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business elite canada
H
SEPTEMBER 2015
“We want to raise the image of taxi drivers. (Drivers) are professionals and should
be respected; they’re doing an honourable job and they keep this city moving.”
pany after running a small fleet out of Dia-
mond Taxi in Toronto. Starting in the city’s
east end with 25 distinctively painted cars,
he aimed to offer faster, more efficient
service. When Beck died in the 1980s, his
daughter Gail Beck-Souter took over the
operation that had grown to just under 200
cars. Hubbard ventured into the business
as a teenager in the early 1990s, work-
ing in the office and learning the business
from the ground up.
“I begged for it,” Hubbard said. “I was a
young teenager and I was like, ‘Come on,
Mom. I can work there. Pretend I’m the
call taker and you can be the customer and
you’ll see that I can do it.’”
The taxi business soon became Hubbard’s
passion. She continued to work while at-
tending York University in Toronto but
transferred two years later to the Univer-
sity of Western Ontario in London to sepa-
