Skoot: When One Teacher Saw a Need, She Rolled with It

In October of last year, Christine Sugrue had friends visiting from New Zealand. They were doing all the tourist things in New York City, and her friend’s seven-year-old son was struggling to keep up.

“The last night they were here, he and I were walking back to the train, holding hands, and he just said, ‘Oh Chris, I’m just so tired,’” Christine recalls. “Kids who are visiting aren’t used to walking that much. When I was talking to my husband about it, I said our kids never walked that far, they always had their scooters. I wished we would have had a scooter for Hugo when he was here.”

That wish became a question. What if families could rent children’s scooters in New York City, the same way people rent bikes or strollers?

 

From Curiosity to Commitment

After her friends flew home, Christine got curious. She sat down at her computer and typed in “scooter rental New York.” There were electric scooters. There were mobility scooters. But there wasn’t a single service offering the type of scooters her own kids had always used growing up.

“I couldn’t believe this didn’t exist,” she says. “We kept looking, and we still couldn’t find it. That’s when I started wondering, what would it take to make this happen?”

Christine didn’t let the thought sit. Within two weeks she had filed an LLC. She called insurance companies to figure out what coverage would look like, knowing liability was the first hurdle. She also reached out to the scooter brand her family trusted, and to her surprise, they wrote back. Suddenly, this wasn’t just an idea she was toying with — it was a path.

For Christine, every step was new. “I’m a public school teacher. I don’t go to meetings with CEOs, I go to meetings with parents,” she says. “But all of a sudden, professional women were taking what I was doing seriously. That really pushed me to keep going.”

By April 2025, her new business, Skoot, welcomed its first customer.

 

Taking a Leap Outside Her Comfort Zone

Christine has been a New York City public school teacher for 26 years, teaching middle school social studies. It’s a stable career, built on routine. Starting a business felt very different.

“It’s a really low-risk career,” she explains of teaching. “I know what I have to do, and there’s not the gamble that starting a business is. But here, everything comes back to my decisions.”

Still, her husband and teenage twins encouraged her to take the leap. “They’ve been so supportive of me trying something outside my comfort zone,” she says. “They’d rather see me give it a shot than watch me look back years later wondering, what if?”

 

Families Show It Works

From the beginning, families validated what Christine had suspected on that walk to the train: visitors needed a way for kids to keep up in New York City. With 65 million people visiting New York every year, even a fraction of a percent being families with young children meant the need could be enormous.

The five-star Tripadvisor reviews became proof she had stumbled onto a great idea. Parents called the scooters “a game changer,” “the best thing we did,” and even the “MVPs of our trip.” One dad wrote that renting a scooter “turned the toughest part of our trip into the best part.”

For Christine, these weren’t just compliments. They confirmed there was a gap worth filling. “Everyone who has rented has given glowing reviews,” she says. “Sometimes they look at us like we saved their trip. That means everything.”

 

How Skoot Works

Skoot rents foldable manual scooters for kids ages four to twelve. Families book online, and Christine or her family deliver the scooters to hotels in Manhattan and Brooklyn, then pick them up when the rental ends. The cost is $30 per day, with discounts for multi-day rentals.

Most families rent for two or three days, though some stay longer. One family visiting from Sweden rented scooters for two full weeks during a home exchange. Christine often checks in with parents by text, making the service feel personal and friendly.

She also adds small touches, like replacing helmets on short notice or tucking in stickers for kids. Parents sometimes send her photos of their children smiling on scooters, which Christine keeps as reminders of the joy Skoot brings.

 

Looking Ahead

Christine is still teaching, but she sees Skoot as her bridge to what comes next. She is determined to grow it into something lasting, a venture she can carry into life after teaching.

“In my dream world, I build this business to the point where I transition into that being my gig when I retire from teaching,” she says.

For now, every happy family reminds her why she took the leap. “It’s better to take a chance than to look back and wonder,” Christine reflects. “Even if all I did was help a few families, I know I made their time in New York better. And that makes it worth it.”

Based in Brooklyn, New York
Website: www.skootbk.com
Instagram: @skootbk
Email: hello@skootbk.com
Phone: (201) 788-8287