If you have already read our ABOUT US page, then you read where I said, “we ALL have struggles in life sometimes…”!  I have… you have… EVERYONE has… (yes, even you… and everyone knows it). This venture of starting 5-0 Ride-0 Transportation is no exception.  If it wasn’t for many people in Margie’s and my life, we would not be doing what we are doing today… in fact I would have probably been forced to go back to the “corporate machine” again… and while I would have done it if necessary, I really did not want to!

I heard it said by a very wise preacher that… “Gratitude is the Attitude that sets the Altitude for Living!”  We believe that whole heartedly… so there are several people we would like to thank…

First, we thank God, because without Him… we would have NOTHING!  Not life… not breath… not existence, NOTHING… that’s what we believe and are not afraid to say it!  We are so thankful for all that He has provided for us and blessed us with, in so many ways that we do not deserve!  In our imperfect humanity, we do our best to operate our business with complete integrity because we want this company to be honoring to Him!

Next I want to thank my beautiful and patient wife, Margie!  She has been so supportive of this venture, right from the very beginning.  How many wives do you know that, if her husband came to her and said

“Baby, I want to leave my current career and start a brand new transportation company from the ground up… oh yeah honey, and I plan on funding venture this by cashing out of my stocks & retirement savings…”?

Well… I’m sure you can imagine how most spouses would respond, but not from my wife!  She knew this was not some half-hearted, whimsical, mid-life crisis thing I was going through, she knew I was in complete faith and would do everything possible to make this a success.  Thank you for all of your support… We came across a lot of roadblocks through this but I couldn’t have done any of this without you!

We would also like to thank my brother John for all the tireless and seemingly endless hours he and I put into the restoration of the car.  His ASE Certified Master Technician skills went to work on our limousine, with meticulous attention to detail to make this car RIGHT!  Anyone that knows John, knows that it is the ONLY way he does ANYTHING… with perfection!  He invested so much time, talent and money as well as other resources into into our business… and he didn’t have to!  Thank you so much bro… for EVERYTHING!

I’d also like to thank Uncle Mark & Aunt Linda for the use of their pole barn for the 3 1/2 months it took to do the restoration of the limousine because the car certainly would have never been able to fit inside my garage.  None of us had any idea at the time… but due to unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances, while it is a large pole barn, my 30 foot long car was completely obstructing the entire main path of their barn for MUCH longer than we had anticipated.  Their hospitality, patience and understanding of the situation was incredible and without ALL of that… this project would have NEVER been able to be completed.

Also I would also like to thank my brother & sister-in-law, Jim & Patty as well as our very long time friends Eric & Dianah for all the many times you have been there for us.  You have helped in so many ways, for so many years and your generosity and love for us has been overwhelming at times!

I’d also like to thank my brother Chris for putting up with me during some rough times… you are always there to lean on and have stepped in and helped us where we needed it most, at the time we needed it most… THANK YOU bro!

During this venture, we also went through some pretty tight financial times, because while we had originally set aside plenty of money to get this project completed, the project wound up taking about a month-and-a-half longer and cost about $10,000 more that we expected.

Part of the reason for that is that we had an “incident” where a tow truck did some fairly significant damage to the front of the car while towing it off the highway after I had a break-down on my way to the shop to begin the restoration.  Hey, we get it… accidents happen and people make mistakes… it is what it is, and it certainly was not done intentionally.  But, even though it caused more initial expense and a major delay in the process, we would also like to thank Byer’s Towing Service in Rochester, MI, because while it was one of their tow operators that made the mistake that damaged the limousine in the first place, the owner of Byer’s simply requested a couple of estimates for the damage and within a few days of submitting them,  he wrote a check to pay for the total damages without any delay or argument.   This is a fairly rare thing to see in business these days so thank you and I would not hesitate to use Byer’s services again… though honestly, I hope I will never need to.

There are others that we would like to thank too such as our church Cornerstone Community Church in Lapeer and a couple of other friends, Russ, Bob and Donna for giving me work to supplement my income while finishing the extended project on the limousine.

THANK YOU TO ALL OF YOU…