Diamond Cab Company is one of the oldest cab company in the country. They have been around since the 1920's, in fact we still have some of the old farts driving who were present at the inauguration of the company. I hear from some of my passengers that tell me that their grandparents used to ride with Diamond. That says a lot about any business that could survive this long, especially a small businesses like Diamond.
At one point Diamond had over a thousand cabs in the fleet, at least that was I was told. That number evaporated to just over couple hundred nowadays, and the old retards who own this company don't give a shit at all. If you pay a visit to the dispatch room you would experience a time travel back in to the 1960's. The duck-taped radio equipments that barely work, you will see a pile of hand written order tickets all over the place because a machine called "COMPUTER" hasn't been discovered yet at Diamond.
Since Yellow Cab Company of DC installed the computer dispatch system, almost hundred Diamond cab operators had defected to Yellow Cab! Instead of keeping up with the competition, this company is ruining the "DIAMOND" brand straight to the grave by hiring dispatchers who don't have the command of the English language, by refusing to modernize the dispatch system, by not hiring a real manager instead of a second hand book-keeper running the place like a junkyard, by allowing some unprofessional drivers and operators stick with the company and by losing most of the contracts that we had with different law and lobbying firms on K street, just to mention a few.
With the ongoing self destructive course I just don't see this company surviving another year, unless they sell it to a hungry investor with vision and capital that can turn around this potentially cash-cow operation in to a real dominant transportation powerhouse in Washington DC.
Anyone out there that is sitting on couple of million dollars or so and don't know what to do with it? Forget the stock market, I just gave you a fat ass insider information that can make you a shit load of money in a relatively short period of time. I will be glad to share ideas with you @ maddccabbie@yahoo.com if interested.
Please don't forget the homeless,
Mad Cabbie.
8 comments:
Are you back driving with Diamond, Mad Cabbie? I had heard that you had left some time back.
The only one left in Diamond's ownership who is even close to the original days is Mr. Walker, who holds the most shares and controls the largest bloc of shares. Mr. Walker's father was one of the early stockholders from 1926, the year that the company was founded. Mr. Walker did work there in the 1930s and actually did drive from the 1940s to the 1990s (minus the time served in the Second World War).
I sold my interest in 2007, for reasons that I will not discuss here. The funny thing is that people still think that I have something to do with the Management of that Company. This is not true. I have had no involvement in the Management of that Company since August, 2007.
Many of the drivers who went to Yellow did come back. They did not like going to Southeast, something that happens frequently at Yellow. Many of the drivers who stayed at Yellow are the guys who used to run the voucher jobs at night. Now they are running voucher jobs at Yellow. Yellow does have many accounts.
Many who left because of Karas did not come back, even after Karas was shown the door. Many who left because of King Jive did return after he left. In fact, when King Jive made a brief reappearance in 2009 (or was it late 2008?), many of the drivers who came back from Yellow were threatening to go back there. The King Jive problem solved itself. I understand that he is too sick to do much of anything, these days.
The satellite may be wonderful at assigning calls, but it does not dispatch. The satellite can not see to it that someone who rides three times daily gets picked up ahead of someone who has never called. The satellite will send you on a guaranteed NSP, whereas a dispatcher (and I mean a real dispatcher) just announces "Pick 'em up". The satellite sends you on a Union Station job so that you can get four hundred dollars worth of summonses from the Harassment Inspector or sends you on some stick up job to Benning Heights while the National, Dulles or Friendship job goes begging. The dispatcher sends you to the best that is there (or the worst, if you have made him unhappy). While we are on the subject, a satellite can not smell a rat; a real dispatcher can and knows to throw the call into the trash.
Given the calibre of driver that you get these days, though, the satellite makes sense. Most of these assclowns can not do anything for themselves and expect that you will do everything but collect the fare. The satellite does everything for them. It tells them where the job is. It tells them how to get from where they are to the address. They push a button, and the satellite calls the customer. The satellite tells them how to get from the customer's address to his destination. The idiot box tells him how much to charge.
Most of these drivers do not want a real dispatcher these days, anyhow, they want someone to mollycoddle them and whom they can abuse at will. This is one reason that the hackers like me, but the cab drivers do not. And yes, there IS a difference between a hacker and a cab driver.
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For Management, the satellite does not complain, it does not want days off, it does not ask for benefits, it does not favour its buddies, it does not punish crybabies and send them wailing to Management and it does not steal or sell jobs. The order takers can still do this, though.
I hate to see the satellite, but since drivers and Management no longer want real dispatchers, it makes more sense. I am one of the last of the breed. There are probably fewer than fifteen of us left in Washington.
But there you go, we are the last of the breed and after us, there will be no more. The cab business will be the poorer for it.
I know Phil, you are the only real dispatcher left in that dump! But unfortunately the voice dispatch days are behind us. Both have pros and cons, but if Diamond wants to turn things around in to at least 500 cabs strong, it has to switch in to auto dispatching system. In the mean while I will find a spot for you at the Smithsonian!
I am still with Diamond but I don't have the radio anymore. I gave it up after they pushed out Robby because I kind of felt I was hacking in Accra! I don't take a lot of calls anyways so I am back in the hoods bro!
Mad Cabby! I read your blog but didn't know you'd started posting again because your Atom RSS feed is broken -- click on the link at the bottom. Fix it so I can known when you put up new posts! Thanks!
Mad Cabby! I read your blog but didn't know you'd started posting again because your Atom RSS feed is broken -- click on the link at the bottom. Fix it so I can known when you put up new posts! Thanks!
Mad Cabby! I read your blog but didn't know you'd started posting again because your Atom RSS feed is broken -- click on the link at the bottom. Fix it so I can known when you put up new posts! Thanks!
Found your blog -- interesting stuff! I live within a stone's throw of Diamond Cab but have heard some bad stuff about stranded fares. What are my chances of Diamond honoring my request to take me from Logan Circle to Union Station at 3 in the morning?
Pretty good, unless it is a weekend. The gin mills close at 0300, so many of the night drivers are working the bar traffic, then.
Still, there are usually many drivers around Iowa Circle at that time in the morning.
Oh, and Mad Cabbie, I doubt that you will see a satellite dispatching at Diamond any time soon.
Diamond Cab was the oldest and largest cab company. They had a vast fleet lineup. You have indicated a very good business plan in your post. Good writing :)
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