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Turo Profile: Pandemic Layoffs, Business Model, and Current Status

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The profile

Turo laid off 108 employees, 30 percent of its staff, as shelter-in-place orders stopped car rentals in spring 2020. On April 28, 2020 its lender approved a $6,572,900 Paycheck Protection Program loan. Turo later told investors that its bank had found the full amount eligible for forgiveness, and that it repaid the loan anyway, in July 2021, "given our recent business performance."

  • Category: peer-to-peer car sharing
  • Pandemic-layoff role: Additional sourced company
  • Last updated: 2026-09-25
  • Related article: The Pandemic Layoff Stress Test

Founders, executives and investors

Turo lets private car owners rent out their vehicles through its website and app. It was incorporated in Delaware in August 2009 as RelayRides, Inc. and took the name Turo in March 2016. Andre Haddad, formerly chief executive of Shopping.com, has been chief executive since September 2011 and chairperson since October 2011. The company raised close to $500 million in equity; Crunchbase News named IAC, G Squared and August Capital as its largest stakeholders.

Business before the pandemic

It is sometimes described, TechCrunch noted, as "the Airbnb for cars"; car owners are hosts and renters are guests. By its own count it had 150,000 active hosts, 350,000 active vehicle listings and 3.5 million active guests in September 2024, across the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France and Australia.

What the pandemic changed

Turo's registration statement lists the March 2020 cost cuts: less marketing spend, layoffs, furloughs and salary reductions, and the closing of its German business. Layoffs.fyi recorded the layoff in April 2020 at 108 employees in San Francisco and Phoenix, across all departments. "Consumers are no longer renting cars due to shelter-in-place orders," it wrote, and the same collapse hit Turo's competitors Getaround and Zipcar.

The federal loan followed. SBA's PPP data show the $6,572,900 loan approved on April 28, 2020 through LendingClub Bank, with 439 jobs reported and the whole amount listed for payroll. Turo's filing says it obtained about $6.6 million in May 2020, at 1 percent interest. To get it, Turo had to certify that economic uncertainty made the loan necessary. The filing warned investors that this certification "does not contain any objective criteria and is subject to interpretation," and that a finding of ineligibility could bring penalties, including under the False Claims Act. In February 2021 Turo applied for forgiveness, and its bank said the full amount was eligible, subject to SBA's decision. Turo repaid the loan in full in July 2021 instead; SBA's data record it as paid in full on August 10, 2021, with no forgiveness.

After the first shock

The rental business came back fast. Use of the platform rose above pre-pandemic levels in the second half of 2020 as shelter-in-place orders lifted, the company said, and it credited the pandemic with drawing more people to host cars for income. Turo's revenue was $150 million in 2020, according to Haddad, and $469 million in 2021, up 213 percent. TechCrunch, citing the company's filings, put part of that jump down to "a boost from the COVID-19 pandemic." Revenue reached $746.6 million in 2022 and $879.7 million in 2023, and Turo reported net income of $154.7 million in 2022 and $14.7 million in 2023.

Turo filed publicly for an initial public offering in January 2022 and updated the prospectus in November 2024, reporting $722 million of revenue for the first nine months of that year, up about 8 percent.

Since 2025

On January 1, 2025 attackers used vehicles rented through Turo in two separate attacks. In New Orleans a man drove a Ford F-150 Lightning pickup onto Bourbon Street, killing 15 people including himself. In Las Vegas a Tesla Cybertruck exploded outside the Trump International Hotel. Turo said it did not believe either renter had a criminal background that would have flagged them.

On February 13, 2025 Turo withdrew its IPO registration. The filing said only that it "does not wish to conduct a public offering of securities at this time." Haddad said the board had "decided now is not the right time for Turo to pursue a public offering," and that 2024 revenue had reached $958 million. The day before, Getaround had shut down its U.S. operations.

Sources

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