The car service price war continues: Challenging Uber, Gett tests $10 rides

On-demand car service Gett, now calling itself “Uber’s #1 competitor,” today announced that every ride it gives in Manhattan will cost a flat rate of $10 for the rest of the year.

Often described as a “race to the bottom,” transportation startups Uber and Lyft have continuously cut prices across their most popular cities. Uber, for example, now claims it’s cheaper than a city cab in New York. A few years ago, that was not the case.

This race to the bottom follows the storage war, in which big players like Google have driven the price of personal online file storage down to (nearly) zero.

Gett, which announced a $25 million funding round earlier this month, says its promotion will offer rides anywhere on the island — even “from Harlem to Wall Street” — for $10 automatically. It “doesn’t matter if you’re stuck in traffic for 2 hours,” the company said in an official release. Unlike Uber, however, tips are not included.

When asked about the impact this will have on the long-brewing car service price war, a Gett spokesperson told VentureBeat that “we want to always have the lowest prices possible, but not at the expense of our drivers, who we care about and consider our partners.” The company also said that “drivers’ pay will not be affected” by the price cut.

The company doesn’t currently have plans to launch the experiment in other cities, the spokesperson told us. But even if Gett’s test is momentary, it may leave an impact on Uber and Lyft if Gett proves its car service is just as addictive for consumers.