Most college students wouldn’t be caught dead driving a bright yellow minivan. Lane Etheridge, a graduate student in industrial technology, seems to be happy with his.
Etheridge started his taxi service, Dogs Patrol Cab Company, about seven weeks ago, he said.
“A lot of my friends had just gotten DUIs, a lot of them close together,” he said.
He started the taxi service because there was no safe way home from bars except the shuttle.
Rides in Etheridge’s vans cost $3 each for any destination in Starkville at the moment, but he may soon raise them to $4 each due to gas prices.
“A DUI can cost up to $5,000,” he said. “If you think about it, you can get almost 2,000 cab rides for the price of a DUI.”
Etheridge has a seven-person van and a 12-person van. He planned to acquire another seven-person van this week.
“It gets to be more than three or four people, it could get pretty crowded in the car,” he said.
Right now, Etheridge makes enough money to cover his costs, he said. “At night I would like to have a total of 200 people all night. Right now, I’m sitting at 40 or 50 per night,” he said.
Sunday through Wednesday are his slower days, he said, although airport runs are pretty steady. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays are busy, he said.
“Shuttle service is going to make us some money as far as immediately goes,” he said.
Etheridge said he wants to be going full speed by football season. “I’m hoping to get some increased business when it comes to games,” he said.
Rick Welch, owner of Rick’s Caf‹¨, said he sees patrons of his establishment using Etheridge’s vans a lot.
“It’s a great service that he’s providing for the community,” said Welch, who lets Etheridge park his vans in his parking lot.
“With him being located here, my customers are starting to use him more and more,” Welch said.
“I’m real impressed that he took the initiative to do something like this, because I think it’s been needed in Starkville for a long time,” he said.
Patrons of Welch’s bar also use the Night Route and Starkville’s other taxi services, he said.
“There’s a couple of taxi services in town and the Night Route, and I just encourage students to use them, especially when they’ve been drinking,” he said.
According to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, 341 alcohol-related traffic fatalities occured in Mississippi in 2004.
Etheridge and his partner, Southaven attorney Richard Johnson, plan to expand the service to other college town and start up a shuttle service in conjunction with a casino.
When Etheridge isn’t driving taxis, he attends school, works at the Highland Plantations golf shop and buys and sells real estate.
Once he finishes school, he hopes to continue with the taxi service, the shuttle service and real estate investment. His dream job is to work in a front office job for an NFL team, he said.
“It’s all about taking a chance on something, and if it works, it works, great, but if it doesn’t, you move on to something else,” he said.