Flying for Dollars
Area small business owners have found a way to combine their love of flying with their need to make business trips.

By Ellen Jensen

Pete LaColla made 13 client visits in 10 cities throughout the East Coast and Midwest in four and a half days. Sound impossible? It would have been just a few years ago, but in May 2000, LaColla earned his pilot’s license, allowing him to accomplish much more on a business trip in half the time. He and an employee made that 10-city trip in his 1980 Mooney four-seater airplane.

LaColla is the owner of Street Corner, which franchises mall-based convenience stores nationwide. He travels for two main reasons: to meet with potential franchisees and to inspect existing stores and improve operations. LaColla flies 150-200 hours a year, and he said 90 percent of that is for business.

“I can easily visit six to seven cities in a few days and visit 15-20 prospects,” LaColla said. “Almost without fail, I sell at least one store.”

He attributes his huge growth in sales over the last couple of years to flying.

The Hook
What leads people from being a slave to the automobile and commercial airlines, like most of the population, to the freedom of general aviation? There are many catalysts, but underlying each is a deep-seated love of flying.

In December 2002, Paul Bennett, president of Harvest Moon Natural Foods, bought tickets to take his wife up in a plane for a Plaza Lights tour. He had always been interested in flying, but after that short flight, he was hooked. Representatives from the Be a Pilot program were offering introductory flights for $49. Bennett signed up, and shortly after his flight, he jumped into training, earning his license in January 2005.

Ironically, it was a tragedy that led LaColla to the cockpit. He always had been mesmerized by the notion of flying, but didn’t think taking lessons and owning a plane would be feasible. In the aftermath of the John Kennedy Jr. crash, the intense media coverage opened his eyes to general aviation and the ways he could use a plane for business. LaColla started his flying lessons in February 2000, received his pilot’s license in May 2000 and his instrument rating in 2001.

Sometimes the love of flying is passed from generation to generation. Rob Telthorst’s father was a member of the Army Air Corps during WWII, and he shared his passion for flying and his memories of his flight training with his son. As much as Telthorst’s father loved flying, however, he ended up being a tail gunner in a B-17 bomber.

“It broke his heart that he didn’t get to fly the bomber, but they put you where you would be most effective, and he was a great gunner.”

Now Telthorst flies not only for the love of it, but also because flying for his business gives him more flexibility and saves time.

Business Uses
Telthorst is a partner with Telthorst & Associates, an estate and business-planning law firm. He does a lot of tax work, much of which is federal law, so his range of clients is nationwide. Even doing local work in Kansas and Missouri, he covers a lot of territory. He averages a little over 100 flight hours a year, which means two or three trips a month, many of those to small towns.

If your business takes you off the beaten track, general aviation is the only practical way to go, according to some business owners. Jesco Resources Inc. makes custom greases and gear lubricants for companies in the agricultural sector, so Richard Howell, company president, usually travels to out-of-the-way places on behalf of his largest and oldest customer, John Deere. Most of these places aren’t easily accessible through commercial aircraft.

For example, flying commercial to Moline, Ill., is almost a daylong excursion, whether you go through St. Louis or Chicago, Howell said. By the time you factor in the drive to the airport, security and waiting for the flight, it takes most of day to get there.

“I can go to Johnson County Executive airport, jump in the plane and be in Moline in two and a half hours, have a working lunch, a good afternoon of work and see some folks for dinner,” said Howell. “In the morning, I can meet with some more people, and I’m gone by noon, which is a day and a half of efficient use of my time, rather than the better part of two days of nothing but logistics.”

Bennett also uses his plane to get to places such as Shawnee, Okla., and Wichita, Kan., which are difficult to reach through commercial airlines. Besides owning a health food store, Bennett also is president of the National Nutritional Foods Association. In that capacity, he flies his plane to visit other health food stores, where he listens to the owners’ concerns and brings that information back to the association. He also plans to start flying to industry trade shows and educational events. He said that even though commercial flights to Chicago are readily available, the process still is time consuming.

“I find it’s just as fast and more convenient to fly my own plane,” Bennett said.

Another advantage to general aviation is that schedule adjustments are a snap, LaColla said. If he is on a business trip on the East Coast and gets a call from his office that a prospect in Pittsburgh wants to set up an appointment, he easily can add another stop to the trip. Likewise, if a client needs to cancel an appointment, LaColla simply skips that stop and moves on.

When Terry Presta’s company was still based in Garden City, Kan., flying his plane made it easier for him to expand his Presto convenience stores into new markets.

“We could take a look at the site, check traffic patterns, and get a bird’s-eye view of the city,” Presta said. “Flying added another dimension to the business by allowing us to look at the lay of the land with another perspective.”

Having access to a general aviation plane also makes it easier to move equipment.

“I might be hauling a part from a mechanical cotton picker that we lubricate on behalf of Deere,” Howell said. “With my plane, I can go get the thing and am back here in a couple of hours.”

Cost Effective
It depends on how you run the numbers, but most of these business owners find an actual cost savings, in addition to the convenience and flexibility that flying their own planes offers. Some find an actual dollar-for-dollar savings in flying their own planes versus flying commercially or driving. Others find that flying general aviation is a wash cost-wise, but all agree that when you factor in flexibility, convenience and, yes, fun, general aviation definitely comes out ahead.

Does it make economic sense to bear the cost of the airplane and fly as opposed to driving? It saves a huge amount of money, Telthorst said. After all, time is money.

“My billing is $250 an hour,” Telthorst said. “I can fly the airplane for about $100 an hour. If I’m going to a meeting in Goodland, Kan., think of the time it would take me to drive out there. I can fly from Kansas City to Goodland in about 1 1/2 hours. It’s a simple time-value analysis: What is the time worth for the business owner? If
I’m driving to Goodland, I’m wasting $250 an hour as long as it takes me to drive it.”

There is one way to get to Memphis, Tenn., commercially, Howell said, and the best fare is about $600 round trip, sometimes $800. He can fly to Memphis in 2 1/2 hours, and the trip costs him about $200, which includes overhead costs such as gasoline and maintenance.

“For that, I can fly to any of my usual destinations much less expensively than I can fly commercially or drive,” Howell said. “Also, when you’re driving, you have to factor in time. How productive am I sitting behind the wheel on the phone versus being at my destination face-to-face?”

LaColla tracks his expenses for each trip. He paid $2,400 for all of the fuel, maintenance and oil for his 10-city trip. If you add in hotels, meals and car expenses, the total expense was $3,238, which breaks down to a per-visit cost—without labor—of $249 per visit.

“You cannot avoid factoring in time,” he said. “There is no possible way to do that trip by any other means.”

For Bennett, there is less of a direct cost savings, but he added that you have to consider the convenience of flying general aviation. He said saving time is worth any extra cost of conducting business this way.

“If I have my wife with me, it comes closer to a cost savings point,” Bennett said. “It probably costs a little more, but convenience is key.”

Owning a Plane
Co-owning a plane can help cut down on the costs. Sharing a plane makes sense not only because you share capital costs and expenses, LaColla said, but sharing also helps keep the plane up in the air instead of sitting in the hangar.

“The average general aviation plane is used 35 to 50 hours a year (actual flight time),” he said. “That breaks down to one hour a week. What is the plane doing the rest of the time?”

LaColla flies 150-200 hours a year, and his partner flies nearly that much. Even with those high hours, they rarely have a scheduling conflict.

Howell also owns a plane with a partner. They created a calendar on Yahoo so they can block days when they need the plane.

“We’ve always been able to work through the few conflicts we have had,” Howell said.

Bennett owns two planes now, which has turned into a side business. He leases them back to Kansas City Aviation Center at Johnson County Executive airport so that other pilots can rent them.

“I had been traveling commercially more than 20 times a year,” Bennett said. “If my destination is within 1,000 miles, I will fly there now.”

Safety
One disadvantage that general aviation aircraft do have compared to both cars and commercial aircraft is that they are even more at the mercy of Mother Nature. Bad weather can mean canceling or re-scheduling a trip. Telthorst has a rule that he doesn’t fly in bad weather. He’s lucky because his clients understand that if the weather is bad, he might have to come the following day.

“They want me to be safe, so they don’t get upset,” Telthorst said. “Some will even come out to the airport and pick me up.”

Telthorst also stresses safety. His plane is professionally maintained by an air service that keeps it on a maintenance schedule.

“Things can always happen no matter how well you take care of the airplane, but the first step in safety is routine maintenance,” he said. “You can’t pull over to the side of the road to check something out.”

Telthorst added that it’s important to keep up on pilot training.

“Although many people view flying as a hobby, if you fly as a hobby, I don’t think you would be a safe pilot. You need to view it as second profession.”

An important part of flying is the pre-flight checklist, and when you’re in a hurry to get to a meeting, it would be easy to speed the process along by skipping a few steps. Howell said a friend who’s a Federal Aviation Administration examiner told him if you ever are in a rush to get through the checklist, always think, even if flying by yourself, that your wife and kids are in the back. That will help get your priorities straight again.

Stress Relief
One of the less tangible benefits is that flying provides enjoyment and stress relief, which leads to higher productivity.

“You don’t want to fly stressed out, but if you need to get away, nobody can call you up there,” Bennett said.

Howell agreed. He said flying provides him an outlet for relaxation.

“I can be having the worst day possible, and absolutely forget about everything else other than flying the airplane and looking out windows,” Howell said. “You always see something new.”

It’s a quality of life issue as well, Telthorst said.

“If I can get to my meeting and back in time to have dinner with my family that night, as opposed to spending the night somewhere, which also costs money, I’m that much happier,” Telthorst said.

And if you’re happier, you’re more effective on the job. At least, that’s one rationale. For these guys, getting to fly makes going on all of those business trips more appealing.

“If you’re dreading business trips, you are less apt to go,” LaColla said. “When I go to see prospects, I am more likely to make the sale. With flying, the trip becomes something to look forward to.”

If anything, Howell bemoans the lost years before he learned how to fly.

“I wish that I had done this before,” he said. “Many of the facilities we need to visit are so much easier to get to with my own airplane.”

Ellen Jensen is the managing editor of Kansas City Small Business Monthly magazine.