Cueing up tunes worth cutting a rug to was always integral to Solvang business owner James Hooshman’s transportation company, long before brides- and grooms-to-be became some of his most frequent clients.
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To find out more about SB Limo, call (805) 965-4900 or visit sblimos.com. The company’s headquarters is located at 803 Kolding Ave., Solvang.
“He’s been in business for 20-ish years and it all started with one cab,” SB Limo Operations Manager Stephanie Chase explained. “This was back before Pandora and all that good stuff, and he was the only cab in town that had an iPod with like a million songs, where you could pick your own music and play it as loud as you wanted in his car, … before Uber, before rideshares.”
Originally known as Rock Star Transportation, Hooshman’s company gradually evolved into SB Limo, with several kinds of vehicles—specifically luxury vehicles—at its disposal to rent out.
“He got a whole fleet going and hired like 10 drivers, and it’s just expanded from that cab service to luxury transportation,” Chase said. “And to go with the times, once Uber and Lyft took over, we got rid of the cabs and started doing more luxury wine tours, weddings, and events like that.”
Sprinter limousines (available to rent for $110 to $125 per hour), minicoaches ($225 to $250 per hour), and trolleys ($150 to $225 per hour) are among the rides customers book most often for weddings, wedding receptions, bridal showers, and bachelor/bachelorette parties, Chase said.
However, requests to rent a traditional stretch limousine—like SB Limo’s Lincoln stretch 8-to-10-passenger limo (offered for $100 per hour on weekdays; $115 per hour on weekends)—have gone the way of the dodo in recent years, she added.
“Stretch limos are kind of obsolete now. Nobody really wants them because you have to crouch down and get into them,” said Chase, who’s worked for SB Limo for about 15 years. “Now we have limo Sprinters where you can walk right into them. … It just kind of evolved into Sprinters where there’s room for you to stand up but still have that limo wrap-around seating. And it’s higher off the ground, you can see out the windows. That’s kind of the preference right now.”
On occasion, Chase added, “one out of 100 people” will ask to rent a classic stretch limo, which SB Limo is happy to facilitate.
Based in Solvang, the company offers its services throughout Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura counties.
“We do all over. A lot in SLO. A lot in Ojai,” Chase said. “Occasionally, we go pretty far out. I would say we’re mostly in Santa Barbara County, all the way down to Camarillo, and all the way up to San Luis Obispo.”
Of the various rides SB Limo can provide, Chase said one of her personal favorites is the town-style trolley.
“I think the trolleys are super cute. We have a white and gold wedding trolley with wooden bench seating,” she said. “Then we have this 13-passenger limo bus that I really like. It’s really big. It’s got the limo wrap-around seating, ice buckets, TVs.”
There’s one trolley trait that can be a deal breaker for some wedding parties, Chase added.
“It’s kind of limiting because they’re open-air, and people dressed up with their hair done might not want wind blowing through and messing up the vibe,” she said.
‘Stretch limos are kind of obsolete now. Nobody really wants them because you have to crouch down and get into them. Now we have limo Sprinters where you can walk right into them.’
—Stephanie Chase, SB Limo operations manager
Outside of being booked for wedding services, SB Limo often serves clients who organize winery and vineyard tours across the Santa Ynez Valley and other parts of Santa Barbara County, including venues in Santa Maria and Sisquoc along the Foxen Canyon Wine Trail, the Santa Rita Hills area, and Los Alamos.
Wine tour packages include several amenities for riders, ranging from chilled sparkling wine on board to complimentary cheese, crackers, and chocolates to snack on between wine tasting destinations.
The company also has bus and vehicle rental packages designed for organizers in need of airport transportation, school field trip transportation, and other purposes.
As far as SB Limo has stretched away from its origins as a taxi company, its current services have a nod to its beginnings, Chase explained.
“All of our vehicles are Bluetooth accessible. You can play your own music on board, and that’s definitely a selling point for us because everyone wants to have their own music,” she said. “Most of our vehicles also have TVs, so you can play videos or whatever else you would want on the screens.” ∆
Reach Sun Senior Staff Writer Caleb Wiseblood, from New Times’ sister paper, at cwiseblood@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Weddings 2026.