Archive for the ‘private jet’ Category:
Fly to Nashville For A Taste of Country
Social Flights offers service into Nashville from Branson, Milwaukee, Austin. We also offer flights from any where your group or organization originates. Take advantage of the taste of country package or any of the exciting vacation packages below.
Country music fans get a taste of Nashville’s most popular attractions when they visit Gaylord Opryland Resort!
Availability: Select dates through October, 2012
(Note: This package is not available October 5-7, 2012, due to the Opry’s 87th Birthday Celebration)
Duration: 2 nights (extra nights may be available at prevailing rates)
To Book: Call 1-866-972-6779
Package includes:
- Two night room accommodations at Gaylord Opryland Resort
- Reserved seat ticket to the Grand Ole Opry – the show that made country music famous! Valid Tuesday, Friday or Saturday (plus special Wednesday performances July 18 & 25 and August 1 & 8 only)
-or-
Reserved seat ticket to Opry Country Classics at the Ryman Auditorium; this show shines a spotlight on the classic country songs that have defined country music for generations of fans (Thursdays, March 29 – May 24 and October 4 – 25)
-plus- - Grand Ole Opry House Backstage Tour
- Ryman Auditorium Museum Self-Guided Tour
- Voucher toward a meal at the Opry Backstage Grill ($20 per adult, $10 per child age 4-11)
- General Jackson Showboat lunch or dinner cruise and show
Package price:
With General Jackson lunch cruise: $280*
With General Jackson dinner cruise: $305*
*Rate is per person, based on double occupancy for traditional accommodations, plus applicable tax, resort fee and parking. Extra nights and atrium upgrades may be available at prevailing rates. Rate subject to change without notice. Restrictions apply.
Suggested Add-ons:
(per person, plus tax)
- Shuttle transportation to Ryman Auditorium; inquire about rates when making package reservation
- Enjoy lunch, dinner, or a concert at the Wildhorse Saloon®
- A relaxing spa treatment at Relâche – The Spa at Gaylord Opryland
- Gaylord Springs™ Golf Links – Tee times available 30 days out
- General Jackson® – Showboat luncheon cruise and show
- Enjoy a concert at the historic Ryman Auditorium
Current Nashville Vacation Packages and Specials at Gaylord Opryland
- A Night at the Opry – Our most popular vacation package!
- Summer Fun with Shrek & Friends
- The DreamWorks Birthday Celebration
- Taste of Country – 2-night Package!
- Gaylord Hotels’ Unforgettable Anniversary
- Remember Romance – 1 or 2 nights
- Gaylord Hotels’ Birthday Getaway
- Rooms for Good™ – Reward yourself by helping others
- Thank You Thursdays – Get 40%* savings on Thursdays. TN residents only.
- Nashville Nights – 1 and 2-night packages available
- 2012 CMA Music Festival / Fan Fair Package
- Opry’s 87th Birthday – 2-night Package!
- New Year’s Eve Celebration 2012 – A Southern Gospel Festival
How To Improve Air Transportation For Everyone
If improving the aviation system is disruptive, then call us revolutionaries.
We could say that Social Flights is disruptive to the commercial aviation system, except that we serve markets that the commercial aviation industry has rejected.
We could say that we compete with the airlines, except we provide services that would be impossible for the commercial aviation system to deliver efficiently.
We could say that we found a way to exploit an inefficient market, except that we actually make that market more efficient.
- Available Airports In US
Social Flights is not an airline.
In simplest terms, Social Flights is a data platform for private aviation. The Social Flights platform will “systemize” the operations of up to 15,000 private aircraft across up to 5000 North American Airports. The beneficiaries will be travelers, aircraft operators, and the communities they support. We’ll even help the airlines do what they do better.
Where is the pain?
- Airlines are pulling out of smaller markets effectively isolating millions of people
- Smaller communities are cut off from the global economy
- The “Real Cost” to travelers flying into and out of smaller communities is stifling.
- The Private Aviation industry is manipulated by brokers; 40% of private flights are empty.
- The Hub and Spoke system serves large airplanes, not people
- Travelers have few other travel options; driving is difficult and trains are sparse.
- Very low utilization of private jet assets vs. commercial jet assets
Where is the opportunity?
- Next Generation air traffic management/control will open thousands of airports to ATC
- A huge inventory of efficient short haul aircraft is available.
- Empty legs on existing private flights are available
- Favorable FAA and DOT regulatory environment in “Public Charter” classification
- Millions of people travel to their “Social Networks” not their hubs and spokes
- Communities are willing to participate in their own air-service destiny
What is the solution?
CASP: Community Air Service Program
Social Flights deploys turbine powered commuter aircraft to small communities to provide frequent direct service to the nearest major hub allowing access to the world.
Uniform Booking Platform
The Social Flights provides operators with a free online scheduling and automating quoting system that will save them thousands of dollars per actual flight.
Systemized inventory listing
Operators effectively list their inventory and the system matches the right aircraft with the right mission thereby improving yields.
Ride Sharing
National itinerary allows for the sale of private jet service on a “per seat” basis instead of a customer chartering a whole jet.
Corporate Travel Programs
Corporate and VIP owners can increase Yield and utilization of aircraft for greater profits without sacrificing benefits of ownership.
Community Organization
Social Flights helps communities to determine where they want to fly. We provide aircraft, training, operations, consulting, and regulatory authority to operate community charter operations. Then we integrate the system into our Nationwide platform.
How do we do it?
Social Flights provides a single platform that acts as a clearinghouse for community information about REAL ASSETS – not just demographics for sale to marketers.
The social flights data can be used to create opportunities with a new class of business methods and applications from scheduling air service, to organizing a group of friends for Spring Break.
Social Flights allows smaller communities to access hub airport quickly, directly, frequently and inexpensively so that they can have economic access to the world.
Social Flights allows corporations and VIP aircraft owners to maximize the return on their aircraft investment while retaining the flexibility of ownership.
Social Flights liberates millions of people from the weaknesses of the increasingly fragile and segmented commercial aviation system while retaining the strengths of the hub airport efficiency.
Social Flights improves aviation.
Announcing Air Service Between Branson and Nashville for 79 Dollars
Branson Air, in cooperation with CFM aviation and Social Flights, is offering a special on air service between Branson Missouri and Nashville Tennessee. This limited time price may not last long since the route is filling fast – both of these cities are world recognized for their entertainment and cultural attributes. Now Social Flights brings them together at an astonishing low price.
To put things in perspective, simply perform a search for airline pricing between these cities:
You’ll find that major airlines are willing to give you the privilege of paying 500 dollars and waiting 8 hours (including security and check in) to take the same trip. These cities are only 435 miles apart – you can drive in less time than that. Seriously, who is watching these numbers?
Social Flights will get you there in 1/3 the time and 1/3 the cost of flying commercial airlines. When you fly Social Flights you can often avoid extra overnights, hotel fees, and days off work. You wouldn’t even need to carry all that extra baggage in the first place!
If you are wondering how you can spend all that extra time check out these two lists that we’ve compiled with our friends in each city.
102 things to do in Branson 102 things to do in Nashville
You will find some of friendliest, hard working, and talented people in the United States in these two cities. Now you can experience all the magic and none of the harassment for 1/3 rd the price.
A recipe for opportunity
Most importantly, there are many things that were never economically possible between these two cities, but now are. That is what opportunity is made of.
People who follow Social Flights know that our business model is hugely disruptive to the airlines. They know that Social Flights opens new frontiers of opportunity. They know that Social Flights liberates stranded communities from Airline Chess Masters. With air service between Branson and Nashville for under 100 dollars – this is only the beginning.
Who knew that having fun could be such serious business?
Air service between Branson and Austin ONLY 79 dollars
Branson Air, in cooperation with CFM aviation and Social Flights, is offering a special on air service between Austin Texas and Branson Missouri. If you book through Social Flights, you’ll receive an additional 20 dollars discount for a limited time when you mention this post.
If you are wondering what to do when you get to your final destination, just check out these two posts:
102 Things to do in Branson 101 Things to do in Austin
Or, think of it this way:
I did a google search on “Austin Tx Facebook” and received 134 Million returns. Then, I did a search on “Branson MO Facebook” and received 3.7 Million returns. Finally, I did a search on the term “Branson MO Austin TX Facebook” and received 1.1 Million returns.
Next I did a search on airfare Branson to Austin and found the following result:
A recipe for opportunity
While this is far from a scientific research study, there is little doubt that many people in Branson know somebody in Austin and vice versa. There are many people in Austin that can find a reason to hop a quick plane out to Branson with all of their friends.
Most importantly, there are many things that were never economically possible between these two cities, but now are. That is what opportunity is made of.
People who follow Social Flights know that our business model is hugely disruptive to the airlines. They know that Social Flights opens new frontiers of opportunity. They know that Social Flights liberates stranded communities from Airline Chess Masters. With air service between Branson and Austin for under 100 dollars – this is only the beginning.
So the choice is simple;
There are hundreds of things to do with millions of friends, colleagues, relatives, and business relationships for 160 dollars on a flight that lasts less than two hours. Or, spend close to 500 dollars on a 15 hour flight losing two days of work and spending an two extra nights in a hotel with people you don’t know. The choice is obvious.
Who knew that having fun could be such serious business?
The Opportunity Of Social Media in General Aviation
Paraphrased from an excellent article in the Wichita Business Journal by Emily Behlmann:
With all the attention social media is getting these days, (the results) of a recent survey shows that 45 percent said social media was a low priority. Deanna Harms, executive vice president at the Greteman Group , a Wichita branding agency who lists aviation brands to be a specialty, says business aviation companies, some of the most major brands in Wichita, have hung back on [Social Media] even more than other B2B firms.
Harms says she thinks one reason could be related to recent criticism of business jets as unnecessary luxuries. “Even in newsletters, it’s difficult to get aircraft owners to agree to being profiled,” Harms says. “You’ve heard the campaign ‘No plane. No gain.’ Aircraft owners, unfortunately, often think, ‘No ink. No criticism.’ The minute you start talking about your use of business aviation, the naysayers attack.”
Let’s rethink this:
Social Flights uses social media tools to fill empty legs and sell primary charter “by the seat”. We also provide limited calendar air service (FAA Part 380 Public Charter). In addition to marketing, we use these tools to aggregate private airplane operators and their inventory so we can “systemize” a large virtual fleet.
These innovations are a far cry from the domain of the demonized elitist corporate jet owner. In fact, we are hearing from dozens of small communities who are functionally stranded without access to commercial aviation with very few other practical travel modes. Communities passionately ask us for air- service into a hub like Atlanta instead of bouncing around several regional airports and enduring a 3-hour drive to anywhere. Millions of American need access to each other and global markets beyond their parochial economies. People need opportunities – that’s what social media is all about.
You can’t Globalize until you Regionalize
Regionalization is where small communities want direct service to other small communities. Social Flights is introducing air service between Branson MO, Nashville, Tri-cities TN, Austin, and Milwaukee. It almost takes less time to drive between some of these places than to fly commercial. The same holds true for Wichita.
It Boils down to Supply and Demand
Meanwhile, hundreds of commuter jets are coming into the market. Utilization of corporate jets is 1/20 of a commercial jet. Corporations are looking for increased revenue from their jet assets. Manufacturers can deliver white tails into a new air-service system to keep production lines steady. Airlines can off load volatility (overbooking and low yield flights) to private carriers, Next Gen air traffic control will open thousands of smaller airports to air service, ironically, this includes Wichita.
This boils down to huge inventory, huge need, greater efficiency, and nobody to serve the market. Our prediction is that Social media is the glue that will hold this thing together. People travel across their social graph (Facebook, linkedin, and g+ connections) not to the hub airports, period. People want to work where they live and play, not just surviving in 1 of 28 U.S. hub cities. People want to go to where they are going.
There is profound opportunity in private aviation and Social Flights is the pioneer.
102 Things To Do In Nashville Tennessee
Social Flights is introducing air service between Nashville Tennessee, Austin Texas, Milwaukee Wisconsin and Branson Missouri beginning in May 2012. The opportunities for travelers to access business opportunities, recreational experiences, family connections, and entertainment value has never been better.
Say Goodbye to the Hassle
The social experience of travel has finally been liberated from the boardrooms of the airlines and no longer subject to the fragile and abusive hub and spoke system. No more long lines, luggage searches or irradiation machines. Social Flights takes you where you want to go.
Visit all the Capitals
Nashville is the music capital of the world – without rival. For publishing, recording, and production Nashville has few peers. Nashville is located in the population center of the United States and perfectly accessible to many locations of magnificent beauty, culture, and business opportunities.
Your way, not the highway
There are many great things to do in Nashville and dozens of websites that will help you find the getaway of your dreams. Social Flights now makes these opportunities to a wider market of people than ever before. Fly to Nashville today with Social Flights – lose the hassle. (list compiled by: 365Nashville.com)
7. The Melrose Spring Beer Tasting
9. Glass Night at Flying Saucer
10. Train for the Country Music Marathon or 1/2 Marathon
11. Mulligan’s Pub and Restaurant
12. Frist Center For the Visual Arts
13. Radnor Lake
14. Art By the Glass
16. NashVegas Casino Night at Cannery Ballroom
17. Nuvo Burrito
18. Bluebird Café
19. Warner Parks
21. “8 off 8th” at Mercy Lounge
22. Two for Tuesdays
23. Climb Nashville
24. Nashville Lawn & Garden Show
25. Nashville Haunted Pub Crawl
27. Las Paletas
29. The Billy Block Show from 12th and Porter
30. The Pie Wagon
32. Belmont Mansion
35. Jacks BBQ
36. Volunteer at 2nd Harvest Food Bank
38. Disc Golf at Seven Oaks Park
40. Zumi Sushi
41. Musica Sculpture
42. Bongo Java Roasting Company
43. The Station Inn
45. Crow’s Nest
49. Hatch Show Print
50. Nashville Predators
51. Whiskey Kitchen
52. Love Circle
53. Dozen – A Nashville Sweet Shop
54. Laser Quest
55. Dragon Park
57. Eco-Adventure Canopy Zip Tour
58. Loveless Café
59. Commodore Grille
61. Nashville Zoo
62. Brunch at the Copper Kettle
63. Sweet CeCe’s
64. All Fired Up
65. Downtown Nashville Home Tour
65. Rajin’ Cajun Crawfish Boil
66. Taco Mamacita
67. Nashville Sounds
71. Donut Den
72. Dove Awards
74. South Street
75. Country Music Hall of Fame
79. Exit/In
80. Allium
83. Southern Bred
84. Franklin Rodeo
87. Tuesdays at the French Quarters
88. Music City Roots
89. Burger Up
90. We ART Nashville
91. Nashville Shores
92. Fido
95. Brown Bag Lunch Concert Series
96. Tennessee Renaissance Festival
99. Grassmere Bicentennial Picnic Celebration
100. Memorial Day Blues Festival
101. Movies in the Park
Social Flights Features Tri Cities Tennessee
At Social Flights, we are continually amazed at the communities that we work with looking for an opportunity to bypass commercial airline service. Communities know what they want and they know where they want to go – most importantly, in the great American Tradition, they are not waiting for someone else to do it for them. Tri-Cities Tennessee is one such community.
In Tennessee and Virginia the name “Tri-Cities” refers to the region comprising the cities of Kingsport, Johnson City and Bristol and the surrounding smaller towns and communities in Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia. All three of the principal cities are located in the extreme northeastern corner of Tennessee, while Bristol has a Twin city of the same name on the Virginia side.
Tri Cities is one of those great places that few people know about. They represent a vibrant American community of over 500,000 located in a beautiful part of the country with mild temperate weather yet in close proximity to many economically important places such as Nashville, Washington, DC, New York, Atlanta, St. Louis, etc. When airlines cut service to a community like Tri-Cities, they cut off a half million people from the vast economic opportunity.
Similarly, the deprive many people of a wonderful place to visit, vacation, or relocate to. By all accounts, Tri-Cities is a magnificent place to raise a family. Tri-Cities has an abundance of recreational opportunities in nearby Lake Boone, the Blue Ridge Mountains, rivers and forest. Real estate is still reasonably priced.
Social Flights is looking forward to an opportunity to provide air service to Tri-Cities and the remarkable people who make up that community. It is our sincere desire to create an air service plan that meets the needs of so many 500K population communities across the United States. With Tri-Cities, we all get there together!
Tri-cities Events
Airline Social Media A Mixed Bag
Debbie Miller is a social media and hospitality blogger who recently outlined some social media efforts of airlines. Her analysis is important for two reasons; first, it demonstrates how the industry can use social media to communicate with travelers and their network of friends and family.
Second, it demonstrates how communities respond to social media inputs; what works and what does not.
Luggage Tracking
Delta Airlines implemented a system for travelers to track their checked baggage. Via the airline carrier’s iPhone app, guests are able to monitor the whereabouts of their luggage at all times. [response unknown]
Influencer Events
In the fall, All Nippon Airways (ANA), Japan’s leading airline carrier, announced that its “Inspiration of Japan” service brand would be introduced to the Los Angeles-Narita (Tokyo) route beginning in January. [ANA is threw a big party through social media resulting in 5.4 Million brand impressions]
Choose Your Seat Mate
Recently, Royal Dutch airline KLM announced a new program called “Meat and Seat,” allowing people to choose who they might sit next to on a flight by viewing other travelers’ social media profiles. [Reaction remains mixed]
15 Minute Flights
Last summer, a bridge over LA’s popular 405 Freeway was set to be demolished, leaving a significant portion of highly-trafficked highway to be closed for a weekend in July. As a result, JetBlue Airlines decided to offer $4 flights from Long Beach to Burbank and vice versa on Saturday. [surpassed all expectations and all flights sold out in 3 hours.]
Building a company on Social Media:
Meanwhile, Social Flights is building the company on Social Media – and we are learning many new things. Today we have over 14,000 registered users, over 90 private operators representing 500 aircraft. We have dozens of partners who want to service our travelers.
Social Flights has opened flights between Branson, Milwaukee, Austin, and Nashville. We have flown Football, NASCAR, and Corporate passengers as well as VIPs, Celebrities, and politicians. Apparently, our social media design is working well.
Lessons learned
Ideally, we would like to have a person on the ground in each location to interpret data related to that location to proactively match supply and demand. This person would be able to nudge a community toward the private air service option and educate them to the value proposition.
Now comparing our experience with the airline experience cited above, there are several similarities;
- Each seeks to distinguish themselves by introducing a scalable service
- They operate in a hyper-local domain.
In other words, they seek to improve the travel experience and they have someone on the ground meeting a local need. Those are the activities that work best.
The use of social media in air service industry is still very new, but already we can see important trends for social media usage in air service industries
The 44 Best Event Planner Industry Blogs
I first discovered Keith Johnson’s blog, PlannerWire.net starting with his article 13 Event Industry Blogs and Sites That You Should Check Out. Last July he updated the list to 44 event industry blogs that are important. It it just too hard to resist not publishing the list he compiled. Below (after a few of my comments) please find the best event planner blogs on the Internet, by Keith Johnson.
Why is an aviation company like Social Flights interested in event planners?
Nobody ever suggests that UAL or Alaska Airlines would ever ask anyone who intends to stay on the ground that day what their opinion is regarding airline service. Airlines are too busy to worry about what happens before and after their clients board their planes. The airlines are in the business of filling seats so why would they care about the communities whose collective posteriors occupy the spaces in between the lines on their balance sheets?
Maybe that’s the problem with airlines.
Social Flights has every intention to understand the needs of the travelers for whom we provide air service. We exist because the communities we serve tell us to exist. Communities of travelers tell us where to fly and when to fly. They tell us how many people they need to arrive at any geographic point in North America and how many people to depart from any point. Without event planners, there is no reason to travel. Think about that for a moment.
To our esteemed readership
There is some incredible information in these links. Reach out to these bloggers ask how you can help. Send them your best Routes and ask them what’s going on between any two points. They’ll know better than you – they’ll know who wants to share a jet. If you are a charter jet firm, you can either take out a full page ad in the New York Times or you can send these bloggers your empty leg schedule and let them talk about it.
That being said, here are 44 Event Industry Blogs That You Should be Reading, checking out, or know exist. Compiled by By Keith Johnson
Jeff Hurt – Midcourse Corrections
Michael McCurry – McCurry’s Corner
William Thomson – Gallus Events Blog
Peter Straube – Events for Change
Traci Brown – Trade Show Institute
Adrian Segar – Conferences that Work
Janet Rudolph – Team Building Unlimited
Lara McCulloch-Carter – Ready 2 Spark
Michelle Bruno – A Fork in the Road
Christian W. Frei – Meetings Industry Blog
Heather DeLoach – Constellation Communication
Keith Johnston and Teresa Nelson – FamIt!
Heidi Thorn – Promo With Purpose
Alison Smith Jenks – The TBA Global Blog
Rob Hard – Business Travel Destinations
Rob Hard – About.com Event Planning
Emilie Barta – Professional Tradeshow Presenter
Emilie Barta – Virtual Event Host
Thomas H Hallin – THe HTH Business Solutions Blog
Bonuses (Suggestions from readers)
Hotel Desk (this one is interesting, connects event planners and hotels)
Social Flights Offers Marketing Services to Operators
Social media marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) are no longer just the shiny new soapbox for advertisers, they have become powerful tools for organizing communities.
We all know that social media campaigns have become the PR machine of the modern airline, but they still fail to understand the difference between community awareness and harnessing the power of community engagement.
Who has time to Twitter?
Many private operators are too focused on the day-to-day business of keeping their fleet in top readiness to start the long haul learning curve of social media marketing and SEO.
As a result, those same few brokers and agents (you know who they are) appear on the top of the search engine listing even in your city search! While paid search placement may buy some brand awareness for the brokers, only active blogging, worthy cross linking and strategic partnerships produce the powerful engagements that bring you customers who bring you customers who bring you customers, and so on.
Building these relationships can be difficult, time consuming, and expensive.
Social Flights has trained and experienced account managers that can efficiently carry out the most productive social media presence for private operators and their respective traveler community, economic development agencies, and hospitality partners.
Social Flights offers:
- Syndication of Social Flights blog articles
- Unique blog contents specific to your operation and community.
- Cross linkages with other operators, tourism boards, hospitality, and corporate business centers
- Strategic Twitter campaigns, Facebook pages, G+, press release support, and cross posting with sister cities
- Package formation with festivals, recreation, conventions, and events; locally and across North America
- Cooperative marketing with sister city operators.
Social Flights draws on our unique experience in ride sharing systems and yield management for private aircraft inventory. Social Flights uses up-to-the-minute social media techniques to organize communities around available private aircraft capacity, public charter opportunities, and empty leg fulfillment.
Social Flights draws from our national databases of event organizers, universities, corporate clusters, and diverse industries allowing us to help you identify, influence, and match supply and demand for private air service priced on a per-seat basis. This allows travelers to form a true comparison of the “time-value” of private air service versus commercial air service.
Finally, we also provide you with ways to spot opportunities that commercial airlines simply cannot serve at any price.