Touting the virtues of electric vehicles, the non-profit organization Plug’n Drive routinely hosts demonstrations where members of the public can get behind the wheel of an EV.
The group brings its nationwide ‘EVs are for Everyone’ tour nearby with a stop in Guelph starting this month.
Plug’n Drive has two separate mobile EV education trailers touring different parts of Canada. Each trailer is staffed with EV ambassadors from the community who can speak about the electric driving lifestyle.
Plug’n Drive now has a trailer at the Victoria Road Recreation Center in Guelph, where it will remain until June 14. Interested participants can drop by the trailer, ask questions, check out the EVs, and book a test drive.
“We’ve done events in Guelph since the very beginning, because Guelph has quite an environmental ethic, and it’s a good adopter community. We’re really looking forward to it,” said Cara Clairman, president and CEO of Plug’n Drive.
The national EV tour, launched in 2024, continues this year with partial funding from Natural Resources Canada. After Guelph, the trailer will continue its road trip to Muskoka, then to Quebec City and finally to Montreal.
Bringing the electric vehicles to different communities makes it more convenient for people to learn about the technology, and one of the biggest advantages of the event is the ability for participants to take a test drive, the group notes.
“We bring the cars, and you can try them – we find that really helps people make a decision,” said Clairman.
EVs for Everyone’s focus is on bringing test vehicles to small and medium-sized communities that have less access to EV resources than urban centres such as Toronto.
“We realized that in a lot of parts of Canada, you can’t get a test drive at all, let alone a test drive of a whole bunch of different brands. So, we thought it’s really important [that] if we want to say EVs are the future and they’re for everyone, we should make them available to everyone. That’s really what the philosophy behind the tour is: to get to places that wouldn’t have dealerships,” said Clairman.
Test drives will be available from Thursday to Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Participants can take their pick amongst a variety of EVs, including a 2025 Chevrolet Blazer, 2025 Chevrolet Silverado, 2026 Hyundai IONIQ9, 2024 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV, and a 2025 Volvo EX30.
To prevent long waits, Clairman recommends that interested participants book their test drive slots online in advance. Registration is currently open on Plug’n Drive’s website.
“The great thing about the tour is we bring what we do here at our Discovery Centre in Toronto, where we have all the makes and models of [EV] cars, and no pressure to buy anything, and we’re bringing it to your community,” she explained.
The nationwide EV education tour is only one part of Plug’n Drive’s education. The non-profit also has an ‘Electrify Your Workplace’ series, including a webinar and test drives, geared towards businesses and workplaces looking to engage their employees and communities around building a healthier future. Training in the EV industry is another area of focus.
“Now we’re doing a lot of training. We’re training mechanics in partnership with the Automotive Industries Association and a program called Achēv, which is for new immigrants exploring the EV industry as a potential career. We do some special programming for Uber drivers. We do any kind of training that somebody wants.”
Clairman herself has been a long-time driver of an EV, buying her first one in 2011, when there was only one EV charging station in the entire province.
“For me, it was really about the environment. I knew there was a huge emission reduction. And, also, I was starting up Plug’n Drive, so I thought, ‘Gotta put your money where your mouth is. If I can’t do it, who else will do it?’ And so, I did it, and it was quite challenging. The range of the vehicles was really low compared to today, like 120 kilometres. For 90 per cent of my driving, it was fine. The odd time I had to rent a car. Now I have a Hyundai IONIQ 5, and it gets almost 500 kilometres on a charge. So, it’s not an issue at all,” she said.
Some of the questions and concerns Clairman hears the most from the public are about the availability of electric chargers and the range of the vehicles. While public perception is that there aren’t many EV charging stations, in urban and suburban areas, there are quite a few. Helpful tools such as the Charge Finder website can even identify nearby EV charging stations to the user’s location. As of last spring, there were over 33,700 public electric vehicle charging ports nationwide.
“The public charging is quite good. Where it is a bit weak is in the more rural, remote areas,” explained Clariman.
She added that most Canadians have a daily commute under 50 km, making it more practical to have an EV than people perceive.
For Clairman, the switch to electric means she’s never going back.
“EVs are just more fun to drive than gas cars, and that’s why we love the test drive, because people get the chance to experience that. They have better pickup, they’re quiet, they’re super fun. If you like to drive, it’s a better driving experience. So that’s why we like to get people behind the wheel.”
Anyone interested in signing up for the tour can learn more at www.plugndrive.ca/meet-guelph.
