Nationwide flying club

Challenged

Challenged

Pattern Altitude
Joined
Apr 4, 2011
Messages
1,901
Location
Louisiana
Display Name
Display name:
Challenged
What do you think the economic (and otherwise) feasibility of a flying club on a national scale. Say, you take an organization the size of AOPA but increase the membership dues accordingly and have a fleet or aircraft available all over the country?
 
Been tried by the manufacturers back in the day and failed. Would be nice but I don't think it can ever work.
 
I think AirsharesElite and ourplane.com do something like this? IIRC, you could fly a Cirrus from where ever you happened to be.
 
What I've thought of was a possibility of a partnering network of local flying clubs, where a deal was worked out with insurance companies and such to accept signoffs, and reciprocal flying rights would be granted among participating clubs.

So, if I'm a member here, and I'm travelling to Dallas on business and want to rent a plane locally, I could find a local club with whom my club has reciprocal privileges with.
 
It sounds like a great idea, but I think it would ultimately be extremely difficult to implement.

In the long run, I think it would end up doing the opposite of intended goal. My idea of the intended goal, is cheaper flying, and I can see this easily going back to traditional flight school rates.
 
It was tried about 40 years ago by an outift called "Lease-a-Plane." Join anywhere, get checked out in a type, and you could fly their planes of that type everywhere. It died pretty fast. However, AirShares Elite seems to be making another run of it in a fractional ownership system rather than a club/rental scheme. Minimum buy-in is $60K...
AirShares share prices start at ~$60,000 for a 1/8th interest in an SR22 GTS
Click to expand...
...and you have to go through their checkout/transition training program. See http://www.airshareselite.com/ for more.
 
While this sounds like it would be a great idea, I just don't see how it could be cost effective, and probably would be a nightmare logistics wise to manage. If anything were to work well, and be cost effective, I think it would need to work though a network of pilots, similar to those of us on here at POA.

I know that I would not mind loaning out my Cherokee to any of my fellow friends here on POA.
 
CMTowner said:
While this sounds like it would be a great idea, I just don't see how it could be cost effective, and probably would be a nightmare logistics wise to manage. If anything were to work well, and be cost effective, I think it would need to work though a network of pilots, similar to those of us on here at POA.

I know that I would not mind loaning out my Cherokee to any of my fellow friends here on POA.
Click to expand...

And that's why I've advocated a network of existing local flying clubs.

The big issue will be insurance. That said, there are a limited number of insurers out there, and they have no additional risk if I'm flying a Cherokee from the Rocky Top Flying Club in Knoxville (now defunct :() vs. the Florida Cherokee Club in your neck of the woods, if both clubs have the same insurer.
 
JeffDG said:
The big issue will be insurance. That said, there are a limited number of insurers out there, and they have no additional risk if I'm flying a Cherokee from the Rocky Top Flying Club in Knoxville (now defunct :() vs. the Florida Cherokee Club in your neck of the woods, if both clubs have the same insurer.
Click to expand...
I don't think the legalities are as simple as that. In addition, one of the things that makes the AirShares operation work is that the airplanes are essentially identical. To make this work across geographically dispersed flying clubs, they'd have to standardize their airplanes, and that, I think, would be a real cat-herding exercise.
 
Variations of this have been tried several times over the years. I think it was Hertz that tried to do national aircraft rentals way back. In the mid-80s there was an outfit (Avion??) in the southeast that had a fleet of Warriors based at several different airports. One way rentals were allowed.
 
. . . and Slim left town.
 
I would think it would have to almost be operated like a company, with one insurance policy listing all aircraft and authorized pilots. I could only imagine the cost to something like that.
 
Ron Levy said:
I don't think the legalities are as simple as that. In addition, one of the things that makes the AirShares operation work is that the airplanes are essentially identical. To make this work across geographically dispersed flying clubs, they'd have to standardize their airplanes, and that, I think, would be a real cat-herding exercise.
Click to expand...

I'm not saying it would be simple, but might be doable.

First up, it would probably be limited to clubs with a single insurance carrier. Once you start crossing those lines, the risk equation becomes intractable.

But why would it matter if someone had a checkout in a 182 in one place, properly documented and details available to the remote club, being permitted to use a 182 somewhere else?

There may need to be some specific standards for signoff on the specific model, but if the insurance company's standards are met in TN, I don't see why they would be different in ND.
 
Does anybody really think that any potentially viable and profitable aircraft rental model hasn't been tried?

JeffDG said:
I'm not saying it would be simple, but might be doable.

First up, it would probably be limited to clubs with a single insurance carrier. Once you start crossing those lines, the risk equation becomes intractable.

But why would it matter if someone had a checkout in a 182 in one place, properly documented and details available to the remote club, being permitted to use a 182 somewhere else?

There may need to be some specific standards for signoff on the specific model, but if the insurance company's standards are met in TN, I don't see why they would be different in ND.
Click to expand...
 
wabower said:
Does anybody really think that any potentially viable and profitable aircraft rental model hasn't been tried?
Click to expand...

The point is, this is not directed at a profit. It's an association of non-profit clubs.
 
Isn't Airshares a "you own a share of the airplane and we provide a pilot" type of operation, like NetJets only with pistons?
 
In which case it's even deader than dead. Kinda like the guy who's going to the racetrack and hoping he breaks even because he needs the money.



JeffDG said:
The point is, this is not directed at a profit. It's an association of non-profit clubs.
Click to expand...
 
TMetzinger said:
Isn't Airshares a "you own a share of the airplane and we provide a pilot" type of operation, like NetJets only with pistons?
Click to expand...


They assist with instructors for training but not pilots for charter. Seems nice. Too bad they're not local to me.
 
wabower said:
Does anybody really think that any potentially viable and profitable aircraft rental model hasn't been tried?
Click to expand...
I agree they have been tried.

At work, I try not to simply say "we've tried that already and it didn't work". I'll ask what is different this time- hopefully, either the idea is being implemented differently, or the conditions have changed, although I haven't seen any changes in aircraft rental conditions.
 
I've seen some changes, but unfortuately none that are favorable to the viability of the business.

Cap'n Jack said:
I agree they have been tried.

At work, I try not to simply say "we've tried that already and it didn't work". I'll ask what is different this time- hopefully, either the idea is being implemented differently, or the conditions have changed, although I haven't seen any changes in aircraft rental conditions.
Click to expand...
 
Challenged said:
What do you think the economic (and otherwise) feasibility of a flying club on a national scale. Say, you take an organization the size of AOPA but increase the membership dues accordingly and have a fleet or aircraft available all over the country?
Click to expand...

Planes crash. People die. Lawyers stir. When that happens, if you are the owner of the fatal plane, you don't want to be big, and you don't want to have deep pockets.

Small clubs are better. One of them can blow up without doing any harm to the others.
 
NoHeat said:
Planes crash. People die. Lawyers stir. When that happens, if you are the owner of the fatal plane, you don't want to be big, and you don't want to have deep pockets.

Small clubs are better. One of them can blow up without doing any harm to the others.
Click to expand...

I think you nailed it. The bankruptcy car wash gets utilized a lot in aviation.
 
Well it appears there are several reasons why this probably can't work, but I'm still interested in the idea and maybe even trying to set one up locally. For those of you who are in clubs, or familiar with them, I'm wondering how many members can you typically have per airplane available?
 
That is a thought I was pondering myself. How many pilots will join and how many aircraft can I get. Other questions are could this club effectively manage multiple aircraft on multiple airports? I wish you luck in your adventure and perhaps we can bounce ideas off each other.
 
Challenged said:
Well it appears there are several reasons why this probably can't work, but I'm still interested in the idea and maybe even trying to set one up locally. For those of you who are in clubs, or familiar with them, I'm wondering how many members can you typically have per airplane available?
Click to expand...

My club here in NJ has about 70 members for 4 planes(3x172 1x182). Things get tight when one plane goes down for maintenance but I wouldn't say the ratio is terrible.
 
In which case You will soon find out that you have chosen a very appropriate user ID.
Challenged said:
Well it appears there are several reasons why this probably can't work, but I'm still interested in the idea and maybe even trying to set one up locally. For those of you who are in clubs, or familiar with them, I'm wondering how many members can you typically have per airplane available?
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top