Ledger-Enquirer.com:
Think it’s too much of a hassle to drive to the Kia plant for work?
Naomi Cason and Ronald Henry have a solution. About a year ago, the mother-son pair established Bi-City Transportation, a shuttle service that provides round-trip services for Kia workers from Columbus to West Point.
Henry said the business offers an option to those with transportation issues – whether it’s the 90-mile-plus round trip or lack of a vehicle.
Henry and Cason spoke to the Ledger-Enquirer about brainstorming the idea for the business, helping Kia employees get to work and running a family business.
Tell me about Bi-City Transportation – how you got started, what you offer.
Henry: We started in January 2008. We’re a full-service transportation company.
Our primary function is to offer shuttle service from Columbus to West Point in support of Kia and the suppliers there. What (Kia) allows you to do is apply for a permit to drive onto the premises to bring customers. We’ve applied for and gotten that.
We’re targeting Kia workers going to the plant.
We pick up at various locations throughout Columbus, Phenix City and we’ll be in Opelika soon. We have one 47-passenger charter bus and we’ll have five 15-passenger vans.
Kia won’t have workers go up on a daily basis until the middle of January.
Cason: My son came to me with the idea.
He said, “Since the Kia plant is coming, they will need a way to get back and forth to work.” With the economic climate and as high as gas prices were, this was the perfect opportunity for him and me to get together and start a business.
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