Growing up in Seattle, Sotirios Rebelos was entrenched in the cab industry. His mom and dad — who met washing their taxis at Pink Elephant during the World Fair in 1962 — were in the business, and his brother drove a cab, too.
After he spent a decade as a taxi driver himself, Rebelos made the entrepreneurial leap and founded a black car service called Crown Car in 2006. For the past eight years, revenue has been steady as the company offered an affordable way to travel around Seattle in a luxury vehicle.
But competition has increased ten-fold with California-based startups like Uber and Lyft entering the Seattle market and utilizing smartphone technology to help people get around town. As a result, Crown Car has seen decreased profits while the business environment that once supplied income for Rebelos’ family has changed significantly.
While many black car and taxi companies have spent time and effort lobbying city lawmakers and filing lawsuits over the legality of services like Uber, Crown Car has been busy developing its own app to keep up with the times — and Rebelos is confident that his company now offers a better, more fair service to riders.
Crown Car’s app, which launched this month, is similar to Uber in the most basic ways — customers can request a ride with a push of a button, track driver location, pay through the app, and look up past transaction history.
But while Uber, which offers its own black car service in addition to a cheaper UberX option, has drawn the ire of some consumers with its surge pricing strategy, Crown Car only implements extra charges during rush hour ($5), or for event and excessive traffic ($10).
The company also allows customers to pay with cash, in addition to the in-app payment system. There’s also a way to order trips in advance — something Uber and Lyft don’t allow for.
Rebelos added that his professional drivers, who are commercially licensed and insured — just like Uber’s black car drivers — know the city better than anyone.
“As a matter of fact, chances are you’ll learn a better route from our drivers,” he said. “Many are artists, bartenders, musicians from the Seattle area as well as many chauffeurs that are defecting and coming over from other services.”
Another differentiating aspect is Crown’s rating system. Uber lets both drivers and passengers rate each other after a ride on a 5-star scale — a strategy that Uber says maintains quality, but one that has been criticized by some for its unfairness.
Crown, meanwhile, uses a simple thumbs up or thumbs down rating system. Passengers that issue a thumbs down must provide a reason, while their ratings are kept anonymous to drivers.
“We feel the reason this is a much better system than the 5-star system because it focuses on what really matters: Driver knowledge, cleanliness of the car, and customer service,” Rebelos said.
Crown also does not allow drivers to rate passengers.
“We feel that it’s a bit inappropriate in a sense,” Rebelos said. “We don’t feel there should be one customer seen as a 5-star, and the next a 4.5. It’s all about transparency and equality.”
As far as prices, Crown is comparable to Uber Black. It also offers flat-rate options for people heading to and from the airport.
Meanwhile, Crown’s drivers also earn more per ride than those on Uber — Crown takes $2 for every ride; Uber takes 20 percent.
“Our drivers are ecstatic about it,” Rebelos said.
With the City of Seattle legalizing transportation network companies this past summer, Rebelos said he plans offering a similar service to UberX and Lyft, which allow everyday drivers to offer rides in their own vehicles. He also wants to expand into other cities.
Rebelos said that his experience as a taxi driver is helping him figure out how to best position Crown in this rapidly changing industry.
“You have the the old taxi industry that is only in the business to lease out cabs, so the passengers are secondary,” he explained. “Then you have the startups that are mostly about the customers, and are backed by massive bankroll. So, the driver gets shafted in their market share grab. We’re in the middle. It’s equally about the driver and the passenger. That’s why it’s so harmonious here.”
