options.Photo Credit: Parallel Parking Failed, Again by Jason Thien under CC BY 2.0What do you want to know? If you need some consumer insights on a particular topic, let us know in the comments below and we’ll consider it for an upcoming survey post.

Results were collected on January 2-8 via AYTM’s online survey panel.