Columbia, SC (WLTX) - Blue Ribbon Taxi is one of South Carolina's oldest serving taxi cab companies.
"We started in 1928. And as the time grew, the company continued to grow," says Blue Ribbon President Barbara Dotson.
Dotson started with Blue Ribbon as a driver 40 years ago.
"I enjoyed meeting people," she says.
And after 20 years, she was named the first female president of the company.
She says, "We had to make a transition. First of all, it was a male dominated field, so I had to come in as a woman and earn some respect as a woman."
Dotson says she's seen so many changes during her time with the taxi service. At one time the calls came in via land-line phones and fare were calculated with paper and pencil.
"Now we got computers," she says. "So they're typing them in and drop into the car so it's just different. But if these computers go down we have to go back to the paper and pencil, we have to keep working."
But, she's always worked to make sure one thing stayed the same.
She says, "We have driver training meetings often. We bring in people to talk about customer service, because customer service is the key in any business."
After 40 years with the company, she says it's a privilege to be a part of this community.
"It's very significant. People know you've been there. They know you'll give them a good service when they get you, so longevity helps a lot. People can depend on you, they cant trust you," she says.
On any given day, they still have about 50-60 drivers on the road. Blue Ribbon is also one of only a few taxi services allowed to go onto Fort Jackson, so the built-in customer base has helped them last so long.