Syosset Limo: Leave the Driving to Them

Drawn to the earning potential he saw as a part time chauffeur, Daniel Carbone cut his college experience short and ultimately struck out on his own.

Now the founder of - along with his brother and current business partner Thomas - he operates a full fleet of cars, stretch limousines and buses.

"I worked part time for a limousine service here in Syosset and it was very lucrative," Carbone explained. "That's actually what caused me to stop going to school... because I was doing so well driving a limousine."

However, when that business was sold and moved out of the area, Carbone found himself seeking new employment.

"I went to work at the service station where I had worked as a kid," he remembered. "They offered me a position managing the place... at the time it was called Turnpike Texaco on Jericho Turnpike in Jericho."

That position allowed him to save up enough money to buy his first limousine in 1986. He incorporated in 1987 and soon had five cars and a half dozen employees.

Carbone was three years old when his parents moved to Syosset in 1968 and he graduated from Syosset High School in 1983. "I'm pretty much a 'lifer' here," he joked. 

Early on, he knew the area held great potential for his new business."I could see the way the neighborhood was changing – there was more of a need," he noted. "And since I had grown up here, I had a familiarity with the neighborhood and a lot of contacts, so it was a simple decision to base it here."

In 1999, Thomas Carbone joined the company after retiring from a position at UPS, and the brothers are now partners.

"He's into the bones of the everyday business - dealing with the chauffeurs, the dispatching team," Carbone said. "I'm in corporate sales and the paperwork end -liability insurance, payroll. All of that fun stuff. It's been a good partnership."

Carbone says the farthest he has gone for a client is North Carolina."That was after the scramble of 9/11 when all planes were grounded," he remembered.

"We had other cars that went to Boston, Washington D.C. and Philadelphia, too," he added. "There were a lot of people just trying to get home to their families."

The core of the business is going in and out of the three local airports for both corporate and private accounts. "It all generates out of here,"  Carbone said. "But we've got a steady flow of accounts from a fifty-mile radius of Syosset."

Their 23-vehicle fleet includes Town Cars, stretch limousines, a Chevy Suburban SUV and five buses, or mini-coaches. One recent addition is a Toyota Camry Hybrid.

"We're trying to take an eco-friendly approach," Carbone said. "It's a four-door black car with modern accoutrements... a leather interior... things of that nature. We're still in a pilot stage of getting feedback from customers. But so far, it's been very well-received."

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