Q&A With James Blain of PAX Training

Chauffeur Driven spoke to PAX Training President James Blain on the heels of some whirlwind traveling that saw the operations and training expert—and recent podcaster—visiting various local industry associations.

James Blain Chauffeur Driven: Why is being involved in local associations so important for PAX Training?
James Blain: We have always had a strong connection with the industry. When my partner Bruce Heinrich founded PAX, it was because what he needed for his operation didn’t exist, and once he shared what he was doing with his peers and friends within the industry, he found they had the same need he did. Thus, PAX was born. In the early years, Bruce and I shared an office at his company LEADER Worldwide here in Kansas City. So, even though I came from outside the industry, the mindset I learned was from the perspective of an operator not a vendor. I’ve always been one of those people who felt very strongly that to truly serve your customers you have to be sitting on their side of the table so you can see the problems they see and work with them to solve them. To do that, you have to meet them where they are.

For us, involvement with the associations started from day one on a national level—such as National Limousine Association (NLA) events, etc.—but as we’ve grown and expanded, one of the things we’ve done is to try and bring a focus to the local associations as well. Although we think that every operator should join the NLA and attend the national conferences each year, there are operators who won’t attend unless the event is in their backyard. So, the only way to reach and help those operators is to get involved with the local meetings and events. The local associations also play a key role in giving operators a larger voice in their market.

Our goal is to reach out and be available to operators of all sizes. I was honored that many organizations asked me to present at their conferences and meetings in 2024, and that is going to continue into 2025. We are also getting more involved with local motorcoach associations as well as The Transportation Alliance and others. So, I’m going to end up becoming a true road warrior.

CD: What are you seeing in the safety world?
JB: The biggest thing right now is that operators must shift toward proactive thinking and actions. It’s not enough to wait for incidents to happen. For instance, you can’t just have dash cameras and telematics and only address issues when something goes wrong. Although telematics are great, and I 100 percent recommend having them, that’s kind of like saying, “I know I have a family history of heart disease, and I’m even starting to feel chest pains, but instead of going to the doctor and making changes to get ahead of it, I’m going to wear a fitness tracker to record the details of my first heart attack.” It sounds crazy, but I see operators do it every day. The only way to truly be proactive and get ahead is to have ongoing training that reinforces your initial training program, BEFORE something goes wrong. You want to have policies in place, so your chauffeurs know what to do and how to do things properly. If you wait for harsh-braking notifications or videos of the chauffeur doing something wrong, at that point, the ship has sailed.

I see operators analyzing a video of an accident instead of trying to prevent them from occurring in the first place. We are working this year with as many people as we can on the insurance side to get resources in the hands of operators and make being proactive as easy as possible. We’ve already partnered with Lancer Insurance and are working to make sure other insurance carriers and underwriters understand what PAX’s programs are. We also reached out to industry brokers, because ensuring they have a record of what companies are doing arms them in the fight for getting better rates. We’re having a lot of success with companies that are doing ongoing training and keeping everyone up to speed. I can tell you right now it pays off in their loss runs and that these are the people who are a lot happier come insurance renewal time. If an insurance carrier can see what you are doing to prevent accidents, you’re positioning yourself as a safer bet, which can directly impact your rates.

CD: Can you tell us about PAX’s new partnership with Lancer Insurance?
JB: Our goal is to create a single source of training for the industry. As an operator, you have enough to deal with and track. Lancer has a legacy of safety and going above and beyond for their customers. The idea was, how do we create a win-win for both Lancer and their insureds? So, we partnered with Lancer to create a more effective way to deliver the training resources they provide their insureds right alongside the training that PAX provides. Lancer’s training videos didn’t have tests, so we worked closely with them to turn them into true training courses complete with test questions. Anyone that’s both a Lancer and PAX customer just has to let us know and we can turn on access to the Lancer resources, and PAX will keep a record of it. The PAX Training Platform will track how much time is spent on each course and record the test results. All that information is stored on the platform. Then when renewal time comes up, they can quickly and easily export the Lancer courses their team completed in addition to the PAX-specific courses, giving them a simple way to share what they are proactively doing.

CD: How did you get involved with the American Bus Association’s Bus Industry Safety Council (BISC)?
JB: I was actually invited to be part of a group called The Driving Force, which was chaired by Erin Ducharme of Bloom Tour & Charter Service. We did a webinar together during COVID as part of the Women In Buses webinar series. The whole idea of Driving Force was to provide recruiting resources coming out of the pandemic, and we had a great group of people. Bruce [Heinrich] had introduced me to the current chair of BISC, Jeff Shanker of Black Tie Transportation, early on in my career, and I met him as he was moving from the limousine world toward the motorcoach side. I was also lucky that the chair of BISC’s sister council—the Bus Maintenance & Repair Council (BusMARC)—was Mike McDonal of Saucon Technologies, who was on The Driving Force with me. I talked to Jeff about being more involved in BISC, and that led to me becoming a part of their executive committee. I’ve been fortunate that those two legends in the industry took me under their wings. Honestly, I’ve found that the bus guys are more proactive. A limo operator may purchase a Sprinter or a bus, but often they don’t know what they don’t know, and they don’t even know what questions to ask because sedans and SUVs aren’t as heavily regulated as buses. It’s very rare that you find a motorcoach operator who doesn’t know what they must do because of the high cost, numerous regulations, and the fact BISC exists. BISC is all about making sure that their members are fully informed on the regulations, and they also have a mentoring program for new safety and compliance managers.

CD: What other differences do you see between traditional motorcoach companies and chauffeured ground transportation operations?
JB: There are several things that trigger regulatory compliance. On the black car side, the trigger is usually Sprinters and larger vans. As your fleet vehicles get larger, scrutiny is going to increase due to the high number of regulations. On the motorcoach side, they start with full regulatory compliance requirements, and overall, they have the most regulations. Therefore, if you run a bus company and you’re purely reactive, your chances of a major issue or failed audit is really high. You’re just not going to make it very far. The black car world starts out, in most cases, with vehicles with very few regulations. You aren’t going to hear, “they came in and audited my SUV fleet,” unless maybe you’re in an ultra-regulated city or state.

The two industries have different approaches. Traditional motorcoach operators still provide customer service, but they’re not coming at things like the luxury transportation side—where you do one-on-one, high-touch, high-level service. So, when companies from the chauffeured transportation space buy a motorcoach, they tend to bring that level of service with them. As a result, a pure motorcoach operator that is doing line runs or tours is probably going to have a different thought process toward how they approach the business as compared to folks like Mike Rose of My Limousine Service in New Jersey or Jorge Sanchez of Hermes Worldwide in Denver who are sending out beautiful buses that match the same level as their sedans and SUVs. They spec them out with the mindset of a chauffeured services company and have high-touch chauffeurs driving them. The mentalities are different between the two industries because of where they’re starting from and how they are getting to that point. They’re both great; they’re just different worlds.

CD: In addition to PAX, you also co-host the Ground Transportation Podcast with Ken Lucci of Driving Transactions. How did that come about?
JB: I am taken aback by how many people will listen to me talk. I am flattered and humbled that people are enjoying it. The podcast started from a conversation that I had with Lucci, whom I’ve known for a long time. In fact, something he told me is that at one point he considered getting involved in chauffeur training, but he was so impressed by what PAX was doing that he moved to a different space. I was truly humbled by that. Over the years, our relationship has grown. A lot of what Ken talks about with M&A and what I do with PAX lines up perfectly, because if you want to have a valuable company, you need to have processes and systems in place. Proactive companies sell for more money because they run like clockwork. Ken and I often present at the shows, but there are way more topics than we could ever cover in one-hour sessions, particularly hot-button topics that should be shared NOW. There are so many stories out there to tell, so we thought that it would be great to tell these people’s stories and share the knowledge they’ve gained.

People will often call small business owners an “overnight success,” but what they don’t see are the late nights, the sacrifices, and all the years of hard work put into the company. That story of everything a business owner has seen and learned tends to get lost. So, what I really love is that Ken and I get to help share those stories. It’s a passion project and the highlight of our week. [Editor’s note: Hear CD President Chris Weiss on the podcast at groundtransportationpodcast.com.]

CD: You’ve recently been announced as part of CD’s Safety Group, a collective of industry experts who will provide safety-related content to our pages. What are your impressions of being part of that group?
JB: I’m really excited about it. PAX Training is the official and exclusive training partner of the NLA, and we’ve worked hard to make training and safety a big focus. In the motorcoach world, BISC is a key council for the American Bus Association, so a focus on safety is built right in. We are hoping that the CD Safety Group can be a bridge for this industry and that it’s the first step for operators to take a big leap toward being proactive—as opposed to reactive—in terms of safety. As a rising tide lifts all boats, it too can be a massive steppingstone in taking the industry to the next level because it means better safety and service. The line between Uber Black and luxury car services is getting blurrier every day, and the advantage we have is providing a safe, high-touch luxury experience. So, if we have the safest ride with a chauffeur that provides the best experience, we will win every time.

CD: What’s on your radar for 2025, or even 2026?
JB: I think there’s a couple of big trends coming. We see shuttle contracts for universities and employee transport continuing to be a very lucrative space. In our interview on the Ground Transportation Podcast with Maurice Brewster of Mosaic Worldwide, he talked to us about how Apple released their carbon emissions goals, and before they even came to talk to him about what that meant for their shuttle work, he said, “If Apple is making this a big deal, I need to make it a priority before they come to me—that way I’m going where they’re going.” It goes back to what I said previously: The best vendors are the ones who sit on the same side of the desk as their customers, not across from them. I heard a similar echo about emissions at the Chauffeured Transportation Association of New Jersey holiday party. I get that operators are stoked about the changing of the political guard and how that will reduce the pressure to adopt electric vehicles, but the industry doesn’t answer to politicians; we answer to our clients. If you’re working with Fortune 500 companies, they still care about emissions. Even Amazon is offering a low-carbon emissions option for shipping. EVs and hybrids aren’t for everyone, so one of the things operators need to be thinking about is how they will position themselves to clients who are concerned about emissions. Although you might not have EVs, or they might not even make sense in your market, if you’re doing work for Fortune 500 companies, chances are they care about carbon emissions.   [CD0125]