Help Chantelle and SRT Get Back On Their Feet

My name is Chantelle Brawley. I'm a Laramie native who has been driving taxi here for over 12 years. This is a bit of a long read, but I wanted to be as thorough and transparent as possible.

Almost ten years ago, after being dismayed with how other cab companies treated both their employees and customers, I started my own company, Snowy Range Taxi (back then it was called Here and There Shuttle). My partner Matthew Peck soon joined me, and we began building the most successful taxi company in Laramie history.

It hasn't always been easy, and the first several years were extremely rough...with a lot of ups and downs (we actually nearly went out of business in 2013). We made a lot of mistakes...and we didn't always have the best reputation, I'll fully admit. But we kept working at it, and learned and grew not just as a business, but as people and as a family.

In recent times, we've finally gotten where we want to be, and we've earned the trust and loyalty of the community. We've been able to upgrade to a nice, brand new car, we ended up with a good, dependable backup truck, we've improved our reviews and ratings to a 4.9/5 on Facebook and a 4.1/5 on Google, we've been able to launch a mobile app with an outstanding loyalty rewards program...and most importantly, we've been able to give back to the community by giving out 100% free rides all night on every major drinking holiday for the last year. We've also been able to secure deals with several local bars to provide extremely low flat rates to and from certain places for the community, and been able to lower our prices to levels they've never been at before...often even cheaper than ridesharing companies.

But now, all of that is in danger of coming crashing down...right before the holidays this year...as a perfect storm of things has not gone our way.

On November 4th, the transmission in our main taxi blew up, just barely outside of warranty. If initial diagnosis and estimates are correct, this is around a $5,000 repair. Now, we will be fighting to get the manufacturer to cover it (not only is it just barely outside of warranty, but problems with the transmission were reported to an authorized dealer while the vehicle was still under warranty, and went undiagnosed and unfixed due to intermittent nature). However, there is no guarantee that the manufacturer will cover the cost, and there is a good chance they may only cover part of the cost.

That isn't the only problem we've encountered, however. Our local service center still hasn't been able to actually get in and look at our car and start a claim with the manufacturer, nearly two weeks later. Even if the manufacturer does cover the cost of repair (absolute best case scenario), we're looking at probably another few weeks before getting the vehicle back. So we've been forced into using our backup vehicle.

Here's where things get really rough. We were recently informed that our commercial insurance company would no longer be insuring our backup vehicle for commercial purposes, only for personal purposes. Keep in mind that they had no issue insuring it last year, and they haven't been able to give us a straight answer as to why they won't commercially insure it all of a sudden. Initially they claimed it was because they didn't want to insure a truck as a taxi, even in Wyoming. When we refuted that, they later claimed they actually didn't want to insure it because it was more than ten years old. When we refuted that, they simply shut down and said they aren't insuring it commercially and that's final. Even our own insurance agent is confused, but we apparently have no recourse.

What does this mean for us? Well, it means that if we want to give rides in our backup vehicle and not lose our entire customer base, we have to operate for free, on a non-commercial basis. We cannot charge for rides. We literally have to work for free.

We are now in the unenviable position of having to depend on personal donations to not only keep the company's bills paid, but also our family's bills paid. We are having to literally work for free to keep the company alive, while the bills pile up...and we still don't even know what's going to happen with our main vehicle. Additionally, our backup vehicle is now in need of a fair amount of maintenance (oil change, tires, transmission service, transfer case service, etc.). As expenses climb, bills go unpaid, the holidays are fast approaching, and the future gets more uncertain, we are now asking the community and our longtime customers for help.

We didn't want to start a GoFundMe. We really didn't want to have to resort to soliciting donations to get things sorted out. But we could really, really use some help. If every person who “likes” or “follows” us just on Facebook alone donated just $10, we could continue to give free rides to the community for the next month (while everything gets sorted out)...while getting our bills paid, maintenance done on our backup vehicle, and pay for a large chunk (roughly half) of the repair to our primary vehicle. Keep in mind that our situation is imminent, and the sooner we can get any help, the better.

We are also accepting donation in person, and via Paypal (you can send money directly to [email redacted]).

I never thought we'd be in this precarious of a situation again. Not after how hard we've worked to earn our place in the community, fix past mistakes, and build the reputation we now have. But we hope that you'll help us weather this storm.

We have a team of people...service departments, insurance agents, bartenders and longtime customers, etc...working on our side to help us get things sorted out. But at the end of the day, it all comes down to money. I'd sincerely appreciate any and all help you can give. Even if you don't think you can help much, believe me...even just $10 makes a WORLD of difference.

We love what we do, and we continue to do it for a variety of reasons. We don't want to go out like this, and I've personally put too much into this over the last ten years to give it all up now.

Any questions or concerns at all, feel free to email me at [email redacted], message Snowy Range Taxi on Facebook, talk to me when you see me on the street or take a ride, or give me a call on the business number at [phone redacted].  Those of you who know me personally can feel free to contact me on my personal Facebook or phone as well.

Thanks for your time and consideration.


-Chantelle Brawley

Snowy Range Taxi