James Blain: 0:26

Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of the Ground Transformation Podcast. Uh, unfortunately today I do not have my esteemed co-host Ken Lucci. He is probably off doing an amazing deal, selling, buying all those wonderful things that he does. I'm sure we'll hear about the amazing deal he's cutting right now at some point in the future. But I'm super excited today because although I don't have Ken, I have someone that I have actually known for quite some time. Um, I've had the pleasure of working with him when he was on the ground transportation side. Now I am really excited to see where he's going with things. Um, I gotta tell you, I, I'm gonna use the introduction, right? So it's Dr. Uma Aslan from the Growth and Success Institute. Um, hey bud. How you doing?

Dr Umut Aslan: 1:09

Good. How are you, James?

James Blain: 1:11

I am good. I gotta tell you, I'm pretty excited about this because I remember when you were working in the family business and working together, implementing Pax, doing things there, and I'm pretty excited to see where you're at now. Um, for those that don't know, obviously give your family business the shout out. Tell us how'd you get into the industry.

Dr Umut Aslan: 1:32

A great question and how we started the business with my brother Alim. That was 2009, and before that we were working for a guy, I don't wanna give him his name. Everything was being done under the table. It was not like, professional, but it gave us like a learning platform to learn it. And I was also doing my master's in business administration, so something happened with the owner and my brother, so, and then he, my brother decided to. part his way. And the owner a day later called me, said, I cannot keep you because you have your brother. And I said, okay. And interestingly, SEM always wanted to start his own business. In the past, he applied for a limousine company, local limousine company in San Diego. They're not in the in business anymore. And they rejected him because of his age and he tells me, Hey, you know what, I always wanted to start my business. In limousine. What do you think? I said Fine. Let's go ahead and do it. So this is how we started. We started with one vehicle in a short amount of time that we grew up to, I think in six months, six vehicles, and then things

James Blain: 2:48

In six months.

Dr Umut Aslan: 2:50

six months.

James Blain: 2:51

So what did you guys start with? What was the first vehicle?

Dr Umut Aslan: 2:54

It was a Lincoln Town guy.

James Blain: 2:57

Okay. And this is like 2009, so that makes sense.

Dr Umut Aslan: 3:01

2009. And then we added, the second vehicle was an SUV. And that idea, we said, some of the people were asking, Hey, do you have more than four people? And then we added the SUV. And then the reason behind of it was because we could use the SUV both for as a Satan and also as A-N-S-C-V.

James Blain: 3:25

Right.

Dr Umut Aslan: 3:26

I had a background in the corporate marketing, so I did some more like the marketing ideas that caught a fire, and also that was the moment of the Google starting a, becoming Google Maps, Google business webpage. So that helped us a lot in a real quick, fast. Way that we grew up and other things I knew and SLI initially was resistant. I tell that people, because now Alim doesn't wanna get out of the events of the National Limousine Association or part of the peer groups. Right? I said, let's go to the, at that time it was LCP in Mega. I said, let's go give it a try. He said, what are we gonna do? We don't know anyone. I said, look. When I was working for a corporate, this is what we would do. We'd go to the, and then you learn. You meet people, it'll take you some time. After first one, it goes to almost all of them. It doesn't miss anything. And actually it's a great, because you learn, you meet people, you learn, you learn the deep details of the how to run your business, and you meet

James Blain: 4:31

Right.

Dr Umut Aslan: 4:32

And one thing that this industry is different than so many different industries because there is a way that to share. You don't learn it maybe at first meeting, but when you keep going there, people, when you build connections that they'll share, they'll help you to grow your business. Not like a pizza joint. You cannot that work together.

James Blain: 4:52

no, but I think, I think one of the things, and this comes up on literally interview after interview episode after episode. Is that we see people that are able to find mentors, that are able to find people to work with, that are able to really go out there and, and network. Um, one of the things that Ken and I say all the time is that the most backwards, the most ridiculous, the most poorly ran companies that we see. Are often kind of the little islands, the ones that don't want to go to meetings, that don't wanna talk to anyone else, that don't wanna figure it out, you know, because they have to figure everything out by themselves. They don't have peers that they can network with. They don't have anyone they can work with. So I think, I think that in my mind makes a lot of sense that early on you'd be going, now I've gotta know and just outta curiosity. So you guys go to your first event, you go to your first LCT, you guys are building out the business. Is it MIB at this point? Have you, have you guys, is that men in black or are you guys flying under a different flag? Or what does that company look like at that point?

Dr Umut Aslan: 5:54

It was men in black transportation. It was men in black transportation. And I think at that moment it's just like we quickly, I quickly wanted to go in there'cause I, I searched and I found it and I remember like, okay, so was it, I think it was Jim l he had a, he had his own business in Bakersfield and we were asking him, Hey, what, what do you recommend? He, the first question he asked, are you guys still driving? We said, yes. Get out of the driver's seat.

James Blain: 6:26

So six cars and you're both still driving.

Dr Umut Aslan: 6:29

at the beginning. You're doing everything to run the business.

James Blain: 6:33

what, what changes at that point, right? Jim gives you this advice, get outta the driver's seat. What happens once you guys step outta the driver's seat? Now you guys have this huge advantage, right? And that you've got two brothers running the business who kind of starts doing what?

Dr Umut Aslan: 6:49

So what we bring my sister. She is really, she

James Blain: 6:53

More family. I love it.

Dr Umut Aslan: 6:55

Yeah. It's a family business. And what we decide, she takes over, we get her ready, we train her to answer the phones, and she's smart. She's intelligent, she is very detail oriented. Celi is more like a picture, big picture oriented. I'm detail oriented. Visionary. I'm like, and my sister is kind of integrated between us'cause I'm detail oriented. He is a big picture guy. And then she comes in and. She takes over the reservation dispatching and she learns real, real quick and we start hiring people. So Celine becomes the finance and also the hr. And I become the marketing and sales guy that I go to the network and events and at that moment we start branching out. More to the networking events in the industry, both of us. But at the same time, I branch out to the local associations that to create like a IB brand by networking and also doing some activities like marketing, et cetera, in the local arena.

James Blain: 8:03

So this, this is 2009 ish, so that's where we start. At what point do you bring your sister in? Is that a year or two down the line.

Dr Umut Aslan: 8:13

I, I don't exactly remember, but it was quick. It was quick. It took us a while to get her on board. Initially, we asked her to answer the phones. She was living in Turkey and she didn't wanna come in here. So what we asked her, Hey, at least can you pick up the phones while we can have a sleep. You know, this is a 24 hours job and there is a time differences in Turkey. So we initially convinced her and then we say, look, the business is good. Why don't you come here? Join

James Blain: 8:42

actually convinced her to move from Turkey to the United States.

Dr Umut Aslan: 8:46

She's been, she's been here, yeah. A few times in, in the United States.

James Blain: 8:50

Okay, so what does that start to look like or how does that start to shift and change for you guys? So now you guys have kind of got your visionary, which is your brother Celine. You've got yourself, which is kind of the the integrator or the type A personality that's going in this detail oriented. You've got the sister now who's running kind of the phones and those pieces. what does that now start to look like in terms of growth? Are you guys still. Staying on that same path of bringing on more SUVs or what is the, what does the business kind of start to become at that point?

Dr Umut Aslan: 9:22

It become to grow more faster, more vehicles. And I think in a year or so, we could even offer this is, and remember this is a time that Uber is was born and they even offered us to be part of it. And we, and then the pricing were radicalized and I know some of the companies accepted. We said, no, we don't need you. We have enough business. We even have more than enough business that we can handle it, sustain it. And I think we grew up up to 15 vehicles

James Blain: 9:54

Okay.

Dr Umut Aslan: 9:55

with the sedans and the SUVs, and we had the. along the way. I don't remember the exact terms, but we also purchased a company, that local company, a limousine company with the two limousines. We added them to limousines in our entire fleet, and here comes 2015.

James Blain: 10:12

Okay.

Dr Umut Aslan: 10:13

Now we're starting like seeing the growth is going down.

James Blain: 10:17

Right.

Dr Umut Aslan: 10:18

If you remember, Uber is catching traction.

James Blain: 10:22

Yeah.

Dr Umut Aslan: 10:23

Everything that we're doing, it not resulting it, and we come up with the idea, okay, so we're doing whatever we need to do, but it's not like bringing results. We're not getting the results, what we wanna do. And then people are saying it. Even the big corporation saying it, Hey, heard you. I love you, but Uber is cheaper. I'll only use you for the CEO or the top level executive. So. Okay. And then we added minibus,

James Blain: 10:55

Okay, so you guys jump straight to the larger vehicles.

Dr Umut Aslan: 10:58

larger vehicles. Yes.

James Blain: 10:59

And this is, and we're talking, you know, 2015, so this is well before, when we start seeing in 20 18, 20 19, a lot of the companies jumping up, you guys are getting way ahead of that. Especially being in California, I can only imagine the fun it was to try and jump up to that level. So what does that look like? When you guys entered that first mini bus, was that something where Alim had the idea and then you went and implemented? Or is that something that you guys came to together? What was kind of the catalyst that made you guys say, Hey, we should go to this larger vehicle?

Dr Umut Aslan: 11:33

So one of the catalysts was like the efforts are not bringing any results and looking at the, that, how can we diversify, find the ways that to capture the customers. And some of our customers started asking. When they stopped using us in a certain, they were asking, Hey, can you cover that? I have that many people. We added that. That's one of the reason, and we wanted to be proactive. We didn't wanna just sit there and then see Uber taking us all of our like business share, and we wanted to see where we can grab a customer and think about San Diego. It's a group and convention center that is a, Every, every month we have events that comes large groups into San Diego. So we said, let's give it a try. We know nothing about it, but let's give it and learn. about it. So we started one mini bus, then we added another 49 passenger bus. I don't remember exactly years. But also we added down later on, after 2, 2 49 passengers, we added, larger buses. 57 56

James Blain: 12:39

All the way up. Yeah. So you start making your way all the way up into the Motor Coach, and I think you've, you've hit on something really important and we talk about it a lot on the show, and that's, you were listening to what your customers were looking for, but you were also mindful. Of how your city, how your area works, you know that you've got these large conventions coming through, you know that you've got that opportunity. Let me ask you, do you remember when you guys got that first mini bus? Was that something where you guys were able to hit the ground running and you had it fully booked? Or is that something where you had to slowly try and build up the usage on it?

Dr Umut Aslan: 13:17

We slowly, you know, so some people go, there is a saying that build it, they'll come. I think ours is kind of like that. Build it, they'll come, we've got it in and then it's gonna come in. And some people, what they do different approach. Is they wait, they measure how much the business, they farm it out, and then they buy their vehicles. So two different approaches. When I speak to the other business owners and they would say, Hey, I don't have the business. Why would I invest in it? Rightfully there, there is no right or wrong, but we took to. Whether we call it the risk or in initiative to be able to start with it and we were able to build it because of our current clientele plus San Diego being a, a convention center, that gave us like the leverage to be able to add other vehicle, other larger vehicles.

James Blain: 14:10

Well, and I think what you're talking about there, right? You've got, you've got kind of that mentality of I'm gonna farm it out, farm it out, farm it out till I have the work, and then put it in there. I think you guys saw an opportunity, you said, Hey, we can get some work immediately. Then we can backfill, we can now start to move into that area. And so rather than trying to kind of get there ahead of time and then bring in the vehicle, you guys saw the opportunity to get the vehicle, start building out the work and kind of back yourselves into it, which I think makes a lot of sense. So where do things go right then at that point, obviously now you're, you become. A, a mixed fleet. You've got your motor coaches all the way down to the sedans. What starts happening, kind of the evolution of the company and most importantly, let me ask you, having having started right within six months, you guys are six cars. What kinda happens with the evolution of you and your brother as entrepreneurs and what you guys are learning and what you guys are focusing on? How does that kind of shift and what do you guys kind of become?

Dr Umut Aslan: 15:52

So every time that your company grows, you have to bring a different level of skills. You have to learn. You're delivering this service, but at the same time, when you grow up, you want your. Drivers or your reservation agent, your dispatch agent, to deliver the same level of service in. In other words, your values that you want it to be delivered, even if you're not doing it better than you is in this case, is then your switching your skill level to be able to lead or show them this is what you would like them and you would like your also input to be able to do it better than you do. One, one of the key things, I think we, we had one of our core values. Is it just like, I even, it is like even sometimes the employees joke about that. I said, okay. It, it is like if, like being on time is late, I understand that every company almost has it, but we were obsessed with it. One of the things that also, we started early when the GPS is coming into the picture, I was like adamant that I told Alim I want vehicles to be GPS tracked. There was, there was a company from Florida, and if you remember, it wasn't Verizon, it was a different company. They were super expensive. So I said, let's give it a try. This is like, I wanna see it. And then this GPS would monitor you if you're on time or not. And initially. Of course there's a resistance. We're testing it, but the dispatcher loved it. The moment, if the moment this, the system is not working, the GPS, they would call, Hey, GPS system is down. I don't know how you guys were working. I don't know how we, we worked before, but it just drives me crazy. I cannot see the driver. And here's one of the things I would do initially just to understand them, that I'm crazy about like being in a car earlier than the scheduled time. Sometimes I would wake up in the middle of the 4:00 AM going to the bathroom, right? I would call the dispatch, say, Hey, is the audio drivers like early? She said like if she said, Hey, this, this for a second, what happened? No, I'm just like, you know, I was busy with something else. Can you make sure that your drivers are 15 minutes earlier? Even that sign being like early. On time is late, was everywhere in the bathroom, everywhere inside of the office. And I would, me and Seline continuously ask the first thing, is everyone 15 minutes early, are the old drivers dressed and they come into the office and are the cars clean? Did they go clean? Did they clean up before? It may sound simple, but at the same time it's not because sometimes. People don't wanna do it or they wanna do the easier way. But if you tell them this is what we care about it and these are the values that we wanna deliver to the customer, they understand that when you grow up, that message gets distorted. So we kept that message and, hey, is everyone 15 minutes early or the cars are clean? First thing that for me, on a daytime after greetings, Hey, can you tell me if everyone is like early? Are the cleans, are the vehicles clean? Is everyone dressed to the dress code?

James Blain: 19:24

No, I, I couldn't agree more. You know, if you, if you look and, and obviously you've, you've guys have used pac, so, you know, but if you look in our world, right, we have kind of this pyramid that you build up. The very first part of that is on time and early is on time. And on time is late. And it's one of the things I think, especially for me as someone who, you know, I, when I travel, when I'm doing anything. I am one of those people that it's not uncommon for me to run a little bit ahead of schedule and want to go somewhere ahead early, and I cannot tell you how many times, you know, I've got a chauffeur that thinks they're on time. That shows up right at the pickup time. I've already been standing there for five minutes. Right. Because I knew what time it was. And you know, for me it, it, it comes down to a generational thing because when I was growing up, I grew up with not only, um, you know, no one in the transportation space, no family that did anything, but my dad had been a pilot in the Army and my dad had then gone into the corporate world. And so literally my entire life I was taught. If you're on time, you need to be there 15 minutes early so that when the button hits, you're already in the door, you're already there, right? If you're going for a job interview, that person should look out and see you there. And if you gotta sit there for 15 minutes, that's fine. And the only place I've found that's a horrible idea is the doctors, right? Because really, you're just gonna sit there another extra 15 minutes. But guess what? That doctor's car should still be there 15 minutes early. Um, so for me, I think that's a big thing in my mind because the other problem becomes if you are driving for a living like chauffeurs do, or even like motor coach drivers, anyone in this industry, if you're trying to get there right on time, any kind of traffic whatsoever. Is going to cause you to be late. And so especially in your major cities, right? Your, you, New York, la, Chicago, Dallas, um, anywhere that's got traffic. I think trying to target that, you've gotta learn how to work backwards and you've gotta then say, Hey, if I'm gonna be there 15 minutes early. I need to have a little bit of buffer time. And I think at, at least it sounds like you guys are similar to, to me and, and the way that we think impacts in that if you are not constantly thinking about it and you're trying to run on time, inevitably you're gonna run late.

Dr Umut Aslan: 22:01

Exactly. A hundred percent agree.

James Blain: 22:05

So let me ask you, as you guys have kind of grown and evolved. what does that look like for you in the business heading into now what's, what's going to be, obviously we know what's coming now, but you know, back then we had no idea what was coming around the corner with COVID and 2020. What does that kind of look like as far as where you're in the business and what that starts to look like as we start moving past. 2015, you guys are now a mixed fleet, bit of a, a motor coach bus and, and you know, still a sedan and, and SUV company. What does that kinda look like for you and, and what does that kind of turn into? Where do you end up?

Dr Umut Aslan: 22:45

So I can say that the company right now, which I sold my share to my brother, I'm a, I'm out of it, so out of the business. By still involved here, kind of business coaching consultant with him. So I could tell you right now is like mostly the majority of the business comes through the large groups and then small, small amount of it comes in from the, like the sedan and SUVs'cause the ground is shifting and it's gonna shift a lot. And one of the things that. I'm gonna like to mention it. So I, I did a research in my, during my doctorate for business management and strategy, focused on more strategy. And I interviewed very successful business people that they, they grew up their businesses and one of the things I know they, one of my concepts came out of it. Some of the business owners, and especially in our industry, they're more focused on short term planning. Either day to day, monthly or quarterly planning. And there was some of them planning for one, one year to three year planning. So one thing I would tell and suggest to people based on the data and experiences that I have nowadays, people or the companies, organizations should look into a little bit further to into the feature and see. What they can do come up with some services is, you know, right now the robotaxis are spreading out. And a few people I spoke and some of the business owners that they, they share that they use the robotaxis and they even prefer a robotaxi to have it for their kids versus a car with the driver.

James Blain: 24:35

I, I mean, it makes sense, right? Because if you think about, you know, some of the things that have happened in the Rideshare world. You know, I think we all saw the articles that came out about the sexual assaults and all the issues that they've had in kind of the rideshare space. I think if you can eliminate the person from that equation. Obviously at that point there, it's just you in the vehicle. At that point, the concern becomes more of the same as someone in a dark, dimly lit parking lot at night, right? You're safe once you get in the car. You just have to get into the car safely, and so I think that makes a lot of sense and that if you can safely get into the vehicle and the vehicle gets moving at that point, you're good to go. Now, I guess my question would be, you know, as you're kind of doing this research, as you're kind of getting ready there. What, I guess what is the big factor that a lot of these successful companies had in common in terms of their adoption of that kind of technology? Was there kind of a thread there that was, that's common in terms of leveraging technology?

Dr Umut Aslan: 25:37

Not really, but like my, my research was trying to figure out the factors that helped them to grow from a, like a small vehicle number of vehicles to more 10 or more vehicles. The common themes that came up, number one is networking at the national, like the industry associations and local association. Marketing, that was number one of them. And being part of integrated networking regularly with the people, whether in the industry or outside of the industry, and keep marketing

James Blain: 26:14

Yep.

Dr Umut Aslan: 26:14

to the marketing continuous with the strong presence, uh, website, maybe we can integrate that as a part of the technology, a CEO and another part of it, but that's not enough. Delivering the service. Providing the service, but not as a low, low cost provider to be able to sustain it. The keys that companies should be able to deliver, the service they promised, which was a clean vehicle, well dressed offer, and on time vehicle plus, another key is who's behind the wheel and who's behind the phones. That answering the phone that to deliver the service when they call. When they call the customers, you can't believe sometimes if you call a certain companies, they still pick up the phones. Dispatch.

James Blain: 27:01

Oh yeah, yeah. No, look, when I first got into the industry, right, you know, we were, we were unknown. We had just come out, you know, PAX was, was brand new and I remember calling people and, and I'd hear car service. And I'm like, oh, hello. you know, now that you've yelled car service at me, but it's true. There are still companies that I think that operate that way, and I think one of the things that we have talked about since the inception of pax, and this is something I've been and will be adamant about, is that you have to be able to provide an experience to that passenger. That is going to be different than the others that they're dealing with. So if your goal is, I'm gonna compete directly with Uber, guess what? Unless you have the same convenience level, the app, the same availability as the app, the same on demand experience, the same everything, you are not going to be able to compete with Uber. One of the things that makes Rideshare work is they've got this national footprint, they've got this single application. I can call up and I can have someone here to pick me up in a couple minutes. What I can't do though, is have that same level of expectation of service. My expectation when I go with Rideshare has got to come down. the easiest way if you're trying to lure people away from Rideshare is to make sure that you have, people on your team that are. Literally blowing the doors off of the experience for that passenger. It's a pristine vehicle. It's someone dressed that looks the part, you know? It's someone that understands, Hey, I'm gonna help you with the door. I'm gonna help you with this. They're like we said, they're not right there on time. They're 15 minutes early, they're hitting their spot time. You are putting yourself in a different category. It's the same reason someone would stay at a Ritz Carlton instead of a Holiday Inn Express. Holiday Inn Express has its place in the market and so does the Ritz Carlton. But if I'm going on a trip, I'm probably never gonna go, you know, my choices right now, I'm stuck between the Ritz and the Holiday Inn. I'm not sure which one I'm gonna pick right there. There are different levels and I think that says a lot to it. Um, now I'd love to know one of the things that we hear. Over and over and over from people that are successful in the industry is mentorship. When you were doing your research, was there any level of having a mentor or someone specifically mentoring them that came up? Or was it more so towards networking groups?

Dr Umut Aslan: 29:27

Is is I'm gonna tell you the one concept that networking associations and specifically many people share that the Limousine Association NLA shows that was big for them, plus the peer groups. That's one of the reasons that I embarked on the peer group and. So what they, what people shared that going to the industry show. That was for us, same because we found some people to guide us and we were part of Arthur, Arthur Messina's peer groups. Me and Celine were at different groups and that created building that relationship. You build deep connections, dependant, and you can call, say hey. I need the help. What would you do in this cases? And imagine that also what it gives you an advantage because you're, you're thinking from one perspective, but when you go to that peer groups or closer relationships, you have a smart people or smarter people than you, that who has done the business before or they're doing it and they tell you, why don't you do that if you're open? To learn. And if you're open to be coachable, you can say, okay, let me see that. Can I implement it? An example that when, when you go to the, okay, you start past business, right? You have no idea, but where do you get the customers? Google is money eater. Yes, Google has a portion will bring you, but not only will bring you, but there are another avenues. People tell you, Hey, go to the colleges. An example.

James Blain: 31:07

Yeah.

Dr Umut Aslan: 31:08

do that? Have you done that or are you part of that? Associations that people are part of it. Okay. It just, you'll learn it, but you don't have to learn from the beginning. Try to find the inventive tools there already exist there, and you're having that not only one mentor, you have like multiple mantras in your group telling you, guiding you. To find you're running in issues that you could say, Hey, this is what I'm running. What have you guys done it? Have you ever experienced this one?

James Blain: 31:38

Well, and I, I think the big thing there, you know, it's, it's funny. So I was at a neighborhood block party the other night with my family, right? And every year our, our neighborhood has this block party. Uh, and I was talking to someone who had just started a business, nothing to do with transportation, nothing at all to do with our industry. Um, but he started talking to me about marketing And, you know, kinda what he was thinking and what he's, and this person had, gimme this advice, this person to gimme me that advice. And, you know, I couldn't help myself immediately. It was, okay, well, tell me about your business. Right? We, once you're an entrepreneur, you're an entrepreneur for life, right? And so it was, all right, well, tell me about your business. And I quickly found out that, and, and this is true, I think of a lot of different industries, there are no lack of people. That are going to tell you what to do. They're gonna tell you how to run things. They're gonna tell you how to do things that want to tell you everything without taking the time to learn about what you do. To learn about what your business is. And so through this conversation, you know, I felt bad'cause I just tell me more. Okay, what are you doing here? What are you doing there? What are you doing here? What are you doing there? Um, because I, I was trying to understand the business and, you know, after talking to him for a while, it was very clear that he had talked to some marketing people that were like, oh yeah, we're gonna set you up on Google ads and you're go talk to these people and talk to those people and do this and do that. But what they hadn't done is they hadn't actually sat down and tried to learn. The business to kind of figure it out. And I think one of the things that in our industry makes peer groups and the association events and all of these different things so successful is that you are there with people that are doing the same thing that you are. You're there with people that have been exactly where you are. So whereas for you, you may be buying your bus for the first time and thinking, oh, you know, I've got this great idea. I'm gonna do this and this and this. You'll have the opportunity to talk to someone and says, oh yeah, I did all of those things. That was a great idea. That was an okay idea. That was the worst day of my life. Don't do that one. Right. And so I think there's this huge value there. And being able to do that, I, I think you can still move forward without it. Uh, but I, like I said, it's kinda like the, the companies that don't. Kind of leave their sphere of influence, they end up with their own kind of solutions they've had to fight and work for. So I guess the, the other question I'd have is, when you were doing your research, you know, were there any other key things that stuck out in terms of the most successful companies as it relates to that space? Was there anything that kind of surprised you or you went, oh, I wouldn't have thought of that.

Dr Umut Aslan: 35:23

You know, now it's something that is, the concept that I came in was, you sign simple,

James Blain: 35:31

Yeah.

Dr Umut Aslan: 35:31

but you, you think that even, even one of my chair commented, isn't that common sense? One of the things is keeping your financial, your company financially healthy

James Blain: 35:43

Right.

Dr Umut Aslan: 35:43

is you think that, but in when you investigate, you're gonna see that some of the business owners, they only know about the profit or they don't know the details of the numbers. What is the gross margin? What is the e EBIT or EBITDA that so, and. We discuss about delivering the service. That's like no brainer, right? We say it's simple that you have to do that, but we come across, we experience working with an athlete that they send you crappy vehicle, a driver. You tell them, Hey, this is, I'm having large groups. I would like you to make sure that all your guys are dressed, your vehicle are cleaned up. Guess what? It seems like you know the other company didn't hear anything from you. If you talk to certain providers in the nest, they'll sell, they'll tell you how many times they burned out because of using an athlete, or some of the operators start entering the bus business because of level of service they you receive from the motor coach companies. So they decided. You know what? Screw you guys, I'm gonna buy my own motor coach and build my own businesses. That you hear that stories too, and it is all simple being like a networking at the associations or local associations being part of the group and delivering the service with the right pricing. But you see also at the same time, people price it so cheap and they cannot make it and. Keeping financially healthy. Recently, someone shared with me, there was a guy that he purchased for vehicles and now he cannot continue his business. He cannot stay in it. And then when he was asked, why did you buy so many vehicles? And the answer is, I wanted to have a different variety. You want it to have a different variety without like having enough business for each of them. So it sounds simple, but when you look at it, the, the, the sharings that comes with from people, successful people, the biggest key is execution of that. What we think that is a common sense or simple ideas to be able to make it reality, to execute them. And another one is constant planning is. Some of them is focused entirely in the business, and some of them focus on str like in Strategic Planet. But now what I would suggest based on my studies and what's happening in the industry or in all over the life that changes Rapid, is I think that Moore law that mentions about the exponential change, right? So in this moment, companies should look into also into the future. Okay, what's happening? What will happen and how we can mitigate it, or how can we be ahead of the game when the robotaxis comes in? Many people in the industrial think that robot taxi may kill the limo business.

James Blain: 38:52

You know, I, I will say in, in my opinion, I think you, you've hit on a lot of things and I want to take a second and try and unpack a couple of'em.'cause some of the things you said early on are coming back now and I think there's a lot here that's relevant. I think something you said early on, um, and it's really important is. You who you are when you're a one car operator, as a person, as a leader, has to be different than who you are right now that you've got a larger fleet or when you hit a larger fleet. And the way that I've always heard that and the way that it was always taught to me is what will get you to your first million? Is not what you're going to need to get to 2 million and beyond, right? It's, it's not the same in terms of where you're at, where you're focusing on. And I think what we see a lot is when you're that one car operator, you can be a lot scrappier, you can be a lot more out there. You can be in the car, you can drive, because at that point you are kind of the business and as you grow the business and you have to step up and you have to start delegating, pushing things out. You have to change. I think one of the biggest things that I've seen, and I was having a conversation with someone about this and then an announcement came out, is I think a lot of companies are already trying to see down the road and figure that out. A great example of that is the car rental industry. Look, when we get to the point where there's autonomous vehicles. We still have to have them cleaned, serviced, checked out and put back on the road. great news for mechanics. If you're a mechanic, guys, a OK, you're good. You're good. now the difference is who's gonna do that? So, you know, if you've got way more operating a fleet, well guess what? The rental car companies, and, and don't quote me on who it was, I wanna say Hertz, but I could be wrong, have already stepped in and said, Hey. We're going to clean service and turn around autonomous vehicles. So the autonomous vehicle will drive to us. We'll clean it, we'll service it, we'll take care of it, we'll put it back on the road. if you are thinking as a driver, if you're thinking as an owner, one of the things to keep in mind is I don't think we ever get to the Jetsons where we have Robot Betty. Right. You know, zipping around with, with things. It doesn't make sense, right? If I think of, and, and look at the hotel industry. If you look at the hotel industry, when you go to check in, what is the base level? Check-in the kiosk, right? The kiosk is the base level. Check-in. Now who in their right mind is gonna, you know, you go to Vegas, you go to a large hotel, you go to the nicest hotel in New York. Do you expect that your highest customer service level hotel is gonna have a kiosk? No, of course not. There's somebody there to welcome you to the hotel, right? To make sure things are taken care of, to be that face of it. And so I think it hearkens back to what we talked about earlier of what is on time, what is appearance, what is a clean vehicle? Because if the base level of service becomes. Everything's automated. Everything's a kiosk. Everything is this and that. You then have this higher tier that becomes. This is hands-on, this is white glove. This is what that might be. because what we're seeing right now, even in regular rideshare is if I order, you know, your base level rideshare vehicle, they might send me a RAV4, right? Nothing against Toyota Love Toyota, but they might send me someone in a RAV4 if I order their premium luxury, their chauffeur. They're basically sending me the same person, but that person's driving a suburban or maybe an Escalade, depending on the market, the color of that vehicle. Is not going to define for me what the level of service is. My experience with that person in that vehicle is what's gonna define it. And so I think it's important that when we're looking ahead, that you have to keep in mind that we are a service-based industry. So let me ask you, what are your thoughts in terms of what does that look like? You know, obviously you are out of the, the business with your brother, but you are still now. Coaching and, and you're doing development and you're helping companies. When you're helping them try to figure that out, what are you looking towards? What do you see as the opportunity?

Dr Umut Aslan: 43:25

One of the opportunities I see, I think similar to what you mentioned there, there will be open up different opportunities like a fleet management the, of the autonomous vehicles, because I don't think. Either Google or Wemo or Tesla will wanna to manage that vehicles for running a fleet of vehicles that run or run that eventually that vehicles will be run down. Or imagine that also at the same time that even in Texas or Uber people, at least some of them, not all of them will clean up their vehicles, but if you're running a robot taxi all the time, who's gonna clean that vehicle? And at the same time, how long we, I, I don't know if these companies have the data of running the whole vehicle, mechanically maintaining it, what kind of maintain maintenance needed, and, and then who's gonna keep it clean? Who's gonna keep it, who's gonna maintain it? But at the same time, I see people are crazy about trying to test them. I, I think I, I saw one article said one guy. To try the driverless vehicle. He canceled all of the driver, but just to be able to try driverless vehicle. But at the same time, there are people that they don't feel comfortable. They don't feel safe in it, whether the data shows that they're safer than the human drivers, but at the same time, people will want the human connection. That's what we all want. Everything when it goes to. Automate it. People will still look for someone to drive them. Also someone to experience or help them at. So there are opportunities, there will be opportunities may the niche will be smaller, but at the same time for any company to be able to capture this. They have to look a little bit forward and then experiment with their ideas, come up with different ideas. During that talk, you mentioned that, okay, cleanliness services or maintenance of the vehicle. What about for people? Okay, but they still want the human touch. They don't want to be driven or they want someone to be present and then also handle their lage backs.

James Blain: 45:40

Right.

Dr Umut Aslan: 45:42

So it should be. I can't tell you what the future will bring, but I also, what I could tell companies who in the industry to keep looking, discovering or looking, exploring the opportunities that they could use with their, their own competencies in the business, in their own businesses.'cause again, we always need like a human touch, human service. Some people will not give away that one. They'll prefer to interconnect or receive the human services, as you mentioned with the RIS Carlton.

James Blain: 46:13

Right. Well, I think the other side of that is I also would say, you know, people talk about autonomous, like it's happening tomorrow. You know, I think and, and again, you know, we, we saw this happen. If we start looking back through history, you saw this happen with emissions, you see this happen with vehicle safety features. You see this happen with all of these different major changes to transportation, right? The infrastructure is not there. To just take every car off the road and have autonomous tomorrow. you know, obviously we're seeing these slowly deploying fleets in major cities. But the other thing is, if you start looking at providers in smaller rural areas, I don't know that it makes sense in the next five or 10 years for way more autonomous to really kind of try and get a foothold. I think the other side of that is, as I mentioned earlier, knowing kind of the level that you're gonna play at and the level you're gonna provide service at. So I guess my thing would be, you know, obviously we wanna keep looking forward to that. What does an operator do today? If, you know, let's say you are someone that, that is looking to implement what we're talking about in terms of I wanna find a peer group, I want to get more involved with the associations, I want to kind of grow my business. I know that you are working on a project to kind of put some groups together. Can you tell us a little bit about what is it that you are doing and how is that an opportunity for someone to get that type of support that we've been talking about?

Dr Umut Aslan: 47:41

So as, as you mentioned, it is like the key is to be able to find out other people's ideas. All everyone has a different like knowledge. Everyone has a different perspectives. And the key that in my project, the peer groups, other than one-on-one business coaching app, the peer groups here helps you to be able to learn from others. Not only one person, even when you and I sit at any events that I learn from you, every time I speak to you, I learn from other people. And I'm gonna tell you something that one of the most successful guys in the industry, George Jacobs, so everyone knows him. And funny thing he said, like when I say I learn a lot from you, he said, I learn from you. And I learn even from like a smaller guy operations that that the way that to learner is not about size of the organization, but at the same time to be open and then ask the questions. Because everyone has a different, like collecting different knowledge. But when we come together, and this is, I call it partially working on the business, when you are away from your operations, when operations, day-to-day business, when you get out of that daily huddles, daily challenges, and you sit with the like-minded successful people that you see something different. you are away from your own business. You are learning. You're building your knowledge. You're seeing something that you didn't catch or you didn't grasp it by talking to people. And also in that peer groups or what the expert speakers comes in from the industry and whether it's technology, marketing, delivering the service operations, you grab something that you can take out and implement it in your day-to-day real life business. And again, I keep saying that one you have, there's a Japanese saying that we're not as smart as all of us. So if you can elicit the wisdom of the grow up, that'll help you to take your business to the next level.

James Blain: 49:48

I, I agree entirely. I think one of the things that we have seen over and over and over with all the successful people we've talked to is that they are always very big to give credit where credit is due in terms of people that have coached them, people that have helped them, people that have taken them under their wing. You know, I, I did a, a podcast interview recently. On, uh, on the Raise Up podcast with Charlie and Athena Grim, which happened to be two of my mentors in the industry, right. I was lucky enough to, to have them at, at one of the shows, kind of when I was first getting in, say, Hey, you know, why don't you come to dinner with us? And that kind of blossomed into having mentors. And I think there's a lot to be said about being able to find the people that you can connect with and that get it. And to George's point. I think there's an opportunity to learn from anyone and everyone. it might be learning what not to do, um, or it might be learning what to do. But I think, I think one of the things about learning that you've really nailed is that you have to be open and you have to be able to kind of see the lesson and absorb the lesson. I, I often find that the people that think they are the smartest in the room are usually the most closed off in the room. Usually the ones that are, are more willing to absorb everything are truly the ones that are getting the benefit. So let me ask, you know, obviously you've got your groups that are, you're putting together. if someone's wanting to join one of your peer groups, if they're wanting to learn more about what you are doing, how you can help them, where would they go for that? Yep.

Dr Umut Aslan: 51:22

You can go to growth and success institute.com or they could, I think majority of the people are connected to me on Facebook. They can send me, message or they can gimme a call and my cell phone if they wanna talk more about it.

James Blain: 51:38

All right. So you guys heard that Connect on Facebook. I'm guessing they probably connect on LinkedIn as well. Uh, growth and Success Institute. Now, let me ask you, how often are your groups meeting? How often are you having these peer groups?

Dr Umut Aslan: 51:52

so we're having it three times in a year, yeah, three times in a year.

James Blain: 51:56

And can you tell us a little bit about what you know, what does that kind of entail? Is that something where they're flying in? How do they get involved with that?

Dr Umut Aslan: 52:04

So another key factor, and especially in person versus in in Zoom or virtually, you see the operations of another operators, like the, our first meeting will be in San Diego, so we're gonna visit minimum black transportation. The key gives you, when you come in here, you step into the other operator. Place the running like, or let's call it business or house, that you see how they're managing it. And when you see it, you see the way that they're managing it. Is it something that you can adapt it or you may see it, they're, they're doing something that you may take. Implement it. Of course, you're not gonna take anything just like to look at it, but you see like you can adapt it and then take the idea and implement the businesses. And also you have the opportunity to talk with the employees, ask them questions. With the challenges that you're facing, are they similar to your challenges? Another learn opportunity, seeing it, how they're design their operations, how are they running their operation? And who are behind the scenes? What are they doing it? And when you ask people. That their opinion. People love to talk. They, they love sharing their love, sharing their expertise, their information as wherever you go. People love to help other people. I think helping other people is in need like expression of love that we show. We care about the people. And when people come from different part of the transportation companies, they're not competing confidential people. Open up, tell, hey, this is what I'm doing, or. And I'm gonna give you our, like, sometimes people call our sales director the MIB sales and ask her what she's doing, how she's doing it, and she, she tells me she loves sharing it. Hey, are you doing this? Are you doing this one? And you're coming here. You're getting like a free real life that is proven to bring the company to certain level for free. That's, that's priceless.

James Blain: 54:06

Well, and, and look, I am fortunate enough that kind of in my role in training, I get to travel the country and I get to do site visits all the time. I have lost count of the number of operations that I've been to, and what I found is that there doesn't seem to be, you know, there's things that, that they haven in common. If you go visit a hundred operations, you may see a hundred different ways to do things from something as simple as, how we store the keys, how they check in to something as complicated as, Hey, here's our maintenance schedules. it's very eye-opening when you get to go to operations and do that because one of the things that I found is. Al like you said, almost all the operations are very forthcoming. because here's the thing, the little battles are just as important as the bigger battles in certain places, but if I'm coming to visit you from another part of the country. The way that you organize your fleet in the parking lot is not necessarily going to affect. If I take that and I apply what I've learned, but the other thing that I've seen happen and I've watched these conversations is I've watched someone on a site visit say, Hey, that's really neat. Why are you doing it that way? Well, we do it this way because of this. Oh, well we do this. And then the next thing you know, they've shared the information. They've each shared a piece that brought them further to where they want to be. And the next thing you know, they, both sides have been able to improve their process, whereas they never would've seen it. They never would've shared it. They'd have no idea how they do it. And so I have to say, for me at least, I think that's one of the neatest things. About getting to do site visits is you get to find out those pieces that are the things that we see every day that no one else probably ever gets to see. Um, so obviously the first one's in San Diego, when is that one gonna be?

Dr Umut Aslan: 56:00

It's gonna be in December, first week of December.

James Blain: 56:03

All right, so you guys, first week of December, if you are looking for a peer group, I know somebody. Um, no, but more importantly, I think the big thing here is this really ties into what we've talked about almost since the exception of the podcast, and that's that having mentorship. Having somewhere where you're going for knowledge, getting to be able to hear the different opinions and see the different ways that things are done and kind of interact with the others in the industry is truly something that gives you an edge. Um, I can't thank you enough for coming on the podcast. one last time. Where is it? They can go if they wanna sign up and learn more.

Dr Umut Aslan: 56:39

So they can, if they want, I'll give my cell phone(619) 723-8104. They can text me, call me, or they can go to the Growth and Success Institute. Or I can give my email UD UM ut at growth and success institute.com and you could find me on LinkedIn or Facebook.

James Blain: 57:01

I can't thank you enough for coming on. Uh, thank you everyone for listening. Hopefully you've liked and subscribed. One thing worth noting, if you love what you're hearing, if you want to hear more, drop us a, like, drop us a comment. Let us know what we can do to help you guys get the support you need from the podcast. And as always, thanks you everybody for listening. Bye-bye.

57:20

Thank you for listening to the ground transportation podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe to the show on apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. For more information about PAX training and to contact James, go to PAX training.com. And for more information about driving transactions and to contact Ken, Go to driving transactions.com. We'll see you next time on the ground transportation podcast.