DriveTribe

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DriveTribe

Type of site	Automotive social media
Headquarters	London, UK
Founder(s)	Ernesto Schmitt Jeremy Clarkson Richard Hammond James May
Parent	W. Chump & Sons
URL	drivetribe.com
Commercial	Yes
Launched	28 November 2016; 5 years ago (2016-11-28)
Current status	Active

DriveTribe is an automotive enthusiast online community platform founded by (and featuring content from) The Grand Tour presenters Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond.^[1]

From left to right, Richard Hammond, James May and Jeremy Clarkson

The platform is a social media website that is categorised by automotive-themed 'tribes', which allow users to join open groups of car enthusiasts with similar interests. This method can be considered as new compared to older and more traditional forums, as members can post articles, quizzes, and polls in their tribe rather than just a thread topic.

Tribes[]

Tribes are categorisations and themes, allowing users to find content most relevant to their area of interest. These range from Tribes dedicated to particular makes and models, to Tribes about road trips, engineering and even remote-controlled cars. The website launched in November 2016, under Ernesto Schmitt, Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May to much fanfare, with several selected tribe leaders to get things started. These early adopters started their tribes a week ahead of the full release to allow new fan-made tribes to reach maturity before the masses were allowed entry. Each tribe has a specific theme and members join whichever tribe fits their personal tastes. Some Tribes are run by automotive celebrities such as Mark Webber, Damon Hill, and many others.^[2]

Leadership and investors[]

Serial tech entrepreneur Ernesto Schmitt is a Co-Founder and the former CEO of the platform. Financing for DriveTribe came from, among others, 21st Century Fox and Breyer Capital, who have invested respectively $6.5 and $5.5 million in the platform.^[3][4]

Commercialisation[]

In April 2018, DriveTribe announced its first commercial partnership, with German car manufacturer Audi.^[5]

In June 2018, DriveTribe launched a joint partnership with JOE Media and Renault, a six-figure deal focusing on the launch of the Megane RS. Renault UK marketing director, Adam Wood, said the partnership would look to "engage a broader lifestyle market through original content production, influencer led activation and editorial support."^[6]

In November 2018, the DriveTribe CEO, Jonathan Morris, described the four elements of the company's commercial model, which include content creation, distribution, and data insights.^[7] The latter of which is made possible because DriveTribe's tech stack is built on Apache Flink.^[8]

Data[]

In an article on LinkedIn, DriveTribe CSO, Richard Beech said that data captured by DriveTribe user engagement had allowed the company to connect car brands to "millennials who are affluent and open-minded when it comes to electric vehicles, or mums and dads that own SUVs, but that have limited knowledge about tyres".^[9]

References[]