So why aren't there any cool commercials to motivate people to go fly.

[kontiki]

I see commercial after commercial for expensive things people can buy and do. I see GA withering. Nobody's marketing it! What's going on?

 

[poadeleted21]

I see commercial after commercial for expensive things people can buy and do. I see GA withering. Nobody's marketing it! What's going on?

What? I'm going to pay $50,000 to advertise a $20,000 cherokee that the average person MIGHT be able to fly only after they've dedicated time and money to getting a license?

Cessna made 77 172s last year I believe and I'd figure the market for people buying new 172s would be people very in the know about aviation and not need marketing too.

But yeah, I'm with you, it'd be refreshing to see EAA/AOPA run an ad or two just pumping up aviation in general.

Back in the day Piper even sponsored NASCAR.

 

[MachFly]

You really want a lot more people flying?
That will make our lives a lot more dangerous.

 

[John221us]

Would mass marketing be effective? Community events, like airshows, young eagle programs, etc. get people interested. Getting people to spend money on it is another issue. It is not a cheap hobby. While it is reachable by the middle class, that requires some sacrifice and singular focus. You either have to do this before you start a family (when most can least afford it) or wait until the kids have flown the nest. It seems to me, the barriers are either finding ways to fund young people (though my son was only interested until he got a girlfriend and then he didn't have time for it), or somehow lower the time and focus commitment for the 30 something's. They can squeeze in golf now and again, but finding time to fly two or three days a week can be a challenge when you are raising a family.

 

[jasc15]

Before I even thought of beginning flight training, I considered myself more interested in aviation than the average person. As a kid I had posters of SR-71's and the space shuttle, etc. I never heard a whisper of any sort of community events or young eagles type programs. Air shows were never advertised that I can recall. Only when I finally talked to an owner of a flight school did I actually step onto an airport.

Even though these outreach efforts are great, I don't think they cast a wide enough net. They didnt even catch me, a kid who always loved aviation.

 

[steingar]

Airline prices came down to the point where we're no longer competitive for many routes. That's probably when GA started to die in earnest.

Then again, the security theater could get so bad folks are forced back into GA. It could happen. All the marketing in the world won't get folks spend the kind of money one does on aviation. It is utterly nuts to do so.

 

[ClimbnSink]

Yeah a slick video with a Cirrus or something shiny and pointy buzzing around, then people show up to a FBO and get the worst customer service they have ever experienced, snob treatment from other pilots and a 30 year old dirty, ragged out spam can for 150 bucks an hour. Other then flying low what is the fun? If you show people flying to great destinations you are selling the destination and we can drive and tow the jetskis or buy a ticket on the smoker(and be served alcohol on the way) for chump change.
Tiny market that behaves poorly, that will never change.

 

[John Baker]

Spending money advertising anything when people are not buying is not the way it is done. You advertise to people who are buying, not to people who are not buying.

In a dead market, the only advertising you should do is minimal institutional advertising to keep your name out there. People buy groceries all year long, so you see lots of grocery ads.

The department stores lay out their most advertising dollars prior to Christmas.

Do you really think a ten million dollar advertising campaign would sell enough $250,000.00 airplanes to justify the expense. LS aircraft companies wouldn't have that kind of money even if people were buying, which they are not.

If airplanes were popular, and people were buying them, you would be seeing airplane ads everywhere. That is not the case.

An advertising campaign is not going to convince anyone who does not want to own an airplane to buy one. That just is not how it works.

If you were selling cars, then you would advertise. People are buying cars.

-John

 

[John Baker]

Yeah a slick video with a Cirrus or something shiny and pointy buzzing around, then people show up to a FBO and get the worst customer service they have ever experienced, snob treatment from other pilots and a 30 year old dirty, ragged out spam can for 150 bucks an hour. Other then flying low what is the fun? If you show people flying to great destinations you are selling the destination and we can drive and tow the jetskis or buy a ticket on the smoker(and be served alcohol on the way) for chump change.
Tiny market that behaves poorly, that will never change.

When I first started flying, I had not even done my ground school yet, I was siting in the FBO trying to look as inconspicuous as possible among about six or seven pilots that were also hanging around doing nothing other than flinging the bull about airplanes and flying.

They pulled me into the conversation, asked me questions, wanted to know my thoughts on whatever. They made me part of the group of pilots.

My brother picked me up after my lesson, and I told him about that. I said that these guys treated me just like I was one of them, a pilot. I've never forgotten that experience.

It kept up the whole time I was at that school. The only time I ever felt like a nobody in that FBO is when a group of B-17 pilots and crew swaggered in one afternoon, like they had just returned from bombing Berlin. They had the prerequisite leather jackets, the hats, they were in full costume, and even fuller of themselves.

-John

 

[steingar]

Actually, when Icon first announced plans to build the LSA seaplane, they did all their promotion LA style, with lots of glitz and pretty girls. Got slammed for it pretty roundly.

 

[Sac Arrow]

I can see putting advertising money in to getting pilots to buy aviation related items in the mass media, but for reasons already mentioned, it's useless for the purpose of selling aircraft.

And probably for motivating people to fly. Anyone and everyone who might contemplate flying at one point in their life, will do so regardless of positive media propaganda.

 

[oldShar]

A few years ago, AOPA (I think) did pay for a series of commercials over a period of many months, but they stopped bothering when it didn't amount to any return --- and that was when people WERE buying.

Besides, they have cheap advertising now. It's called, "Flying Wild Alaska" and the one about Buffalo Aviation on The Weather Channel and the one about the Coast Guard (helicopter rescues), and also "The Aviators." .... so having something out there/awareness isn't dead, just focused a little

 

[Dr. O]

Immediate gratification, RULES!
And there is none in GA flying...

Sell em a Lexus and they have immediate status in the neighborhood...
Sell em a Cigarette Boat and they have bikini bimbos hanging all over them while anchored out at the sand bar...
Sell em a Big Screen Flat TV and their buddies worship them...

Sell em a Skyhawk and?
The GF leaves for a guy who has cash left for going to the bar on Friday night...
He lives on Ramen noodles to pay for the CFI - and make the airplane payments - and pay the hull insurance - and pay the hangar - and the fuel...
Shortly after, the boss decides he must have been siphoning cash from the business to be a RICH airplane owner and cans him...
Then it is bill collectors and having to room in with the z00mer - finally he is living in a cardboard box under the overpass when when his GF zooms past in his ex best frined's Lexus and gives our pilot the finger while leaning on the horn...
He jumps off the overpass...
The media has a field day with stories about rich pilots gone bad...

The moral is:
Go for the immediate gratification...

 

[jpower]

I don't see mainstream advertising on TV for buying a 172 doing anything good. I do, however see marketing GA in general. It's a whole lot easier to sell an $8,000 certificate than a $350,000ish airplane. Even less than $8,000 if you advertise LSA. (No LSA bashing please! It's true that it's less expensive to get into, and that's what matters for marketing.)

 

[Irish_Armada]

Immediate gratification, RULES!
And there is none in GA flying...

Sell em a Lexus and they have immediate status in the neighborhood...
Sell em a Cigarette Boat and they have bikini bimbos hanging all over them while anchored out at the sand bar...
Sell em a Big Screen Flat TV and their buddies worship them...

Sell em a Skyhawk and?
The GF leaves for a guy who has cash left for going to the bar on Friday night...
He lives on Ramen noodles to pay for the CFI - and make the airplane payments - and pay the hull insurance - and pay the hangar - and the fuel...
Shortly after, the boss decides he must have been siphoning cash from the business to be a RICH airplane owner and cans him...
Then it is bill collectors and having to room in with the z00mer - finally he is living in a cardboard box under the overpass when when his GF zooms past in his ex best frined's Lexus and gives our pilot the finger while leaning on the horn...
He jumps off the overpass...
The media has a field day with stories about rich pilots gone bad...

The moral is:
Go for the immediate gratification...

Hahahaha, that is some funny stuff.

Agree on most points made here on marketing. I work in the political field and would suggest the only marketing worth anyone's time would be awareness ads about the positive attributes of GA generally so as to position the industry better in the eyes of the general pop the next time the government tries to take a big swipe at us. I know AOPA does this at various levels, but in terms of big spending on TV commercials, generic ads putting the industry in a positive light would be the only thing that might make sense to me.

 

[Josh_C]

Someone mentioned the airshows as marketing. At the limited few I have been too, I don't remember seeing any advertising about becoming a pilot or even buying pilot supplies really. Unless you count the military branches trying to recruit. I'm sure there is more than a few who watch the show and later remember it as the moment they decided to become a pilot. Yea, they are inspiring and a lot of people leave with the "Wow, it would be so fun to do that" look in their eyes, but I don't remember a booth of CFIs standing by to tell them that they could one day and sign them up for the first step.
They sell every tee shirt, toy and trinket with wings you can imagine. There's vendors for car insurance, military, motorcycle dealers, ect. I understand that there is a vendor fee, and CFIs would have to seriously cut into their ramen noodle fund, but what if a show coordinator just donated and area to set aside as a CFI corral? Just some thoughts.

 

[Datadriver]

No one wants to pay $150 to rent a 40 year old airpane. Those that do are on their way to something else like a rating or different plane.

 

[Henning]

I see commercial after commercial for expensive things people can buy and do. I see GA withering. Nobody's marketing it! What's going on?

Story board one up for us right now, what would you sell it with?

 

[raider]

I think the OP is referring to merely flying maybe even garnering interest in aviation, not buying a plane

 

[kontiki]

Story board one up for us right now, what would you sell it with?

Easy, like the REI commercial, sell the coolness. Their bit - I'm gonna bike in the hot dusty dry desert, but it will be cool, I'll wear sexy cool sunglasses, have a girlfriend that has a waist, camp in the desert, and share good times with friends etc.

Except, that I'll be flying over snow capped mountain vistas to really pristine camp grounds to camp with friend and sleep under the stars.

Or instead of drinking pop to be popular and have friends, we'll be doing major cool stuff seeing concerts and foot ball games in nearby cities all the while with great smiles hot women and guys and our Cessna.

It shouldn't be sold as a spectator sport (air races and air shows) it's really something you do!

Instead of driving that $50k Bavarian road machine from stop light to stop light, I'll be cruising with my RV buddies in a formation, doing breaks and stuff before going home to sleep with hot women and be really liked by people.

Posts I saw in here were depressing.

There is a marketing story about 2 shoe salesmen that visit a primitive a remote jungle tribe. First one came back and told his boss, don't bother with that place, nobody wears shoes there.

Second one goes and comes back to tell his boss, it's a gold mine, we can sell shoes to every single living soul there!

There was a time when pro tennis and golfers barely made a living. Now they all millionaire sex addicts and stuff. That was all created! That's what marketing is. (This is a little off topic, but to the point)

Everyone driving a Porsche in the inner city could have probably been sold a plane.

Just my 2 cents on things.

 

[LJS1993]

Is this what you're talking about? Check it out guys. Future baseball HOF'er flies a Cirrus. For young people you'd have to have someone like LeBron James or Kobe Bryant as the spokesman but Griffey could still work.
Personally I believe GA is going to continue to decline until flying is simply more affordable. Right now, and let me tell you guys from personal experience. Whenever I mention the thought of learning to fly and possibly owning a plane my friends, some poor and some middle class, talk about only the "country club" types being able to own and fly planes. They have flat out told me I'll never be able to afford to fly. So, until newer planes become much more affordable it will never grow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQdE_CoysLI

 

[N2124v]

One thing that would help the industry is if everyone would quit their bitching and whining about how expensive it is and just talk about it with friends and take people who express an interest flying. If someone wants something bad enough they will figure out the time and means to do it.

My god, we are like people on a sinking ship arguing about who should get in what life boat and not trying to figure out how to stop the ship from sinking. We need new pilots coming into the system, we need to work to get the regs changed so new products can be brought to the market faster and cheaper, and the biggest thing that could help would be to remove the requirement that "EXPERIMENTAL" be plastered all over a kit built aircraft.

Yes, flying is expensive, but by god it is worth it!!

As far as an advertising campaign some ads showing the utility ( like Chevy truck hauling stuff), community ( RVing, motor cycles), experience/life style ( cool scenic shots), and the accomplishment (graduating college, building something, and tie it all into one neat package. Between AOPA/EAA/NBAA they can find the funding, heck maybe even the FAA would get involved. Just some general feel good, we are here at your local airport, come out and talk and see for yourself would do wonders. Now we can't drop the ball and have a snotty, holier than thou attitude when they show up.

Rant off......

 

[Henning]

Easy, like the REI commercial, sell the coolness. Their bit - I'm gonna bike in the hot dusty dry desert, but it will be cool, I'll wear sexy cool sunglasses, have a girlfriend that has a waist, camp in the desert, and share good times with friends etc.

Except, that I'll be flying over snow capped mountain vistas to really pristine camp grounds to camp with friend and sleep under the stars.

If you look through the archives of GA you'll see this has all been done. The non circumventable cost factors are what kill it, it is that far beyond most hobbies with boating as the exception.

 

[MSPAviator]

It seems to me, the barriers are either finding ways to fund young people (though my son was only interested until he got a girlfriend and then he didn't have time for it), or somehow lower the time and focus commitment for the 30 something's.

Flying is expensive and spending $7-9k nowdays just to get the private cert. is a tough pill to swallow for most. I didn't get started until my late 20s simply because of money and I consider myself somewhat fortunate.

Many of my peers are deep in five or six figures of student loan debt and earn middling salaries. If they have kids or were "smart" and bought a house before the downturn then forget it, they are so far under water that extra money for GA flying is just not happening.

The only possible savior is cheaper fuel... $5.51/gal. at my home base hurts but I am still paying it for the time being. I would LOVE to ditch these outdated 360 cubic inch Lycomings that suck down 10-11 GPH like it was free, but the money and the STC'ed modern engines for legacy aircraft just aren't there. I think servicing mags and points every 500 hours is just ridiculous. This old stuff hasn't been used in cars in 3 or more decades!

No one wants to pay $150 to rent a 40 year old airpane. Those that do are on their way to something else like a rating or different plane.

Hey, I'm paying close to that to rent a 40 yearold complex airplane. I've logged about 6 or 7 hours this month in it. Now you're making me feel bad.

 

[Sportsman]

It's patronizing when folks minimize the cost. I have "expensive" hobbies. I've.spent $10,000 on photography gear in last five years. Most folks gasp at that yet I have no marginal costs other than gas to Yosemite to shoot spectacular photos for years. Same 10 grand just gets me a PPL and "license to learn. I've been a member of a country club, albeit not ritzy, but $2500/yr dues and I'm in business plus $1,200 for set of clubs. Not even close to flying.

Entry barriers are too high for most folks and will be until fuel drops. I started golf with $1.25 twighlight fees at college course on handmedown clubs and dove for balls after dark. Can't do that with flying.

For Henning, I have owned a boat and experienced "hole in the water that you pour money in" a d will carry that with me if/when I consider a plane purchase.

 

[N2124v]

I'm not saying to minimize the cost, just don't focus on it. Lay it out there and let the person make their own decision. They need to determine the value of the activity to them, not be influenced by someone complaining.

 

[jstro]

From the title of the thread I was kind of thinking about those Dos Equis "Most Interesting Man in the World" commercials

Stay thirsty, my friends.

 

[onwards]

The only possible savior is cheaper fuel... $5.51/gal. at my home base hurts but I am still paying it for the time being. I would LOVE to ditch these outdated 360 cubic inch Lycomings that suck down 10-11 GPH like it was free, but the money and the STC'ed modern engines for legacy aircraft just aren't there. I think servicing mags and points every 500 hours is just ridiculous. This old stuff hasn't been used in cars in 3 or more decades!
(

This. Why can't I, at engine overhaul, get a modern engine in a 40 year old airframe? I know the reason - no one would pay the expense to get it STCed. But shouldn't the FAA have a vested interest in this? It would sure make flying safer. Wouldn't it be cool if someone would set up a program to get the STC shared by pilots on that airframe?

 

[kontiki]

If you look through the archives of GA you'll see this has all been done. The non circumventable cost factors are what kill it, it is that far beyond most hobbies with boating as the exception.

Has it? I have a hunch that a lot of the countries early aviation fever was a spin-off of WWII, and the military's PR effort to sell the war to the public. Typically, all sides in a war need massive PR to keep them going.

We're all alarmed to some degree at disappearing airports and the prospect of no fuel.

It's not going to be enough for the few public figures in GA to roll up their sleeves and go head to head with developers and government officials to hammer out solutions to tough issues.

General Aviation needs to be re-packaged and resold.

Another example, grungy old time hardware stores (that had everything you could ever need) are gone. Know why? Smart people realized that women had money to spend, and women didn't like old cluttered dismal hardware stores with old cigar smoking guys hanging around to help you find stuff.

So they invented Home Depot and Lowes, every female home decorator/renovator's/gardener's dream. Everything in nice neat bubble pack, well lit, bright colors, assistants in orange aprons everywhere. Do it yourself books everywhere. Somehow orange is an important color to shopping women.
It can be done.

 

[HerrGruyere]

I remember several years ago there would occasionally be an advertisement for Dream Flight or something like that urging people to go take an introductory flight. I don't think it worked.

 

[John Baker]

No matter what it is, if it is aviation related, it is a very high end item that you are advertising. There is nothing cheap in GA at all. A handheld Garmin for your car is around three or four hundred. An identical looking Garmin for your airplane is over a thousand dollars.

A brand new eye catching car is around fifty thousand. A brand new eye catching airplane is close to a quarter million dollars at the bottom end.

To learn how to drive a car is usually under a thousand dollars, or if you have family or friends, nothing. Learning to fly an airplane is at rock bottom, around four or five thousand dollars. That is assuming you are an incredibly quick learner along with having the good fortune to own a photographic mind.

We are thinking about advertising an incredibly high end product that has a target audience of people fifty or over, or they are trust fund luck outs.

The only advertising that could possibly make any financial sense is exactly the way it is being done now, word of mouth.

-John

 

[kontiki]

OK look at the country's deep marriage tradition, giving a woman a couple diamond rings. An expensive tradition (for worthless rock) entirely manufactured by De Beers.

When we were an agricultural society, think anybody gave women diamonds? NO. How did they do it? It was more than the occasional add. It was really buying script time in Hollywood movies. Like too many things, the fake deep tradition became reality after being in featured scenes of popular movies.

That was the sad commentary of Schindler's list, for the first time the Holocaust became real for a whole generation of people, because they saw a provocative movie.

You can't run 2 backwoods car sales ads a month and expect to pique everyone's emotions. It doesn't matter if the pilot orgs, airplane manufacturer orgs and and FBO orgs, believe or not.

It's all going away if the current trend isn't reversed. Good ad campaigns aren't cheap. Option B, stick head in ground.

On the note of selling flying to women, the planes can't look like crap inside and out and really be inviting. GA has got to come out of the greasy old barn and into the marketing daylight.

Thanks for the airtime.

 

[rainsux]

One of our local flight schools is pumping intro flights on GroupOn. I am curious
how that is working out for them.

 

[hopmedic]

One of our local flight schools is pumping intro flights on GroupOn. I am curious
how that is working out for them.

I've seen a number of them in the Atlanta area as well. I have a coworker who buys every flying groupon he can get, cons them into believing that he's comparing flight schools, and says he's going to write a book on how he made it up to solo on Groupon (surely, no one is going to let him solo on a Groupon ).

I'm curious, as well, how Groupon is working out for them.

 

[John Baker]

The average amount spent on a diamond wedding ring purchased from a jewelry store is between $3,500 and $5,000.

The average spent on becoming a pilot is $6,000 to $15,000.

The average purchase price of a used entry level GA aircraft is from $30,000 to a little over $100,000.

I don't know what the average purchase price of an entry level wife is, but I assume maintenance can get pretty high these days. Probably much like maintaining a small airplane.

-John

 

[dell30rb]

Is this what you're talking about? Check it out guys. Future baseball HOF'er flies a Cirrus. For young people you'd have to have someone like LeBron James or Kobe Bryant as the spokesman but Griffey could still work.
Personally I believe GA is going to continue to decline until flying is simply more affordable. Right now, and let me tell you guys from personal experience. Whenever I mention the thought of learning to fly and possibly owning a plane my friends, some poor and some middle class, talk about only the "country club" types being able to own and fly planes. They have flat out told me I'll never be able to afford to fly. So, until newer planes become much more affordable it will never grow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQdE_CoysLI

Last time I checked out cirrus airplanes the cirrus sales weasel told me Griffey flies one

 

[dell30rb]

I don't know what the average purchase price of an entry level wife is, but I assume maintenance can get pretty high these days. Probably much like maintaining a small airplane.

-John

My mom had surgery for a slipped disc a few years back and was laid up for two months.. dad said that even with the cost of the surgery and rehab we were actually saving money because she was not spending anything .. hahaha

 

[grand_sea]

Ok so to sum this up basically in the economic nose dive our country has been in for the last decade or so and with our financial plane having a piston shot through the block and the stabilator ripped off by the state patrol drone there is very little that can be done with out a serious recovery but hope there is some start-up company that can get funding from the Tom Cruise or John Travolta banks to pump them up making LiPo Battery operated twin prop 2-4 seaters with solar panel wings and the ability to catch thermals and recharge via smart car tech. or my hopes and dreams of working as an A&P to fund my 4 children, wife and GA hobby has a pretty marginal chance of happening?

Before commenting please understand I'm a Minnesotan who's mother was a bartender and father is and always has been a truck driver so my sense of humor is as dry as they come....

 

[John Baker]

The entire GA industry has it's head in the sand regarding the cost of owning and flying. They are constantly using assorted comparisons in an effort to make it appear not as bad as it actually is.

Aviation customers have a lot in common with a slot machine for those who are in the industry. They keep throwing them crumbs, and every once in a while, a jackpot to keep their addiction to high prices alive.

Only in aviation can someone sell a thirty year old used radio for several thousand dollars. The reason, every once in a while, someone buys one. Therefore as long as that is what the market will bear, nothing is going to change anytime soon.

Another thing that keeps the prices high, actually the main thing, is government regulations. But then, government regulations keep all prices artificially inflated.

Our mega government costs us a whole lot more than most people realize, but it is what we want, so we gotta pay.

-John

 

[Henning]

The average amount spent on a diamond wedding ring purchased from a jewelry store is between $3,500 and $5,000.

The average spent on becoming a pilot is $6,000 to $15,000.

The average purchase price of a used entry level GA aircraft is from $30,000 to a little over $100,000.

I don't know what the average purchase price of an entry level wife is, but I assume maintenance can get pretty high these days. Probably much like maintaining a small airplane.

-John

My former wife went through 10xs what my former planes did lol.