Randy Allen 0:00

We have this crazy thing in Richmond called Tacky light. Tours in the month of December, Um, it started in the seventies in Richmond off of a radio show that decided to throw a bunch of people in a limo and ride around and look at, look at Christmas lights, at homes in different neighborhoods. And it's grown into, I would conservatively estimate a million dollar business in the month of December for transportation companies locally in the Richmond area by itself.

Ken lLucci 0:53

Well, good afternoon everyone in Podcast Land. Welcome to another exciting edition of the Ground Transportation Podcast. My name is Ken Lucci. I am the Chief Business Analyst at Driving Transactions. We're a financial analysis business valuation and m and a advisory firm specializing in the passenger transportation space. I'm saddened that my partner in crime, James Blaine from PAX Training, is not with me today. He is no doubt out, uh, training a group of chauffeurs or a group of motor coach operators. So wherever you are, James, you are missed. But I am very pleased to have a former client, Randy Allen, from James Limousine, on with me today. Randy, how are you?

Randy Allen 1:41

I am doing great, Ken. I.

Ken lLucci 1:44

Good. Well, thank you for agreeing to come on. you know, when I fir when I called you in full disclosure, you know, uh, driving transactions, did a financial review and valuation and facilitated the sale of James Limousine in Richmond, Virginia. So I wanted you on, because you know, first of all, you're a great guy. You're, and you've got a unique background for somebody in the limousine space. So tell us about your, uh, career and your background before you were the CEO of James limousine.

Randy Allen 2:16

Well, I wanna start by saying it's a real honor to join the, uh, illustrious list of guests you've had on this podcast.

Ken lLucci 2:24

done okay. We've done okay. Well, and the honor is all

Randy Allen 2:27

It's, uh, it's an understatement to, to say you, you had a a, a, a role in, in the sale of our company. You were the driving force and a big reason that, uh, it took a, a couple of tries and a couple of starts, but, uh, we, we got it to a very, very successful conclusion and nobody does it better than you in the industry.

Ken lLucci 2:49

Well, I appreciate you saying that, but it was a great product. Meaning, you know, there's a lot of times when we're dealing with operators that are not as organized as you, not as profitable as you and the, and not as a, commanding brand with a great structure. So, yeah, and I wanted to get into that today with you. So thank you for the

Randy Allen 3:08

as far as like bio and, and background, just, uh, by pure circumstance and, and randomly it seems like, um, I had a career prior to joining the limousine industry that turned out in various ways to be very good prep for this industry without me planning it that way without me had any idea of ever owning a limousine company. started out, had a computer science degree from a four year college. Um, came outta college and started work for a small company that most people have heard of. At and t worked at a manufacturing plant. Everything we produced was, um, equipment for at and t. So if you use the phone anytime after 1980, it was probably made by, uh, at least partially made by the factory I, worked in here in Richmond. So I worked in computer aided manufacturing for almost 17 years. Software. at that time, you know, there were no such thing as, as desktop computers and laptops. It was all big mainframe computers. the, only interactivity you had with, with the, computer back then was, you handed over a punch deck of cards, a stack of cards, and waited for a printout from the printer to come

Ken lLucci 4:26

sure if anybody hasn't seen him, they were like, uh, you know, maybe three by six or something. And the punch cards were fed into the mainframe.

Randy Allen 4:36

Yep. That's how the, you interacted with it. There were a few systems of what you'd call, text-based character terminals, the green phosphorus text terminals, and you could type words and it would interact with you somewhat. But there were no graphics. No, no, no sophistication to it at all. But that's how ancient I am is basically is the, is the ma the story there. Um, so 17 years computer aided manufacturing. I had a vendor that I worked with in that role, uh, that was a startup software company. And a global company. And, um, I helped them kind of get off the ground because it was one of the first ones to use their software. And, um, after it was implemented and working well, they offered me a role in their company. So I left a large company, like at and TA factory with 2000 workers in that environment to a global but very small startup company, a software. So startup company that maybe had 10 or 15 employees when I joined. And all of a sudden I was in the middle of almost everything that was happening in the company and management decisions, upper level strategy decisions, and worked there, about seven or eight years. And that was very valuable experience to prepare me to be a business owner because I was exposed to. All of the things that went into them managing a new startup and trying to grow that business from scratch. In addition, in that role I was a frequent flyer business traveler, 150,000 frequent flyer miles a year, uh, US four or five international trips every year, sometimes two weeks at a time. So I certainly understood travel and business travel, uh, from that, that experience and what, that involves. So those three aspects just randomly happen to fit as good background to become a limousine company owner and focus on ground transportation, business travelers, and managing a small business. So it was just kind of a pattern in my life that it was circumstance and luck that some things came together. I.

Ken lLucci 6:51

Okay, so tell me about, you purchased James limousine circa when, and how big was it when you purchased it?

Randy Allen 7:00

Uh, I purchased it in 2007. I think the company started in 1991, so it was nine 16 years old. I actually, At that time, because of the background in working for the software startup company, it gave me the confidence to want to be a business owner, start my own business, run my own business. There was no history of that in my, my family. We were not business owners. Always worked for somebody else. So that was a bit of a leap for me. But the, the experience at the startup company gave me confidence that, uh, I was ready for it. I think I was 49 years old and, uh, was looking for a business to start up, or franchise or some kind of opportunity. And while I was looking for that, I was actually a driver for them, driving a limousine.

Ken lLucci 7:52

Yep.

Randy Allen 7:52

they took advantage of my, um, skills and had me work in the office as well. So I got a pretty in-depth inside look at the company. Much more so than you would normally as a buyer from the outside. I knew it had potential. They were doing okay with it. Even though they were not very focused on it as a business, they had another primary business and this was just secondary for them. And so I kind of naively thought that, I could buy it and hit the ground running and it would just suddenly explode and be successful and grow and grow and grow. Little did I know the year after I bought it, the housing market would crash.

Ken lLucci 8:31

Sure

Randy Allen 8:32

that was a significant challenge, but, uh, I just saw it as an opportunity. It was, it had a very strong brand in the marketplace. It was

Ken lLucci 8:40

great brand on the marketplace.

Randy Allen 8:42

so I had a big head start versus starting a, starting from scratch.

Ken lLucci 8:48

And when you bought it, you were doing roughly about a

Randy Allen 8:51

about a million dollars. Uh, I think there were 10 vehicles in the fleet, mostly stretched limousines. a lot of retail work. a little bit of corporate. They had one large corporate account, that's, that was headquartered in Richmond. Um, but mostly, uh, stretch limousines and the traditional retail work.

Ken lLucci 9:10

So you basically almost quadrupled the size of the business. There were a million and you, if I, my memory serves you about 4 million, correct?

Randy Allen 9:20

Yeah. And 17, it took 17 years. Uh, there were some hurdles along the way and some challenges to the, to business in general, between COVID and, and the housing market. And wasn't there another recession between, uh, the housing crash and COVID? Uh, there was another,

Ken lLucci 9:38

Well, the biggest milestones, look, the biggest milestones in the economy are, you know, always push back corporate travel. But you know, but the financial crisis was the big one, right? That, that housing crisis and financial crisis. And then we did have a small recession in the early teens, but then COVID.

Randy Allen 9:57

yeah. So there were some challenges there, but during the course of 17 years, we did grow the revenues for X. Uh, the fleet grew from 10 vehicles to about 35 or 36. Not that you measure that as really, any kind of significant, uh, aspect of success. It's more about the financials And the bottom line as you preach all the time.

Ken lLucci 11:24

And you know, one of the things when I first met you that I was extraordinarily impressed with was James limousine to me was branded as if it was a national or global company. And it costs nothing, relatively to brand the right colors I remember walking in the front office and seeing all of the chauffeurs pictures up, and I remember the Burgundy logo, and I remember the branding standards. Were that of a large company. Now, where did you pick that up from?

Randy Allen 12:04

Yeah. I think it was about the third or fourth year running the company. we decided to undertake a major project to, rebrand the company first and then redesign and, and develop a new website as part Of that, the back end of the rebranding process. And we actually hired a local professional marketing company, branding company that did a complete market research. They talked to our customers, they talked to our, our employees, did enough research to kind of understand who we were, what we did, who was our customers. You know, they looked at things like we, we were focusing a lot on corporate. And, and a lot of what you interact with on the corporate side was, um, women, not the passengers necessarily, but the people that were making the reservations that you interacted with were women. And they looked at, what we were trying to do in terms of customer service and taking care of our passengers, doing more than just providing a ride, just treating them, with, white glove service while they were in our car. And they decided that our brand was, focused on loving or love, in a kind of a caring type approach. Loving, loving the client, loving. The service that you're providing, loving the employees. And um, so they came up with the feminine color scheme of, of the, uh, burgundy that you mentioned. Almost every website from transportation companies back then was black, gold, silver. It was unique. and I think it was, uh, I think they just did an excellent job of understanding who we were and, uh,

Ken lLucci 13:50

How, how big were you at that time? Do you remember?

Randy Allen 13:53

well under 2 million. 'cause it was still early on.

Ken lLucci 13:57

Now think about that. Okay. Think about that. Someone would, some operators would think, well, that's expensive. Okay. I, I, I, you must have, you must have, if they did market research, you must have spent some decent money on it to redo your website. But having been in the business many years, when we met, it was instantly apparent to me that your business was different. The, the chauffeurs all had, uh, photos and they were in their dress uniforms, photos when you walked in the foyer, so that clients would see that. But it also gave to me an impression that if I was a chare here, these people care about me. So tell us a little bit about what difference did that process make to your business you know, in the years after you undertook this project?

Randy Allen 14:53

Well, it, it's hard to measure empirically. Just, um, it, it felt like the rebranding worked. it gave a good appearance to the company, to the website, to our marketing materials, our business cards, everything used that color scheme. I've still got the six digit color code on a, on a sticky pad on my desk, and every time I have to use it

Ken lLucci 15:16

do they call that? PPMS codes.

Randy Allen 15:19

Uh, there's three different ways you can represent colors. I can't remember the it, but it's a heck code. It's a six digit hex code. So, in fact, I used it the other day for something and I forget What it, what it was. Uh, oh. I was, I was adding a new webpage, um, and I to the website and had to use the color code. But, um, I think it just. Embodied what we were trying to be and what we were trying to represent to the customer that we cared about. You we're gonna take good care of you. And that feminine approach, the driven to serve motto, was a play on words. Um, I think it, it just helped build trust, uh, from the, from the client that, uh, we would take good care of 'em. And then you mentioned the employees. I always felt it was very important from the very beginning of owning the business, that if you want your employees to take good care of your customers, you have to take good care of them.

Ken lLucci 16:16

A hundred percent.

Randy Allen 16:16

if you're not making them happy, if you're not letting them, if they're not excited about coming into work, whether it's getting behind the wheel or getting behind the, the reservation desk, they're not gonna. Present a good attitude towards your, your clients. So you have to make 'em appreciated. You have to make them feel a sense of ownership. And one of the ways we did that was, most years, every year that we could, we did a profit sharing plan. Uh, we would typically distribute 10 to 20% of our profits, in every profitable year back to the employees.

Ken lLucci 16:54

give us a little bit of an idea, because that is unheard of in this space, and tell me what you think it accomplished for James.

Randy Allen 17:05

Well, you know, all of us deal with vehicle accidents and, uh, a large number of 'em are. avoidable. And every ac every accident takes money out of your pocket. For the repairs, uh, rise drives your insurance cost up. So the message we were trying to to the drivers was yes, we focused on safety. Yes, we want you to be safe. besides just being safe for the good reasons of why you, you want to be safe and protect yourself and the passengers, you have a chance to impact the bottom line in your own pocketbook because every dollar you don't create in damage to vehicles is another dollar that goes straight to the bottom line that you're gonna get a share of at the end of the year.

Ken lLucci 17:53

And I would imagine based on your analytical mind, you came up with a structure. Based on the positions and the contribution of each employee,

Randy Allen 18:03

Yeah, we, we created two buckets. One for the, um. Office reservation staff, and one for the drivers, and decided how we'd allocate the, the overall money between the two pots. then on the driver's side, it was divided proportional to your earnings through the year. So if, if you worked enough that you did 10% of all the earnings of the entire driving staff, then you get 10% of the bonus. It was allocated strictly by ratio of what the contribution you'd made through the course of the year by how much you worked. And part-time people got the bonus too. Of course it was smaller because they were part-time,

Ken lLucci 18:44

But listen, it, it, it, and when did you give it out? What timeframe?

Randy Allen 18:48

uh, usually around the middle of December where it could have the The most impact. And when and. when we had a good idea of where we'd end up during the year. By the end of the year.

Ken lLucci 18:57

As I remember, you had some chauffeurs that had some serious longevity with that company.

Randy Allen 19:03

Yeah, that was definitely, um, an impact not only in our success, but, I think the way we treated the employees had an impact on how long they stayed. We, it's a key, I think to our success that we did have minimal turnover, in the office staff, in management team And and the driving staff.

Ken lLucci 19:25

And tell me, besides the bonus structure, what would you say, if you remember, what's it, what stands out in your mind that you would recommend to operators coming up? Because, because let's just tee this up, right. Getting to 4 million is no easy feat. Okay. I know. I know guys who have been in the business 20 years who are still hovering around a million, a million and a half. And when you get to the 4 million. For everybody out in the audience, you're attracting a completely different buyer persona. Okay. And, you know, you're attracting a completely different way of financing the business. Without getting into details, I mean, the buyer did an SBA finance on this deal. and I remember, you know, there were a couple components to it that, that we assisted with, but it was entirely the reason, the reason he was able to do that is, A, the revenue and b, the profitability. Give me some other ideas of what you think you did right from a perspective of building the company.

Randy Allen 20:28

definitely expanding on the corporate side and focusing on the corporate side. I put a lot of thought into this before we started and there's so many things. I mean, there's A hundred different areas I could touch on, and it's really hard to pick out a few that were most important, but you have to understand. Your market, your competition,

Ken lLucci 20:51

Mm-hmm.

Randy Allen 20:52

and your own strengths and weaknesses. What can you do or what do you do better than anyone else? I had a technology background, so a part of our success, undoubtedly was my ability to understand the technology available to the industry, utilize it to its best to provide, the best customer service we could, in terms of communication, making sure we could, um, respond, quickly and and efficiently to customer request. Making our employees as efficient as possible. So we tried to use technology to leverage it as much as possible, because that was my strength, that I could bring to the table. but, you know, you gotta understand your market. And, um, Richmond, uh, the market that we were in, for the size of, of the market had a very large number of Fortune 500 companies that were headquartered in Richmond. And a number that, did. a lot of international travel. there was an international airport, Dulles and you know, outside DC that's, uh, about a two hour drive away. So our bread and butter became, driving a lot of corporate travelers up and back from Dulles. Um. To catch international flights so they could take one leg outta Dulles as opposed to flying outta Richmond and possibly missing their flight, getting delayed, uh, et cetera. So focusing on corporate, something we did right.

Ken lLucci 22:23

But why do you think the corporations, and there's some good sized ones, I remember some of your clients, they were good sized companies, and I was kind of surprised. Why do you think they chose a local or regional provider? Instead of one of the global networks, a lot of operators think, well, I'm too small to take on a corporate account. Why do you think they, and how did you, I, I mean, how did you approach them and why do you think they went with James? Other than the fact that you looked like a a, a Fortune 100 company, the branding was fantastic, et cetera. how do you think you attracted them, and why do you think they went with you?

Randy Allen 23:03

Well, part of the answer is it's not because we were great at sales and we didn't have a strong salesperson in-house. What I did do right was strong branding of myself in the corporate world by participating wherever I could. Um, I joined the Virginia Business Travel Association very early on, became a member, served on the board, still on the board, um, for 10 plus years. got in front of corporate, uh, travel managers that way, hoteliers that could, could recommend us for groups and events. Just being a good community member. we did a, a fair amount of charity work and charity support and, you know, if you've got a stretch limousine in your, it's no secret, you know, you, you can, you can support a lot of charities. we've, we did probably five or six years in a row, the Night to Shine, event, uh, from Tim Tebow's organization that just, you, you just never know where something like that's gonna help. Because somebody who has a child participating in that event, they could be a corporate business traveler or they could be a, a corporate travel manager for a company that you never heard of or didn't know, and they could become familiar with your company because of that charity event. And next thing you know, they're calling you for their next trip.

Ken lLucci 24:24

Let's stop there for one second. Number one, you said be a good community member. Participate in the, in the community, and, and Richmond is not the biggest metropolitan statistical area in the country. yeah, I think it's right. It it, I think it may be in the top 50, but it's on the smaller side. So you're telling me participate in the community, you participated in the business, travel, organizations, but you also participated in the charities. That's near and dear to my heart because when I was in Tampa, we did the same thing. we had a Rolls Royce Phantom. We used to market it as a live auction item. A night to remember with a bottle of champagne and a restaurant gift certificate. I hit a little bit of a shtick that I won't go into, but I will share with you, and, and, and you probably found the same thing. The top movers and shakers in the community are at these charity events, and it is a huge part of the branding. They wanna do business with people that support the community. That's what a lot of operators miss. It's a little aggravating to me because, listen, some of my best friends in the space are digital marketing people, okay? And I'm emphatically, I, I love look, you know, talking about algorithms and the rest of it. But at the end of the day, I see operators making critical mistakes. They're spending a ton of money on digital. They're spending a ton of money on PPC, and they don't even know the corporate stakeholders in their market.

Randy Allen 25:51

Yeah.

Ken lLucci 25:52

And they don't do any localized branding to me. You know, you can't put a price on the impressions that you make by the James Limousine logo and color scheme and, and branding being associated with Tim Tebow's charity. That's a gift that keeps on giving.

Randy Allen 26:13

When you, when you support a charity, that means something. To a potential client. It it, there's a stickiness There there's a loyalty it creates that you can't create any other way. I, I think another way we did, uh, create more presence in the marketplace and awareness. We tried to create unique ways of being in front of people. one of the ways was in sporting events, There was a local hockey team. It was, uh, like double A level. It wasn't anything huge. We had a stretch limousine with hole in the roof, and we went out between periods and they would throw these rubber hockey pucks, and the first one to throw it through the roof would win a free limo ride. So you're in front of four or 5,000 people every time. And we did the same thing at the local AA baseball, games. We took a stretch. We, no, actually we had a, we had a golf cart that we customized to look like a stretch limousine, and we drove it out on the field between innings.

Ken lLucci 27:11

And look, it's funny, when I, when I was in, in Tampa, the funny thing is, is, is I've got two companies for sale in Tampa that I used to compete with, but we, we did the same thing as far as logo and branding, but my logo was black and gold, which now I'm thinking it should, it should have been burgundy gold. But anyway, I digress. we used to advertise at, uh, Clearwater Catholic. It was a private high school, and people looked at me like, what are you making such a big deal. Let me tell you something. Most of my corporate clients were at those events. They were at the sporting events. They have great sporting programs, and they're paying for their kids to go there. we ended up with the team sports after their bus was 18 years old, broke down. But to me it's weaving. It's creating the community associations and it's seeing the, the movers in the shakers. The more affluent people who are business leaders and they own houses in the best zip codes at those events, you cannot replace that with PPC or digital spend, et cetera. So.

Randy Allen 28:24

I, I'm not saying this is the right approach for every market, but in our market, and we didn't have a, a tremendous amount of local competitors, I don't think we spent a dime on SEO or pay per click for the last seven or eight years I owned the business and.

Ken lLucci 28:39

you still ranked extremely high. And, uh, and you know, it's, it's funny, I, I see people spending a lot, but they're not doing the things that as a business owner, they should know. They, they need to control their business. Their Google Business account, they need to claim their Yelp account. They need to put photos on it. They need to solicit reviews. You know, one of our best friends, Doug Schwartz, he crossed I think 2005 star reviews the other day, and that has boosted him up in Nassau County, long Island, which is a beautiful county. But again, not a huge MSA, it, it, it's all about being in the top one, two, or three in the market. I, I would take being a bigger fish. In a smaller pond any day of the week. I don't know how these guys in New York even try to build a brand, but at the same time, you could strike a vein. Meaning when you did the charity events and you did the local sporting events, you probably saw some of the same people who became your clients.

Randy Allen 29:41

yeah, yeah. You, you've gotta think about where the people are that you're trying to reach, and obviously if you've got a corporate. Account. I mean, you can go to their office and you can try to solicit 'em the standard sales way, but where do the people that you're targeting, where else do they appear that you can interact with them? And you, you just, you just have to think outside the box and be creative. Like, the wedding marketplace, I mean, there's tons of people always going after the wedding market. but we establish relationships with the high-end wedding venues that charge a lot of money. Or the high-end wedding planners that aren't doing the $3,000 wedding, they're doing the 10,000 or the 15,000 wedding and created relationships with them because there's the clients that can, really afford to, to pay a lot for the ground transportation for their event. So it.

Ken lLucci 30:36

as importantly, a bride that hires the best planners in her area. You know, I always found there may be 10 wedding planners, but the top two are getting eight of the 10 best weddings in the market. If you have those relationships with the best caterers, the best photographers, the best, planners, they're gonna order your limousine service first, not

Randy Allen 31:03

Yeah. I would put the planners in the venue owners at the top of the list because a lot of times the venues give preferred vendor list to, the brides. In some cases, they say in ground transportation, these are the only ones you can bring on to my property. Um, because they don't want companies that without good service to destroy their property, hit their fancy cade, they have coming in the driveway,

Ken lLucci 31:31

Yep. we had a, a competitor hit a, the mini bus hit one of the pylons that was holding up the facade. at the wedding venue, and it dropped right on top of the bus. So that was a competitor. And after that, they sent flat out, you have to use the ambassador, but the other piece is they'll also invite you to their events. They'll invite you to their wedding shows. I don't know about you, but we used to go to, I would go to the opening of a supermarket if I thought it was a, in a decent neighborhood and, and some prospective clients were, were gonna be there up until the day I sold the company. We were going to catering, tastings, et cetera. Putting, putting a, a, a vehicle out front. They're not meant to sit in the garage. They're meant to be out there and viewed. Let people get in and look at them. if that's the market you want to go after.

Randy Allen 32:18

another way that we've tried to be creative. Um, there was, uh, an annual wine show, in a convention center, where they would bring in wineries and it'd be a three day event and thousands and thousands of people came. And, I think we brought in party bus whenever we could and, um, set it right in the middle and people were drinking wine, having a great time, and they'd come in the party bus and you'd have a hard time kicking 'em out. And I don't know how many wine tours we sold just by being at an, an event like that, uh, worth people that were interested in wine, enjoyed wine and wanting to take a tour and, and, uh, you had a captive audience.

Ken lLucci 32:55

You know, so it's funny you say that because it flashes me back to, uh, Tampa Bay Wine event that was at, um, I believe it was at the Don Cesar. We met the head travel planner. For one of the largest corporations in Tampa because she was a wine aficionado.

Randy Allen 33:14

you never know who you're gonna meet.

Ken lLucci 33:16

you don't, and sprinters back then, were a new deal, like the 2010 timeframe. And she, she flat out spent time in the sprinter and she's talking to her friends and I said to her, you know, what do you do? And she said, well, actually I'm a corporate travel planner. And I said, well, I'm, I'm actually the president of the company. And she said, you know, something, we were, we were thinking about this sprinter. we have a, executive assistant associate, uh, contest, and we pick, they, they had maybe, maybe 75 administrative assistants and they pick the top eight to 10. And the, she said, you know, we give them a lunch out. And I said, I'll tell you what, I'll drive the sprinter. just make it a part of your deal. Now what did that cost me? I was the owner of the company that was just like a sales call for me. Okay. the other piece of it is I got to know the restaurateur that owned the restaurant that they went to.

Randy Allen 34:15

Mm-hmm.

Ken lLucci 34:17

So, why do you think so many operators poo poo? Well, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna go after the private client. I'm not gonna go after the wedding business. I'm only gonna do affiliate and corporate work. Why do you think that is?

Randy Allen 34:32

I'm not sure, I haven't put a lot of thought into that. Um, there are a lot of headaches associated with, with, uh, retail work. you know, people getting sick in the vehicles, um, demanding refunds because the radio didn't work. There are a lot of headaches associated with the retail, but they leverage each other. you know, another example that we're talking about how you, um, take advantage of unique opportunities. Think outside the box. We have this crazy thing in Richmond called Tacky light. Tours in the month of December,

Ken lLucci 35:03

Tacky

Randy Allen 35:04

Tacky light. tours. Um, it started in the seventies in Richmond off of a radio show that decided to throw a bunch of people in a limo and ride around and look at, look at Christmas lights, at homes in different neighborhoods. And it's grown into, I would conservatively estimate a million dollar business in the month of December for transportation companies locally in the Richmond area by itself. Uh, we would typically in a, in the month of December, do two to 300 taite tours in 30 days, generate $200,000 in revenue. But some of those opportunities were. Corporate outings, um, parties for office, uh, per people. Um, or a family might go out in the Taite tour and a member of the family could be a corporate traveler or executive assistant. You just never know how it's gonna cross pollinate and it's part of building the

Ken lLucci 36:06

It a hundred percent And to me, what, crossed my mind when you said that is, hmm. Christmas comes every single year and we know when it's gonna be. So why wouldn't we start marketing the tacky light tours, the holiday parties, the, you know, being safe around the holidays. Why don't we start marketing that in November? You know, I I

Randy Allen 36:30

Not November. We, we get bookings starting in July and we do zero marketing other than our website. Our website year round has a Taite tour page. We don't do any pay per clicks, no advertising. And we sell out every weekend. In the month of December. I had to create, a calendar for the reservation agents to keep track of all the dates that are sold out by vehicle type. cause they're getting so many requests for the same days, the same vehicles they took. And we do 2 50 maybe, tours. And we probably turned down twice that many because we don't have capacity.

Ken lLucci 37:06

That,

Randy Allen 37:06

crazy.

Ken lLucci 37:07

incredible. And to me, that's Gorilla marketing to me. It's taking advantage of the same event every single year. talk to me about, what other kind of, did you do radio advertising at all? Did you do any trade of any kind to get the brand out there? Yep.

Randy Allen 37:25

Um, we did a fair amount of trade. Some of the, the sports teams would do trade, uh, radio stations would do trade, some hotels would do trade. we were always open to, to doing, doing trade as a cost effective way to reach audiences and, and grow your brand. but I wouldn't say it was a huge part of our, our approach. But I think the moral of the story of what we've been talking about is just be open and creative to all different kinds of ideas of how you can get your company out there, not just the traditional pay per click, SEO and so forth.

Ken lLucci 38:01

I think a lot of operators look for the magic bullet and they look for, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna have this massive one idea that's gonna create a watershed. And to me, marketing is a pie, marketing is a wheel. And the network marketing piece, the networking in the community, making that impression, bringing people together, that's priceless. That's absolutely priceless. being the core person. you know, when you were thinking, when you were talking about the Virginia Business Travelers Association, I remember we were members of MPI and after we became members and we became immersed in the community, I, I remember knowing that four or five of the ladies that went to MPI worked in the same office park and I said, ladies, why don't you let us take you in a sprinter? We have a new sprinter we want to show you, et cetera. So it's about getting creative. So in the last few minutes that we have, talk to us about when you decided you wanted to exit. What was your idea of what motivated your exit? Not that you're totally exiting because you are

Randy Allen 39:12

Yeah,

Ken lLucci 39:13

for the company still.

Randy Allen 39:15

I think it was fatigue mainly. this is a tough industry. Uh, you can see it on everyone's face. Uh, it's 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. It wears you out. And, my first attempt to sell the business was pre COVID, right up to when COVID hit, but COVID was really the, the, um. Convincing that it was time, because once COVID hit and there wasn't much to do and all that pressure was gone, you realized how heavy the weight was on your shoulder. cause when you're carrying a hundred pounds every day, it stops feeling like a hundred pounds. You forget it's there, but when you remove it, you realize what you were carrying. so yeah, it, it was, it was just time, for me. Um, and I felt like the company was at the right point too,

Ken lLucci 41:15

What made it easier? What made it harder?

Randy Allen 41:18

to sell the company. Uh, the hard part was, um. Not having done it before and not knowing much about it and how to go about it and do it well, that's where you came in. and were just, um, invaluable in, uh, guiding us through the process. Yeah, we had some of the raw materials that for you to work with that you mentioned before, but, but, um, we didn't know how to package it. We didn't know how to reach the potential buyers. So it was, uh, very fortunate that a mutual friend of ours, uh, Arthur Messina put us together and, um, it, it, it,

Ken lLucci 41:58

Arthur, create a card.

Randy Allen 42:00

so yeah, it was just, uh, a gut feeling that it was the right time, uh, for myself and, and for the business. I'd lost some of the, the drive to push it as hard as it needed to be pushed.

Ken lLucci 42:14

Well, to your credit, first and foremost, you had unbelievably clean financials way before we got involved together. You were probably the only guy that ever gave me a cashflow statement without us even asking for it. Um, you had your books in order well in advance. You knew your numbers. You were running your, your reports on a monthly basis, and you were, you granularly knew your numbers, which made our job a lot easier. all we did was we did put together polished up and put together a nice package, created a CMI, and it allowed us to create a decent opportunity package to attract the right buyers. So many operators think. First of all, they think it's gonna be an easy process. And people, as soon as you decide you're gonna sell, there'll be people running, you know, around the block with checks. the reason why your transaction was successful is because, number one, you had grown the business. The business was, was growing, the business was also profitable. The financial numbers were there, and the buyer was able to attract SBA financing because they had great credit and they had, they were known in the community. So it, it, it lucked out. So if you had a chance to go back and say to a younger Randy Allen, you know, don't make this decision, what would it be in, in the industry? What would it be in, in the space? What would it be at James Limousine? What do you wish you could go back and do over again? Is there that, is there

Randy Allen 43:44

Uh, a couple of things. hire a good sales person. that? was, uh, a weakness of the company not having, a strong sales effort. We did good marketing that we talked about extensively, but not, uh, a direct sales, approach. Probably could have grown the company faster and been more profitable with more focus on sales and bringing in a, a good salesperson. I did try to get into the motor coach around the time that, that it became kind of a, a, a new idea and people were looking at it, not, not to the point that it has in the last three or four years post COVID, but, um, I. Financially it was, it was kind of intimidating to try to jump into that. And I tried to do it only putting one foot in with a smaller single motor coach, and, uh, made a bad decision on the vendor and, and the, the brand that I bought and had a disaster. And to this day, still haven't gotten back into motor coaches. And I know there's a lot of operators out there that it's become, uh, integral part of their business. So if you have the financial capability and the infrastructure to, to do that, and it's the right market, it's a good opportunity I think for, companies in our industry.

Ken lLucci 45:02

I won't ask you the vendor, but I bet you it was the same vendor that I had when I owned motor Coaches. I made the wrong decision as well when I was, you know, and, and part of what, what's interesting and what I do now is people that I do business with have retained clients of mine. They learn as much from the mistakes I made is the successes that we delivered as a, as an operator, but the, the motor coach sector of the business. One, one thing that is common in this industry, which I bothers me, is what I call a herd mentality. You know, so and so has a, so and so has motor coaches. They're, and they're my 20 group. And so therefore I should, it was on the phone today with an operator who wants to get into the motor coach space and he's got an operator in the area that's failed miserably and now he's upside down on the motor coaches. And this failing operator wants to now partner with my client who's very profitable. And I said, stop. First thing we're gonna do is we're gonna do a cost analysis on the fleet, those two units, and then we're going to look at what you need for pricing and what you have for revenue forecasts, because this is not what you think. This is not a big mini bus. This is a completely different beast. And you want, you, you sounds like you learned it the hard way, the same way I did. there's something also about staying in your lane. There's something also about knowing your lane and, you know, it's, it's like driving a car, right? You, you know, you don't switch lanes without putting on the blinker and checking the mirror and almost triple checking the mirror. I see too many people entering into, several hundred thou, many hundred thousand dollars financial transactions and they just don't have a good other than where it's gonna be parked. They don't have a good plan. A good

Randy Allen 46:53

yeah.

Ken lLucci 46:54

And it can sink you.

Randy Allen 46:56

you. mentioned the term herd mentality. I think, uh, that's a, a, a very imp important. Term, term that can be applied to this industry broadly, not just equipment, but software purchases. Um, almost every aspect of our industry, there's a lot of follow the leader to perceived leader follow each other, um, and not enough people think on their own and evaluate things and trust their own, evaluations of opportunities and choices they need to make. that's definitely advice I would, uh, give anybody getting into the industry is, is think for yourself, and evaluate everything, not just listen to a couple recommendations and say, oh, I'll do the same thing too.

Ken lLucci 47:47

W Right, because your markets are completely different and your finance, more importantly, your financial situation is not anywhere. The, the, the two of them are the, I've never found two operators with the same financial situation or personal financial situation as well. And getting into the motor coach space or entering into that, space from the chauffeur side is probably one of the most risk, more riskier decisions you could make. And I, I wish somebody had, I wish I had listened more closely to, I mean, back then, you know, Tommy Maza was my consultant and God forbid when, when I got into the motor code space, he was. in the throes of his, his illness. But, but I, I would, I, if, if I was to do it again, I would probably want to visit several operators around the country that both our chauffeur operators that went up into Motor Coach and then perhaps other bus companies that, that have only motor coaches. You know, one of the beautiful things, if we look at hard mentality as a negative, one of the good things about this industry is I have found people to be very open on sharing, come on in, come

Randy Allen 49:05

That's correct, yes. Whether it's informally or through a peer group that you can join, I highly recommend that. Uh, it's invaluable, but yeah, generally people are very willing.

Ken lLucci 49:16

they are now you, but you can't, it's the biggest decisions you make can also be the biggest regrets. And one of the things I found is No decision should be made in such haste that you shouldn't take the time to truly analyze and review the data and not just the data that perhaps points you in the decision you wanna make, but be your own contrarian. You know, there, there's a lot of people that cheerlead getting into motor coaches, or there's a lot of people that, that swear by acquiring companies or there's a lot of people that, you know, I don't care what it is they do, you know, airport shuttles, whatever, what's right for them may not be right for you. I mean, I've seen big decisions like acquiring companies sync the host. In other words,

Randy Allen 50:09

Yeah.

Ken lLucci 50:10

affected the primary company.

Randy Allen 50:12

And you need to empower your management team. Give them the freedom to give you input that can be contrary to. What you're thinking or, the outcome that you want. You gotta have people that, can give you different approaches and different ideas and opinions about things. If it's not from your internal management team, it's from, um, a peer group that you can interact with or, business coaching. can be a very isolating position to be a CEO of a small business, and you have to have a network of help, uh, to help you make these kind of decisions in a, in a well informed way.

Ken lLucci 50:47

No question. The other thing I really admired about you, when I stepped into the business, you had a great team. You had people that were empowered to run their part of the business. You were not someone that, because you were the president, you were, you know, hovering over their head that you let them do their job and. They're still running the company today. I mean,

Randy Allen 51:09

correct.

Ken lLucci 51:10

so at the end of the day when the new owners stepped in, that owner did not have to immerse themselves seven days a week because you had a pretty darn good team there They were well supervised, but they also had job descriptions, standard, operating procedures. So, you know, that's the other piece of the puzzle is that I think it's your at and t background and certainly that startup helped you, but I think it's the at and t background in you that built James as an organization. It wasn't just a business, it became a company with SOPs, solid departments, job descriptions, and not just titles, but job descriptions behind them. And it served you well throughout the growth and, and it was certainly evident when you decided you wanted to exit. Where do you think the industry, from the perspective of, if you had to wave your magic wand, what do you think the industry would benefit the most from over the next three to five years? Is as far as growth is concerned?

Randy Allen 52:12

Well, um, I would advise anybody that's, that's gonna be in the industry for the next three or four years. Hold on tight. 'cause it's gonna be a wild ride. Change is coming fast, it's coming faster and faster, and you better be nimble. You better be ready to, to adjust and, um, pivot quickly because change is coming fast. Um, it's so much going on to try to keep up with right now. Whether you're talking about ai, whether you're talking about electric vehicles, change in politics, change in young people, it's just a lot to try to absorb and form into a, a. Strategy for your company going forward is something you have to really constantly work at, uh, because things are not gonna stay the same. And what's working for you today won't necessarily work tomorrow.

Ken lLucci 53:07

you said a mouthful there because when I look at operators, when they come to meet us and they want to sell the most isolated operators, the operators that don't belong to the state associations, they don't participate in the C-D-N-L-A or the NLA or they go to the conference once a year and all they do is really want a party. The ones that don't evolve, the ones that look inside their box, and, and what they're doing is they're immersed in their business every single day, and they don't look at the outside environment. Those are the toughest companies to sell because they're mostly owner dependent, number one owners depe, has to do everything. They're most the most backwards when it comes to technology and their way of thinking. And it's when a buyer comes to look at a business, especially somebody from outside the industry, they wanna be able to look at the business and they want to see that it's not gonna consume them seven days a week. And the worst thing I see is operators that operate with an an omniscience thought process. And omniscience thought process is a cognitive bias where the business owner, this is not just the limo, limo space, the, the business owner thinks tomorrow is gonna be the same as today and yesterday. One thing in my, co-host here talks about it in terms of electronics and electronic evolution, Moore's law. But I think we are at a place specifically with two subjects, AI and autonomous, that these next five years are gonna be nothing like the last five years.

Randy Allen 54:48

And, and I would add a third one because the age group from 21 to 35 is totally different than the older groups that we've been primarily doing business with. They're totally different. They're different animal.

Ken lLucci 55:03

They do everything on this.

Randy Allen 55:06

Yeah.

Ken lLucci 55:06

I'm, by the way, for everybody that's not looking at the video, I'm holding up my smartphone and, you know, you and I have had these private conversations and sometimes I've gotten in myself in trouble up on stage by saying how backwards the technology is. It is not about competing with the TNCs, it's about delivering the customer experience that our today's client wants. I mean, you hit the nail on the head, that 25 to 40 range, those are the corporate road warriors, okay? And they have grown up using Uber and Lyft, but if they can expense a chauffeur car, they're gonna use it. Okay. But if they have to make a phone call or they have to make multiple emails, they're not gonna do it. And, and I get, I get kind of frustrated at software providers that tell us, tell the industry what the industry needs. You, you are now in the position that I'm in, where you, you are able to take a 10,000 foot view of the industry because you don't have to worry about getting the vehicles from point A to point B, doing the billing, et cetera. It gives you a different perspective. It's not about competing with the TNCs, it's about delivering. Better. We already deliver a better in-car experience, but it's the ordering and tracking and payment experience that this new generation of business people, do everything on the

Randy Allen 56:32

Did. If you're not easy to do business with, they're not gonna do business with you. It's a real focus of mine right now. it, it's, uh, a legacy that I hope I leave as having some impact on the industry and improving our use of technology and achieving some, some ease. Ease of use, and I won't mention the company names, but are brought together three different software vendors in Dallas at the recent CD show, sat 'em down and said, look guys, each of you have best in class capability for what you do, but you're at island. You're at island. You're an island. We need things that work together well and provide a comprehensive workflow from start to finish. That's easy, fast, bulletproof. You need to talk to each other, help the whole industry come up to a higher level, by giving us the interoperability and the tools that we need to work together. And, uh, and efficiently. And, uh, that's, that's a lot of my focus is trying to drive that as much as I can.

Ken lLucci 57:42

Well look, to me, you hit the nail on the head. It's about legacy. I think, you know, this is kind of similar to the reason why we, do what we do. to me, it's all about a rising tide lifting all boats. It's not about a competitive advantage. It's about saving the industry and seeing the industry grow the way the other alternatives are growing. there's no question that it's needed. Uh, I'd like to see the people at the top of the industry get together instead of. perhaps being their own little islands. and I hope, I, I honestly, and we talked a little bit offline about it, I, I, I think you're the guy to do it. You've got the analytical mind and you can bring the parties together and, um, wish you luck with that.

Randy Allen 58:22

Well, appreciate it. I hope to have a small role in, in helping.

Ken lLucci 58:26

well, when the, when it comes to a time for announcement, I'm, I'm sure we'll hear more about it. Randy, I really appreciate you coming on because, not to blow smoke, but you were one of the better companies to represent for sale because you had your financials together, you knew your numbers. Anytime we asked you for data, you had it. So the question, the questions were, the answers were always there. And also you went into the process, I think, with some reasonable expectations as to what you're gonna get out of it. I'm, I'm happy that you're still consulting for them, and I'm happy the company is doing so well. Because you, you are a walking kind of example of, you know, there's life after owning a limo company and there's a way to successfully get through the exit process, you know, without driving yourself crazy. But it, it's all about managing expectations.

Randy Allen 59:15

Yeah. Well, I appreciate the opportunity. I enjoyed the conversation. Always do when we, we, we talk and, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm enjoying, uh, I guess you could call it semi-retirement. I jokingly tell people I wake up in the morning and try to decide, is this a retirement day or is this a work day? And having that freedom is, is, uh, wonderful.

Ken lLucci 59:35

it, it, it is, it's a different role. We still have responsibilities to the customers. You feel a different way. but neither one of us are there just for the daily consulting paycheck, and I think our customers benefit from it. I know the, the customers we share benefit from it and they appreciate, the perspective that you bring in. You know, to me, you're a mentor because, you know, a coach is great, but a mentor's been through it. A mentor's been through the fire. A mentor has sat up on Thursday nights knowing that they were gonna have a tough time making payroll the next day. and, and I think it's a different level, I think, and I'm glad you decided to have a second act, so to speak. And I know we'll have you back on the podcast. Um, tell everybody how we can find you if they wanna reach out to you.

Randy Allen 1:00:19

Um, you know, I've got three consulting clients right now that are keeping me as busy as I want be. Um, so I'm, I'm not really advertising. I don't have a website. Um, uh, but, um, at the point where I need or want some more consulting work, I will do some marketing of myself. I guess

Ken lLucci 1:00:44

Sounds great. I think that's a great place to be. I mean, we're in similar spots that way. I'm sure we'll see you. I hope we'll see you in Vegas. If, Randy, Allen from, uh, Allen Consulting. Now, thank you for being on the podcast.

Randy Allen 1:00:57

Thank you, Ken.

1:00:59

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.