About this episode
Roslyn Taggart founded B811 Medical Transportation in Fairfield, California in honor of her brother, and grew it from three rides in March to roughly 70 a week by that November. Instead of knocking on facility doors, she worked council members, mayors and the director of the Department of Aging, which produced a subsidized ride contract with the Solano Transportation Authority for low income seniors and ADA certified riders. She staffs through the local workforce development board, screens applicants for empathy rather than driving experience, and runs the company alongside her adult son and daughter.
Key takeaways
- Taggart treats health fairs as networking, not lead generation. The tables did not bring her riders, they brought her council members, mayors and Department of Aging contacts who control contracts.
- Her broker work is roughly 95 percent ambulatory while her private pay is 95 to 98 percent wheelchair, so she keeps two ambulatory vans dedicated to broker volume.
- The van she regrets is a Toyota Sienna: side entry, one wheelchair at a time. She would buy rear entry with room for two so a second pickup is not a second trip.
- She hires through the workforce development board, which funds on the job training only for applicants who lack driving experience, and screens for empathy because driving itself can be taught.
- Recurring clients get a free Sunday ride anywhere for their birthday, and when a leisure ride is paid for, Taggart passes the whole fare to the driver instead of the business.
Chapters
- 0:00 Introduction
- 1:50 B811 Transport's mission
- 5:35 Scaling the NEMT business
- 11:50 Practical parts of business setup
- 16:39 Expansion plans for next year
- 18:10 Pitfalls to avoid in scaling
- 22:00 Bambi is a lifesaver
- 26:27 Family-run business
- 34:40 Branding
- 36:55 NEMT industry conference
- 42:20 Transportation Authority meetings
- 43:11 Owner and operator
