Plane Conversations

Few people realize the extraordinary opportunity that exists for some communities to literally fly under the radar of the commercial airlines.  Far too often, people are trained to believe that the airlines are the only game in town and if they quote a price, flight time, and wait time, then that must be the best deal out there.  Nothing gives us more pleasure than to demonstrate quite the opposite.

Branson and Nashville

There are no nonstop flights between Nashville and Branson Missouri.  Frontier charges $507.00 and the flight – with connections – takes 8 hours.   Social Flights can fulfill this route for around 260 dollars for a non-stop flight that lasts only one hour – this is an astonishing 50% cheaper and 80% faster that flying commercial.

Branson and Milwaukee

There are no nonstop flights between these cities.  Commercial carriers can provide access but it cost you $335.00 to travel 6 hours.  Social Flights provides non-stop service for $290 dollars in only 2 hours.

 Branson and Austin

There are no non-stop flights between Branson and Austin.  However, Frontier will charge you $523 dollars to leave you in Denver and take an amazing 23 hours! Clearly, it would be faster to drive.  Social Flights provides this flight for $290.00 non-stop and will have you there is 2 hours.

The Functionally Stranded

Thousands of communities across the United States are functionally stranded when they need to pay more in real cost than twice the airfare to reach their destination.   This creates a substantial friction to a local economy since both outbound and inbound passengers suffer the friction loss.

Keeping it Real

OK, so who cares about places like Branson MO, Tri-Cities TN, Somerset KY, Arlington WA, and Danbury CT?  The answer is that millions of people are functionally and economically stranded without global air transportation options – they care deeply.

It does not take long to realize that there are thousands upon thousands of routes  and millions of people in our great country where Social Flights can thoroughly and without question outperform the major airlines in the simple task of connecting real people to the real places that they really want to go.

Social Flights is excited to bring Branson Missouri right to your doorstep in Nashville, Austin, and Milwaukee.  Social Flights offeres the only non-stop air service to Branson from these cities.   Branson has established attracts over 6 million people per year due to it’s family friendly recreation, mild climate, and stunning geographic beauty.

Check our website and book your tickets today.

Many people may have never heard about Branson, so we have provided the following links to 102 things to do in Branson.  Of course there are many more, but spend a little time cruising these links and you’ll see a world of fun and excitement come alive.  Consider Branson for your next family vacation and let Social Flights take you their in comfort and style.

101 Things To Do In Branson

1. Silver Dollar City
2. Swim at White Water
3. Ride The Ducks
4. Shop at Branson Landing
5. Watch the fountain show at the Landing
6. Ride the trolley downtown
7. Zip lining
8. See The Legend of Kung Fu
9. Watch the planes come in at the Branson Airport flight deck
10. Watch the Liverpool Legends
11. Watch an IMAX movie
12. Ride the Go Karts
13. Watch SIX
14. Visit the Titanic
15. Take pictures at the Wax Museum
16. Feed the fish at Shepherd of the Hills Fish Hatchery
17. Visit the dam
18. Swim at Moonshine Beach
19. Watch the Cat’s Pajamas
20. Watch Jim Stafford
21. Visit Shepherd of the Hills
22. Rent a boat at State Park Marina
23. Go fishing!
24. See Kirby Van Burch
25. Go parasailing
26. Get stuffed at the Dixie Stampede
27. Golf-professional or mini!
28. Tour the wineries
29. Visit the Butterfly Palace
30. Tour the Auto Museum
31. Watch Todd Oliver’s talking dogs
32. Watch the Acrobats of China
33. Laugh with Paul Harris and The Cleverly’s
34. Laugh your Yakov with Yakov Smirnoff
35. Ride the Showboat Branson Belle
36. See the largest performing family, the Hughes Brothers
37. Watch the Baldknobbers
38. Ride the train at Branson Scenic Railway
39. Take an Old Time Photo
40. Visit the Shrine of the Holy Spirit
41. Visit the Veterans Memorial Museum
42. Visit the Worlds Largest Toy Museum
43. Tour and shop historic downtown Branson
44. Tour College of the Ozarks
45. Experience the Branson Ballknockers
46. Take a cave tour at Talking Rocks Cavern
47. Rent a canoe or kayak on Lake Taneycomo
48. Get scared at the Castle of Chaos
49. Go horseback riding in the Ozarks and at Shepherd of the Hills
50. Ride a segway
52. Take a ride up Inspiration Tower
53. Take a dam tour
54. Watch the stars at Legends in Concert
55. Eat Branson’s largest banana split at the Starlite Diner
56. Have the time of your life at Bill Medley’s show
57. Walk the red carpet to see Horray for Hollywood
58. See the brotherly love with the Rankin Brothers
59. Hear the smooth sounds of the Texas Tenors
60. Enjoy savings at the Outlet Malls
61. Go crafting
62. Start Your Christmas List early by shopping at the Grand Village Shops
63. Get your fix with the 3 Redneck Tenors
64. See the only dueling piano show in Branson at Ernie Biggs Piano Bar and Restaurant
65. Learn about Table Rock lake at the Dewey Short Visitor Center
66. Visit Shoji Tabuchi’s Theatre to see his world famous bathrooms
67. Learn something new at Ripley’s Believe It or Not
68. Eat at the Candlestick Inn
69. Take a helicopter tour
70. Eat at the Hard Luck Diner—the only diner where the waiters sing!
71. Mountain Bike and Cabin Rentals at Park Trails
72. Eat at Lamberts-home of the thrown rolls
73. Go to Bass Pro Shop for the fish feeding
74. Take a  hydro-limo ride on Table Rock Lake
75. Visit Chateau on the Lake
76. Visit Big Cedar
77. Cakes and Cream
78. Take a carriage ride downtown
79. Dinosaur Museum
80. Eat ice cream at Andy’s Frozen Custard
81. Go Rock Climbing
82. Ride the Bumper Boats
83. Experience the thrill of the Ejection Seat
84. Pull the Rip Cord at The Tracks
85. Camp at Table Rock State Park
86. View the Trail of Lights November through January
87. Visit the spa at Chateau on the Lake
88. Enjoy the atmosphere at Level 2 Steakhouse
89. Eat on the lake front patios at the Landing
90. Build a car at Ridemakerz
91. Make a new friend at Build-a-bear
92. Learn about Our Body- The Universe Within
93. Go to the circus with Yakov’s Dinner Adventure
94. Get lost at Hannah’s Maze of Mirrors
95. Visit Grand Country Square for laser tag, mini golf, and of course the worlds largest banjo!
96. Eat at the Keeter Center
97. Eat Dino’s 24 Karrot Cake
98. Go souvenir shopping !
99. Walk the famous 76 strip
100. Take pictures at the scenic overlooks
101. Learn to scuba dive in Table Rock Lake

102. Fly Social Flights direct from Nashville, Austin, and Milwaukee!!!

Social Flights, in coordination with Branson Air Express and Corporate Flight Management, Inc. announce air service between Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Branson, Missouri.

Near-daily public charter service begins on May 12, 2012.  The flight time is approximately 2 hours and the current one-way price is $144.00.  By comparison, a commercial flight on the same route would take 7 hours (+TSA) with a stop in Denver and a cost of $210.00 dollars each way.

This is important because Social Flights represents the regionalization of air service by providing the right sized aircraft to meet the needs of the smaller communities without hub airports. These are the type of routes that the commercial carriers would never fly direct.   As such, traveling is far more time consuming and expensive than it otherwise needs to be.  Now, Social Flight filling the void.

The Milwaukee metropolitan area has an estimated population of over 2 million people and ranks fifth in the United States in terms of the number of Fortune 500 company headquarters as a share of the population. Milwaukee has one of the highest per capita student populations in North America, ranking 6th among U.S. and Canadian cities in number of college students per 100 residents, according to a January 2000 study from McGill University

Branson is a city in Taney County in the U.S. state of Missouri. Branson has long been a popular destination for vacationers from Missouri and neighboring areas. The construction of music theaters by nationally-known performers along Highway 76 has increased Branson’s popularity as a tourist destination.  Branson draws tourists from all over the World.

Source: World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) 2011

Communities, industries, and economic development agencies are looking for solutions to the travel gaps caused by airline consolidation, regulation, and lack of alternate modes of transportation.  Millions of American citizens are literally stranded in travel access dead zones.

Besides developing revolutionary social technology for buyers and suppliers of alternative air services, Social Flights also provides professional services to organizations, institutions and governments wishing to improve air service to their constituencies. Our services portfolio is designed to serve national and international markets including Asia, Europe and South America as well as local and affinity group communities.

Social Flights Consulting Services

Our service portfolio is aimed at providing 21^st century air service solutions created from innovative data-driven assessment, analysis and strategy. Our professional services team includes resources with credentials in private aviation, airline operations, aircraft manufacturing, statistical analysis, management consulting, strategic development, engineering, planning, yield management, route planning and aircraft acquisition.

Our services include:

• Air Service Determinations
• True Flier Intentions Base Determination & Definition
• Air Services Strategic and Tactical Planning
• Economic Impact & Opportunity Analyses
• Demand Opportunity Analyses
• Private Aviation Services management
• Social Media Marketing, SEO, Community Organization

The genesis of Social Flight Consulting Services came when we all sat in a room together and each looked around at the talent and experience that was looking back at us.

Our people have operated airlines, we have managed airport operations, built substantial FBO operations and facilities.  Our people have held top engineering positions in aircraft manufacturers, we have worked for the Federal Government, we are world travelers, global businesspersons, and economic development professionals.   The people associated with Social Flights are pilots, mechanics, authors, and teachers.  We have world famous social media experts, top travel bloggers, and we come from hospitality industries, event planning, and  entrepreneurial communities.

Let us share ourselves with you.

In upcoming blog posts, we will share the details of each of these services as well as case studies, documented accomplishments  and personnel highlights.

Our hope is to bring the private air services industry closer in collaboration rather than further in competition.  We strongly believe that private operators are far stronger when united than in competition. With airline failures and increase air travel demand, we need to work together with our communities.  We are here to share what we have learned with travelers, communities, tourism / hospitality industries, and economic development agencies.

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.

Please consider adding Social Flights Services to your marketing mix.   Give us a call for a free strategy session and let’s see where we can integrate your air service operation with the entire national travel services industry.

McKinsey just published a very important article called “The Trouble With Travel Distribution” which describes a condition where the travel market has become fractured, siloed, and dysfunctional.

The soul searching has begun.

After a decade of racing to the bottom of the travel market, everyone is raising their heads above the clouds and asking; “what happened to the customer?”

McKinsey suggest that industry incumbents move away from a model focused almost exclusively on reducing channel costs and toward one that seeks to maximize returns by best serving customer needs.

1.  Focus on customers, not channels

2. Win in the era of ‘big data’

3. Unlock the power of partnerships 

4. Master the entire customer experience

McKinsey constantly warns of “new competitors” swooping in to take their piece of the 100 Billion dollar market.  They cite the Google acquisition of ITA travel software. New technologies such as the iPad and iTravel, and even huge data stores such as Amazon all having a shot at disrupting the current travel markets.

On the other hand, McKinsey talks about price uniformity across sectors.  They call for cooperation among partnerships instead of competition of withholding information.  They talk about end-to-end customer experience and the huge impact of social media:

And the incumbents must understand that the customer experience not only begins before the time of sale—and even before the time of search—but also extends well after purchase and travel.

What they don’t talk about is the emergence of an entirely new class of travel products and services flying in under the radar. This new class of services fills in the voids where little is known to exist; a classic disruption.

Enter The Private Sector

Private aviation, private travel agents, private hotels, and private entrepreneurs all have the data and resources that they need to carve out a niche where nobody else can reach.  For example (corresponding to 1-4 McKinsey recommendations above):

• Social Flights is the first air service to focus on needs of the traveler, the group, and the community when deploying an airplane to market.
• Social Flights introduced the concept of replacing infrastructure with data to sort people and planes.
• Social Flights is the first to publish about price uniformity between commercial airlines and private air service.
• Social Flights is the first to deploy a Value Game; which is a system that integrates all travel stakeholders so they can cooperate instead of compete.

The Customer Integration

In Fact, nearly all of the McKinsey recommendation can be rolled up into a new class of business methods for the travel industry.  Social Flights and all of our amazing partners, operator, travelers, and communities are on the deck … and under the radar, for now.

Social Flights introduces a common platform for travelers to access private jet inventory.  By decreasing the cost of organizing individual passengers, our partner operators are rewarded with access to groups of people ready to purchase your primary and your empty legs.

Empty legs are created after an airplane delivers passengers to a destination and must then return back to base empty.  The pilots must return to their families and the aircraft must return to service or scheduled maintenance.  The result is that up to 40% of private aircraft flights are empty.  Over the years there have been many attempts to sell empty seats but success rates rarely exceed 5%.

This creation of empty legs increases the cost (to the customer) of private travel to approximately double the one-way cost of their payload.  The resulting high cost of private travel limits the size of the market and the restricts utilization of aircraft for the owners.

It is expensive to deploy a professional sales staff without prequalifying the customer for sufficient resources, frequency of travel, and repeat business.  A high quality sales force is required because aviation is a complex industry and the price of the product can easily exceed 5 digits.

Empty legs are expensive to sell because the passenger does not walk through the door prequalified.  Empty seats are even more expensive to sell because it takes the same amount of time to sell an individual seat as it does the whole plane; and each person and their special need multiplies the level of complexity.  Finally, the FAA is very strict on the operator’s ability to schedule flights making it difficult to advertise empty legs or empty seats.

The economic value of empty legs would be huge if a platform existed that could sell them as primary flights.  Social Flights has combined our expertise in charter operations with social media organization to create exactly such a system.

Social Flights Creates an environment where operators can minimize the cost of selling empty legs by providing a common information platform that engages and educates the traveler so that a sales professional is not needed to manage every deal.  Social Flights uses social media tools and methods to help people self-organize around an operator’s inventory wherever it may be.  Social Flights combines inventory from many operators in many locations to offer travelers a seamless experience.  Social Flights manages contracts, consideration, and payments.

If you are an owner or operator, we’ll show you how to send us your inventory and scheduling feeds at no cost and we’ll do the rest.  As our system grows, we’ll deploy community organizers across the country and among substantial verticals who will bring customers right to your door step so that you can deliver them right to their door step.

Social flights continues to grow as our users finding new ways to integrate private jet service into their experience travel itinerary.  As with most early adopters, there is a larger vision driving their actions – it’s not to be “first on the block” to experience private travel.  They are the “first OFF the block” in a new form of luxury; The Time Value Experience.

Luxury does not mean the same thing for everyone and this poses a challenge for brands and product designers.  The top tier brands are learning that 45-55 year old who make up a large portion of their markets have a different set of standards when it comes to travel.

Instead of wanting to be pampered with exquisite and precision service, the new generation of luxury travel is seeking value, authenticity, and uniqueness.  They want local experiences, not a duplicate of their home in a new place.

“Value Based Driven”

via Young, affluent travelers disavow luxury defined by older generation – Travel Weekly.

Ellen Bettridge, vice president of American Express Retail Travel Network, told agents and hoteliers attending the 2011 International Luxury Travel Market conference in Cannes, France, last month. “They just know more. Everything’s at their fingertips.”

Knowing your customer’s preferences and accommodating those preferences are two different things in hi-end travel.  Creating “value” is not easy, it takes a lot of work, planning, and technical knowledge as well as follow-up and community management.  Unique experiences, by definition,  don’t come with instructions for the service provider. Competition, by definition, attacks the uniqueness of your service.  Alternatives to your service are as easy for competitors to market as for you.

One of the best ways to achieve uniqueness is to use your brand to integrate with other experience services – a local competitor may not be a competitor after all.   Think about Disneyland;  Mickie Mouse does not compete with Pirates of the Caribbean, rather, they are integrated into the whole grand experience.

If your guests will come for one 2 days, they are more likely to stay for 4 than return for another 2. Then, they are more likely to return if they haven’t “done the whole park”.  If they become comfortable with a place, they will return over and over forming new family traditions that they can identify with and share with their friends…..

Chris Sanderson, co-founder of the Future Laboratory, a London-based brand-marketing firm, asserted, “It’s not about ‘fly and flop.’ It’s about ‘find and seek.’” What makes serving this group tricky is that agents can’t fall back on tried-and-true brands, at least when it comes to accommodations. 

Social Flight is capable and available to serve any community by providing operations in public charter and private charter with modern turbine aircraft.  We have a growing clientele of vacation and resort communities banding together and taking control of the tourist experience instead of depending on outside airlines, charter operators, or tour organizers to do it for them.  Make the “Time Value Experience” your Brand image and make Social Flights your airline.

Social Flights is featuring this property sharing opportunity from AirBnB.com and it’s owner to present a unique way to visit the Olympic Peninsula and the Olympic National Park in the State of Washington. This is the first time we’ve done this because it is a great way to demonstrate the versatility of Private Social Travel.

Cinnamon Bear Cabin is walking distance to the (semi) private and uncrowded Lake Cushman Golf Course and within a few miles of three amazing bodies of water; Lake Cushman, Lake Kokanee, and the Hood Canal (actually a Fjord remnant of the ice ages).  Hood Canal is known for crystal clear saltwater scuba diving, crabbing, clam digging and seasonal salmon fishing.  Lake Cushman is a 4000 acre  glacier fed lake at the foot of 7000 ft mount Washington in the Olympic Range.  Lake Kokanee sits below the Lake Cushman dam and offers a serene  trout fishing experience through its meandering canyons.

The nearest commercial airport is 2 hours away, but Social Flights can bring you and your group directly into Sanderson Field in a private aircraft from anywhere in the US, less than 15 minutes from this very special location where you will pick up your car, keys, and license for fun and adventure.

Olympic National Park is comprised of nearly 1 million acres of the Olympic Mountain range. The Olympics literally halted the glaciers that carved the surrounding geography many thousands of years ago and are now home to unique species and wildlife ecosystems.  The ONP is one of the last remaining temperate rain forests in the World with ancient old growth featuring trees of astonishing size.  Yes we all know of the great sequoias of California, but Imagine cedars, douglas firs, sitka spruce, and hemlock trees 15 ft in diameter and up to 300 feet tall.

Indian heritage is alive and dominant in several areas offering cultural and recreational opportunities found nowhere else.  You can also visit Lake Quinault, The Western shores, and many hot spring locations all easily accessible from Cinnamon Bear Cabin.  In the Northern portion of ONP, you’ll find crystal clear Crescent Lake - a body of water so rare and so old that it’s the home of some species of fishes that exist nowhere else on Earth. Crescent Lake is called a “National Treasure” with 5 stars on TripAdvisor.com

Hiking, camping, Kayaking, festivals, casinos, local artisans, scuba diving, golfing, fishing, sky diving, are all abundant in the Olympic Peninsula.  What you will not find are crowds, tourist traps, tourist crime, pollution, blight, traffic, and harassment.  The Olympic Peninsula has one of the lowest population densities in the US. Local prices are local prices and not tourist prices.  Cinnamon Bear Cabin is perfect for people who want to experience the best of the Pacific Northwest without needing a vacation from their vacation afterwards.

The choice is yours, you can navigate the Gauntlet of the travel industry whose sole purpose is to drive revenue, add fees, sell advertising impressions, waste your time, and reach into your wallet at every fork and bend  on the roads most traveled. Or, you can go for a private experience with all the cherished memories that you expect for your time and money at a cost that is comparable to anything that the commercial travel “processing” industry has to offer. It’s about a colors of time for your money, not the colors of money for your time. You live once, make it count