Recession Taxi in VT

[Lloyd Danforth]

http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20090802/BUSINESS/90801010/Vermont-man-opens-Recession-Taxi

Vermont man opens Recession Taxi

By Joel Banner Baird, Free Press Staff Writer • August 2, 2009

ESSEX — You read it right the first time: the message on the taxi's back window really reads, "Pay What You Want!"
Eric Hagen, 46, an Essex resident and the SUV's owner (and sole proprietor of Recession Ride Taxi) smiles a lot, but he isn't joking. He's making a profit.
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"Nobody has shortchanged me yet," he said Saturday. "Nobody's stiffed me. I've decided to empower the customer; they like the fact they can decide."

Hagen, who still works full time at the American Red Cross in Burlington, hatched his improbable business model in June.

"I hadn't thought about it before," he said. "I was watching CNBC — the financial station — and it suddenly hit me: Everybody's always hearing, 'This is what your mortgage is going to be; this is what your car payment's going to be.' People want to get away from that."

Low start-up costs and low overhead prompted Hagen to get a cabbie's license and insurance.

He printed up some business cards with his cell phone number, and waited.

The first half of July, Hagen took far more questions than fares: "People were coming up to me in parking lots and asking, 'Is this for real?' I'd tell them, 'This is for real.' And I'd give them a card.

"After two weeks, business really started picking up," he continued. "That's the way consumers are: they're curious at first, and then they gain trust. And I'm trusting that the consumer is going to be fair. Maybe that's what people need right now."

The New York Stock Exchange, where Hagen worked in the 1990s, shaped Hagen's take on what he liked — and didn't like — in the world of finance.

Stints at Putnam Investments and Bombardier Capital (now GE Commercial Finance) sharpened his search for a different way to do business.

"It caused me to be more empathetic: You'd see millions of dollars in losses. You'd see corruption, and then you'd talk to people who've lost their entire savings, lost their retirement," he said. "It made me think there's got to be a different approach."

Hagen offers Recession Ride customers an expanding selection of what he terms "the fringe benefits" of his service.

[Peacemaker]

Thanks for posting this story Lloyd.

It's great to see and I find his observation of customers very well said:

"That's the way consumers are: they're curious at first, and then they gain trust."

[Ogre]

Obviously he's outside of the city. Most US cities have organized gangs that you have to ask permission from before you can drive a taxi, and then can only charge what the mob requires you to charge.

Nicely done.

[doobie]

How soon until the government shuts him down?

[KBCraig]

For some time now, I've thought that someone with a 15pax van could do well in the entertainment district, offering an "anti-DWI" service. Especially if you follow the Jeff Foxworthy model of pulling over every couple of blocks, and passing the hat for gas.