MEET: WILD WEST SHUTTLE:

Pedicabs are back, determined to stay

Wild West Shuttle employees pose with pedicabs at Downtown Summerlin Thursday, Dec. 154, 2016. From left: driver Clayton Lee, operations manager Chris Dempsey and assistant manager Jeremy Shand.

Wild West Shuttle

• Address: Downtown Summerlin and UNLV properties

• Phone: 725-222-WILD (9453)

• Website: rickshaw.net

• Hours of operation: 10 a.m.-10 p.m. daily at Downtown Summerlin

• In business since: 1990 (opened in November in Las Vegas)

Describe your business.

Our business is transportainment. We often are a guest’s first experience at a facility or event; we want it to be great. We want it to be memorable for all the right reasons. We provide human-powered pedicab transportation while providing important and useful information to our guests.

Who are your customers?

Our guests are looking for an experience. They want information about the property. They are people who want to experience something different they can count on. Families love to take rides along with shoppers, people out on a date night, etc.

What is your business philosophy?

Our business is to deliver, so we try to over deliver. We are essentially mobile concierges. If we can create a safe and memorable experience, everything will work out. That has worked for us since 1990.

What is the most important part of your job?

Consistency. We are here every single day. We have done that at Universal Orlando Resort since 2005. Being good once in a while does not cut it. We have to be good hundreds of thousands of times every year.

What is the hardest part of doing business in Las Vegas?

We have to deal with history. Pedicabs did not go so well the first time around (when pedicabs were banned in 2003). History will not repeat itself this time around. Being on private property lets us determine our own destiny. Also, the elevation. Thin air.

What is the best part of doing business in Las Vegas?

It’s Vegas. It has a spirit where anything is possible. Out-of-the-box works well here. We fit into that category.

What has been your hardest lesson in business?

Check your ego at the door and never let your guard down. We have over 35 drivers in our three operations but none of them work for me. We all work for the business with a collective goal.

What was your motivation to start your business?

It was 1990. We pulled rickshaws on foot back then. I never wanted to have someone else have a high level of control over my life. I wanted to steer the bus, if you will.

Tell us about some interesting rides or famous people you’ve encountered.

We used to run 120 miles from Kingston, Ontario, to Ottawa to raise money for the Children’s Wish Foundation of Canada. The Deputy Prime Minister of Canada rode with us at one point, but taking the Wish Kids on our final leg into downtown Ottawa was always a highlight. I took a blind man who was lost to a diner in Toronto on New Year’s Eve 2000. That was the ultimate microcosm of what this job is about.

Where would you like to work?

We serve the guests at Downtown Summerlin and all UNLV properties, and are talking to many others. Our goal is to work on properties where there is a need from the guests to have us there. That is many places in this great area.

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