SALEM — If you see a car driving around the North Shore that looks too small to be on the road and is one tire short of normal, don’t be alarmed. It’s a road legal FUV — Fun Utility Vehicle — that’s probably owned by Salem’s Rich Benoit.
The two-seat, all-electric car was produced by the Oregon-based company Arcimoto Inc., which sold the vehicles and a single-seat version with a flatbed for around $20,000. Arcimoto hasn’t seen as much success with the vehicles as it expected and has stopped making new ones, but many of the cars are still available to buy secondhand.
The co-owner of his own electric vehicle repair company, Electrified Garage, Benoit, 42, was gifted two of the fun-sized vehicles by Arcimoto to drive around and promote the unusual product.
He liked them so much that he bought two more. He often lends them to friends, family and neighbors of the home he shares with his brother, 52-year-old Marine Corps veteran Roderick Jones, in Witchcraft Heights.
“They’ll take them out to Dunkin’ Donuts, Market Basket,” Benoit said. “You’ll see multiple people driving them because they’re our neighbors. On a nice day, they’ll just take them.”
Benoit calls the FUV the ideal single-person transport for walkable cities like Salem.
“If they could sell them at a lower price point, I think everyone in Salem would have one of these,” he said, noting how little space they take up.
FUVs are registered as cars. They go on the highway and can reach 75 or 80 mph. They’re quiet and small. They can travel up to 100 miles on one charge. Some have doors. And to Benoit, “they’re almost perfect.”
“The reactions you get from people are insane,” he said. “My brother has been stopped three, maybe four times a day when he drives them and people ask him about what it is, where you can buy them. He gets stopped all the time.”
“I had this one guy follow me from Salem all the way to the Danvers Lowes,” Jones said.
Kids tell Jones how cool the car is. Adults have asked if he’s willing to sell one. The Salem News’ own home delivery manager was so fascinated by the car when she spotted it while delivering newspapers that she flagged down Jones and asked to take a picture.
But the best reactions are from police officers, Jones said.
“They always look at me like, ‘What is that?’” he said. “But they’ve never stopped me or pulled me over.”
The FUV also has heated seats and handgrips for colder months, and some owners are known to equip it with snow tires in the winter. Though Benoit and Jones haven’t tested the car in New England snow.
“I’ve driven it in the cold when it was 30 degrees,” Benoit said. “When there’s snow on the ground, I tend to drive something else.”
He has repaired some of the cars through his company, and said he would be surprised if the FUV isn’t ever put back into production.
“Maybe I might take my own venture into bringing the company back ourselves,” Benoit said. “I’ve never thought that something could be so popular when it’s so simple.”
Contact Caroline Enos at CEnos@northofboston.com .