Plane Conversations

My son came home from school one day with a classroom story I found disturbing.  It was at the beginning of the school year and the teacher asked each student to introduce themselves and to tell what their career goals were.  One student stated that he wanted to be a famous rap artist.  The teacher’s advice to the student was to pick another career, he’d never make it in that one.

I’m sure that there were plenty of people who gave the same advice to Marshall Mathers and Curtis Jackson; but, apparently neither Eminem nor 50 Cent took notice of the naysayers. 

Several months ago, I read a blog entitled Misfit Entrepreneurs that really stuck with me.  In the blog, Dan Pallotta wonders how Bruce Springsteen could communicate his aspirations to his father, “How does he tell his father, ‘I’m going to be Bruce Springsteen?’ “  How does any true visionary communicate their vision to the rest of us?  How can they explain their dream to expand or alter a current reality?  How can they define what we can’t even imagine?

At the moment, my son wants to be a stand-up comedian.  He’s pretty hilarious; so, this may be a good fit for him.  I remind him that the path is difficult and that the price, in terms of work, will be high.  However, if Jerry Seinfeld can do it, I don’t see why my son wouldn’t be able to – provided he’s willing to do the work.  Those are the real keys, aren’t they?  We must be able to envision the goal and we must be willing to do the work.

In the charter side of Business and General Aviation, we often talk about the problems in our industry.  Operators all over the country have shut down.  Those of us still flying struggle with ever-thinner margins.  Customers want more stringent standards; but, they often want to pay less for them.  The market is unwilling to pay price increases that keep pace with cost increases.  How can we continue to operate under these circumstances?  We operate smarter.

But, we can’t operate smarter until we change the way we view ourselves and our product.  We have to envision ourselves as Bruce Springsteen before we can actually translate the vision to reality.  We have to stop seeing our industry only for what it is and, instead, see it for what it can be.  What if we can increase fleet utilization without substantially increasing costs?  What if we can increase our margins simply be changing our customer base?  What if we could increase our customer base by tenfold?

What if I told you that we can?  What if I told you that the vision was becoming reality right on the horizon?  Would you be willing to envision it?  Would you be willing to work on it with us? 

We can do it.  After all, Bruce Springsteen exists.

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As a quick background, I am a very blessed guy, husband to a wonderful wife, father to two beautiful daughters. After serving in the United States Air Force for 20 years, then running a technology company, I had to figure a way to make a good living doing what I love – working around and flying airplanes.

So, armed with a lot of enthusiasm, I bought a flight school and partnered with Corporate Flight Management (CFM) in the process. Not long after that, I started a charter and aircraft management business, Harmony Air.

There are many, many great CFIs (Certified Flight Instructors) and pilots out there; but, sometimes location, hard work and fate help things along. That’s part of this story.  You see, I happened to teach Tim McGraw’s business manager to fly some years ago and sure enough not long after, I began teaching Tim to fly in a Cirrus SR22 , which I provided at our Cirrus Training Center at the John C. Tune Airport in Nashville. Like every, pilot he’s still learning but he does have his Private Pilot License and, between movies, albums, concerts, being a dad and husband, is working on his instrument flying.

Tim and I have flown to some pretty interesting places.  I was fascinated to be able to fly to the NFL Kickoff in New Orleans and to see the game from a suite. Trust me, this is not the typical CFI gig.  Now we are embarking on a really great adventure, Tim’s concert schedule has him touring in Australia and, you guessed it, I’m on my way there right now. And I am fortunate that my wife and youngest daughter are with me. My oldest daughter is in nursing school and could not miss a day, much less two weeks.

It has been a really long time since I’ve flown on a commercial flight; but, so far, American Airlines has treated us very well.  But, $10 for a sandwich?!  Really?!  As I write this, we’re sitting at the International Terminal at LAX awaiting our 16+ hour flight to Sydney and then on to Brisbane. It’s in Brisbane where I’ll get my SR22 check-out at the only Cirrus Training Center in Australia.  I’m looking forward to meeting Steve Maltby, the owner there.

A word of advice, before you go to Australia to rent a plane, do your homework. I began mine two months ago and there are still some issues I’m counting on Steve to help me resolve for my 90-day license to fly.  I plan on using that license to fly between concert venues in Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne.

Stay tuned for more news, pics and video……

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As I’ve mentioned before, my father is a forester and he has always said that there are no better conservationists than his colleagues.  If they don’t take care to preserve the natural resources, foresters work themselves right out of a job.  If you harvest a tree, you plant one in its place, keeping the supply renewed and the resource in balance.  Compared with this “if you use it, you replace it” philosophy, buying carbon credits has the feel of hiring a penitent.  In theory, environmental or moral transgressions are atoned.  And, while I suppose hiring someone to offset one’s carbon footprint is better than doing nothing, that emperor still appears naked to me. 

The transportation industry, in general, and the aviation industry, in particular, has an enormous carbon footprint.  For years, the industry has sought to reduce costs by increasing fuel efficiency, enjoying reduced emissions more as a happy by-product than an actual goal.  Recently, however, there has been something of an ideology shift.  I don’t know that anyone is willing to increase costs to decrease emissions, but certainly, more players in the industry are willing to see cleaner burning, sustainable fuel as a goal in itself.  The shift from “wouldn’t it be nice if” to “how can we do this” can be seen in the developing partnerships.  These aren’t mad scientists cooking up fuels in their garages.  These are Boeing, British Airways, Rolls-Royce developing fuels or partnering with visionary companies like Solena, Solazyme and Honeywell’s UOP.  Big money and big aviation experience are teaming up with big innovation to do something good for both our industry and our planet.  We use  fuel resources and air; and, we are nearing a time when we can renew the one resource while lowering pollutants in the other.  It’s no wonder excitement is growing. 

Flightglobal reports that at the recent air show in Farnborough, England, Richard Altman, executive director of the Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuels Initiative went so far as to say that current technologies “can contribute on a significant level to achieving carbon neutral growth – it’s happening and it’s happening now.”  And it’s happening from different sources.  On March 25, 2010, a United States Air Force A-10 flew its first flight using a blend of conventional JP-8 jet fuel and biomass fuel derived from the camelina plant, like those fuels produced by Alt-Air and Sustainable Oils.  As we discussed on 26 May, Brazil has a dynamic bio-fuels industry currently based on ethanol production from sugar cane. Darpa and others are closing in on an economical process to produce jet fuel from algae.  And Honeywell’s Green Jet Fuel (a blend of fuels from algae and used cooking oil) was used in the first biofuel-powered helicopter flight by the Royal Netherlands Air Force in June. 

The majority of news reports in the United States for the past three months have been stories on the catastrophic oil rig explosion and subsequent spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  China saw a Yellow Sea oil spill of nearly 28 million gallons around the same time.  As I watched those reports, I kept thinking of the progress in bio-fuel production.  Imagine how algal fuel production would eliminate the possibility of such a disaster – how months of clean-up and decontamination could be replaced by a flock of ducks.  Now, you’re really talking carbon neutral and that emperor’s new clothes look good.

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Photo by Mark Blanks

In just a few days, the aviation world will come together to experience the largest display of aeronautical hardware, services, and performances in North America at EAA’s annual AirVenture Oshkosh event. I have been blessed to attend AirVenture for the past two years and I now find myself sorely disappointed that I will not have the same opportunity this year. However, this provides me the perfect opportunity to reflect on my love of, some may say my addiction to, aviation and the way that I see others who experience the same passion of this singular activity.

I have attended many different airshows and have worked at an airport for most of my adult life. Yet, there is still something about watching an old warbird taxi by that makes my heart flutter and I often find myself hearing an old radial engine coming to life in my dreams. However, all of my love for aviation becomes insignificant when I watch a young boy tug at his father to point at another fascinating aircraft or a young girl ask her father to hold her higher so that she can see. What exactly is it about aviation that inspires so many? From the small boy to the old man, there is something inexplicable that strikes a common cord among mankind. So, what is aviation?

There are many explanations that could be offered to describe why people are so fascinated by aviation and flying. I could argue that taking to the sky is symbolic of man conquering a realm that for thousands of years was available only to creatures born with wings. Or, I might launch into a discussion of the freedom that flight provides and how we are able to experience the world in a completely unique fashion. Further still, I could provide examples of how aviation makes the entire earth accessible and allows us to interact with people and cultures from across the globe in a single day. However, none of these explanations could even begin to explain the glint in a child’s eye when they take their first plane ride.

I encourage you to take a window seat on your next business flight and ponder over the experience of flight. Better yet, fly on a private airplane and truly enjoy the freedom that you have to go where ever you want without any kind of hassle. And even better still, take a kid flying and watch for that spark in their eyes and then you will see what aviation is. The spark IS aviation.

Photo by Mark Blanks

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There is a lot of buzz these days about “social”, evidenced by the fact that anytime a topic is brought up online with the words “social” or “social media” all of us who claim to be social tweet it out. 

So what is social and anti social about the experience of traveling by air? 

A good definition of social in this context of travel is “allowing people to meet and interact with others in a friendly way”.

Conversely, Encarta defines antisocial as “hostile or indifferent to the comfort or needs of other members of a community or society as a whole”

So here’s a question for those of you who travel routinely in the airline system: 

Would you rate the experience of airline travel social or antisocial based on the definitions presented above? Is the experience friendly or hostile?

Maybe hostile is too strong of a word to use to describe traveling by airline but “indifferent to the comfort or needs…” may accurately define the experience.

As I queue up in line to take off my shoes, unload my I-Pad bag, get searched, wanded and body scanned I don’t feel real social. The weary and worn out road warriors who spend valuable hours in the waiting areas of terminal buildings most likely don’t feel social either.

Compare the experience of airline travel against the experience of traveling in a business jet or even in a small private airplane.

Come hang out in the lobby of a fixed based operation, a terminal for private flights, and see the difference in the traveler’s demeanor over what you see at a busy hub airport.

We see it every day in our business. Smiling people passing through the lobby departing to go on vacation or a business trip, or getting ready to go home from a trip, knowing they will be back home soon. Knowing the experience they are about to have will be positive from beginning to end.

I grew up flying in small airplanes and some of my fondest memories of travel were the flights riding up front with a father who was a corporate pilot. The passengers in the back of the aircraft most always enjoyed the trip with my father smoothly flying them to the destination. Even when the weather did not cooperate he somehow still made it a good experience.

So what’s it worth to you to have a social versus antisocial travel experience?  

Is there a monetary value difference in the two experiences?

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In 1907, Dr. Heinrich Koppers built the first ovens to recover byproducts from coke used in steel production.  In 1930, the Koppers Company began treating wood with the byproduct creosote and their forest products division was born.  My father worked for that company; so, I was fascinated that telephone pole and railroad cross-tie production got their starts from the steel industry.  Nearly 75 years later, Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson of the Chicago-based software company 37signals have just published Rework, a book outlining how that same concept  has made their business an international success.

In their book, the authors assert that every business creates some kind of byproduct - that it’s impossible to make just one thing.  They encourage businesses to look for those byproducts and to see them as new opportunities.  Their first byproduct was a software program built for internal use which became a popular commercial product.  For private aircraft charters, our largest byproducts are empty legs and empty seats. 

How do we take those and turn them into commercial products?

There are any number of services out there that will list a carrier’s empty legs and offer them up for public sale; however, as most charter operators will tell you, matching an available empty leg to a flight request is quite a trick.  Because the percentage of matches is so low, for many years, operators simply ignored the byproduct altogether.  The emergence of the charter broker changed that.  Brokers saw the potential of empty legs and worked hard to find ones that matched their clients’ requests, sometimes to the frustration of charter operators.  Many operators resisted the trend and, to this day, many view it unfavorably; however, the fact is, that because brokers aggressively sold this byproduct long ignored by operators, the market base for private aircraft charter has grown.

While many charter “purists” would like to put the genie back into the bottle, I don’t really see that happening.  What we have to do now is harness the genie’s potential.

Sure, we list our available empty legs on sites like CharterX and Avinode.  I even have a growing group of travelers who have asked to receive twice-weekly emails from me, outlining what we have available.  And, from time to time, one of those travelers is able to take advantage of an empty leg.  I love it when it works out, but the reality is that it infrequently does.  All of these postings, lists, emails, etc., sound like a really great idea; so, why don’t they work better?  Are we not listing in the best places?  Are there too few participants?  Or, is the problem that the whole system is driven from the supply side?

What if the answer to successfully selling our byproducts is to revolutionize our thinking and let it be driven from the market side?  What if we turned our byproducts into our products?

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My father is a forester.  At one time, his chief role in his company was to evaluate a stand of timber and negotiate with the landowner for the rights to that timber.  Those kinds of deals weren’t made by men in suits in conference rooms or over the phone.  They were made by men in dusty boots on the front porch over a cup of coffee.  Contracts were agreed upon with a handshake before pen was ever put to paper.  There was a protocol for making those deals and, if you rushed it, you lost it. 

The landowner might not have all the latest facts, figures and price indexes for whatever hardwood he was trying to sell, but he wanted a fair price for his resource.  To be sure that he was getting the best price and was being treated fairly, he had to know who he was dealing with.  He might have known a guy who knew a guy, but, even then, he wanted to make the judgement for himself.  And he made that judgement sitting on the front porch drinking a cup of coffee with the potential buyer.

I don’t have land with timber on it.  To be honest, I don’t have a front porch to speak of, either.  But when I’m spending money, I want to know who I’m spending it with and I don’t think I’m unusual.  As a front porch for consumers and vendors alike, Social Media helps me do that.  I tell people regularly to check our commercial site to see what we do; but, to see who we are, check this blog, our Facebook pages and our Tweets.  You’ll see the issues that are important to us – aviation industry issues and advances, marketing and human resources articles, environmental issues and hockey.  (Hey, I’m a fan and since I post many of our updates, well…..)

We can’t shake hands and or make eye contact over a blog, a tweet or a status update; however, with continued exchanges, we can get to know one another.  As a customer, we can watch how vendors treat other customers.  We can see the rate and the quality of interaction.  As a vendor, we can see customers’ interests and viability.  If either party is presenting counterfeit social currency, they won’t be able to hide it for long.

Sure, we can teleconference, video conference, read brochures and websites; however, those things tell us only what their authors want us to know.  By reviewing a vendor or even a customer’s social currency, we can see how closely their actions match their words.  We may not be literally looking each other in the eye, but by exploring a person or company’s social presence, we will find evidence of the each other’s ethics, activity level, responsiveness and global awareness.  Social media gives us all the opportunity to either credit or discredit a company’s claims based on information we find in the company’s own social media offerings and on reviews written by their customers.

The Web of today and the Deep Web right around the corner offer fewer skeleton-hiding closets.  The wide open platform gives consumers and vendors the opportunity to see each other as they are and as they’d like to be seen.  We still may know a guy who knows a guy.  Social Media gives us the chance to look each other in the virtual eye before we make the deal - even without dusty boots or cups of coffee.

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