BRAC drives change at local transportation company

Mary Paramore
HBL Associate Editor
5/1/09

A Harford County based transportation company is refocusing its target market due to personnel changes expected from Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) activities at Aberdeen Proving Ground.

Scott’s Transportation, which has operations in Alabama, South Carolina and Maryland has, almost since its inception in 1998, had a strong relationship with the military. The firm will gradually shift its emphasis here from driving soldiers to and from airports and other military installations to driving military civilians, special groups and corporate clients.

The 24-hour, pre-arranged transportation service has contracts with the Department of Defense and TRADOC, the Army’s training command, but owners Brenda and Ronnie Scott are preparing now for the importance of these contracts to its Harford County operations to diminish. With BRAC, they see both challenge and opportunity for businesses specifically targeting soldiers.

“We’ve always had a strong relationship with local hotels and major employers,” Ronnie Scott said. “We do weddings and charters. We do a lot with the City of Aberdeen. When they were trying to get money to build Ripken stadium, we took the Mayor and Council members back and forth to Annapolis.”

Scott is diversifying its fleet of vehicles, which at one time comprised ten vans in Harford County alone, to appeal to a changing clientele. The company now has six vans, three sedans and a limousine.

Ronnie Scott remembers how he got his start. After eight years in the Army, he got out with just a $500 income tax check and a dream. “I bought a van and started taking little old ladies to bingo,” he said. “Then the Army found out about us.”

As his business grew, he persuaded his brother, Dan Scott, to move here from Alabama to manage drivers and operations. He leased space “to park all those vans” in an old gas station at 301 W. Bel Air Avenue. Brenda Scott began handling reservations, and still does. Extended family members were trusted to open Scott’s Transportation offices near Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama and Ft. Jackson, South Carolina to expand its service area for the military.

After diversifying his fleet and preparing promotional materials to assist in his refocused target marketing, Scott’s Transportation plans to add routes. Ronnie Scott said, “I want to do shuttle stops to the airport, with runs like Forest Hills, Havre de Grace and Edgewood, all to Baltimore County.”

The Scotts have another strength behind them to ensure they survive BRAC: diversification.

They are proprietors of Lele’s Southern Hospitality Restaurant on South Philadelphia Boulevard, which developed a strong customer base during its three years of operation. They closed the restaurant to relocate, but are now waiting for their desired space to become available.

The Scotts also operate a detailing service from bays at the same former gas station where Scott’s Transportation is headquartered.  Unique Car Care provides car washes and full-service car detailing, but if truth be known, cars aren’t the only thing getting a fresh start on the premises.

During its 13 years of operation, Ronnie Scott has made a point of hiring neighborhood kids and young men down on their luck to work at Unique Car Care.  “Some good kids have been in trouble, been in jail, and they come out and I give them a job. One of the reasons I went back to college in 2003 to finish my degree was just to be a good role model.”

Through Unique Car Care, Scott has mentored some famous names in Harford County. One of those is Aaron Henderson, who plays for the Minnesota Vikings. He also points with pride to Jamaica Dunn, who left Harford County to join the Air Force and now works for the federal government at Ft. Meade, and to Meshia Dudley, who, as a high school student, had to support his brothers and sisters and now has a family of his own.

The Scotts’ own children, sons who are now 29, 18 and 15, and a daughter, age 7, work at their businesses, answering phones, clearing restaurant tables, washing and waxing cars. “If they want those expensive tennis shoes, they have to work,” Ronnie Scott said.

For more about Scotts Transportation, call 410-273-1577.

Photo caption: Scott’s Transportation is a family affair in Harford County and at its locations in Alabama and South Carolina. From left are sons Brandon and Brian, with their parents and Scott’s Transportation owners, Brenda and Ronnie Scott. The couple has two other children, Ronnie and LeLe, who also lend helping hands.