#52 Alex Danza, Vonlane | They Said Nobody Would Pay $99 to Ride a Bus

About the episode

People thought Alex Danza was nuts. He was going to ask business travelers to spend $99 to ride a bus. Twelve years later Vonlane has carried 1.8 million passengers across 36 million miles, and it has never taken a dollar of institutional capital.

The plan was not even a luxury service. Danza set out to build a regional charter business, then killed it when he realized the industry competes on nothing but who bids lowest. A coach salesman offered him the way out: “I’ll just sell you one that’s empty with nothing in it.” He built two coaches and ran one route, Dallas to Austin.

What he built is closer to an airline than a bus line. Terminals sit in downtown Dallas, Austin, Houston, and Nashville instead of an airport twenty minutes out. Twenty-two first class seats, an attendant on every trip, Starlink, meals included, and a library voice policy enforced with a discreet card and a piece of chocolate. Net promoter score runs at 90. A new coach costs $1.2 million all in, and the first two he ever bought are still on the road, still earning, twelve years later.

Then COVID took two and a half years. He was two weeks from launching Nashville when March Madness was cancelled, went dark for six weeks, took Vista Bank’s first Main Street lending loan, and did not reach Tennessee until 2023. This year will be the biggest in company history.

He is also blunt about what he wants from autonomy: not the driverless coach, but a regulator willing to give his existing drivers two more hours behind the wheel.