Travelling with children is stressful, but travelling with your beloved furry friends can be even more of an ordeal.
The only place your pet can travel is in the cargo hold.
An environment that’s cold, loud and extremely frightening.
Let’s not forget the extra time required to drop your pet off to the carrier, and the stress of hoping they put your beloved dog or cat onto the correct aircraft.
We’re the first to admit, we do go hard on the airlines.
They do a great job, and we’re so lucky in Australia to have one of the safest regulatory conditions in the world which results in far fewer incidents compared elsewhere.
But our job is to show those who need to fly from A to B, whether that be Melbourne to Sydney, or Moree to Swan Hill, that there is a better way.
You see, the airlines have a task to run their jets to a schedule, where you’re no more important than the other 150+ passengers flying with you.
And they can’t fly everywhere, all the time.
This is why private aviation is such a fast-growing market in Australia. Granted, it has taken a pandemic and associated severe travel disruption to show individuals who are in a financial position that there are economical ways to experience the benefits of chartering a private jet.
Thankfully, though, we’re often provided with free marketing by the actions of airlines.
Stranded passengers, lost luggage, long queues in security, non-responsive customer service, and business travellers sitting on the floor in overcrowded lounges are voiced frequently via social media.
How the airlines ruined Will’s day
For our Access cardholder, Will, a third-generation farmer, trying to get from A to B was a horrid experience.
Two commercial flights from major airports plus a further 3 hours to his final destination by road, was a task that Will never looked forward to.
It only took one of the flights to be delayed or cancelled, and his whole day was ruined, with limited options to reschedule on the day.
A travel solution that’s all about you
Now, having the ability to book a jet to suit his schedule, along a more direct route has completely changed the way that Will does business. Will can depart from his urban airport, saving time by travelling directly to where he needs to be.
A quick trip to inspect a new facility or investment can be achieved with a level of convenience never experienced before.
The added bonus that his dedicated travel specialist knows what paper he likes to read and the food he likes to eat onboard makes Will’s entire travel experience a joy, and something he actually looks forward to.
For Will, the journey is now as important as the destination.
Ever wondered how brokers and operators set their price when you book a private jet?
In most cases they determine the total flight time from the jet’s home base, to your location, to your destination and finally back to the jet’s home base.
Simple enough?
But for our card holder, Will, being located away from the major cities meant he was paying significantly more to have a jet position empty to pick him up.
Will would pay for 5 hours of flying for his 2 hour flight. He only tried charter once before deciding the cost couldn’t be justified.
An Australian-first, Will is only billed for the time he is on the Cessna Citation Mustang, our program aircraft. He doesn’t pay empty positioning fees.
Airly achieves this via a network approach with over 30 card holders requesting flights in all directions. The operations team can then allocate a jet to pickup multiple card holder flights.
The efficient network means there’s less ‘waste’ (empty flying) and provides a very compelling price structure for its card holders.
So how does the program stack up versus charter?
Not only do we transform your A to B, we make it cost effective.
Card holders who felt they’d fly private once or twice a year are now flying every month.
Several never thought they’d fly private, and now they experience it multiple times a year.
Requiring under 1,000 metres of sealed runway to safely take off and land opens a new world to our card holders.
At the time of writing, the program coverage area provides safe access to 130+ airports in South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, Australia Capital Territory, New South Wales and Queensland.
It was this facet of the program that was so important to our card holder Will.
He is able to take off from an airport much closer to home, and land at an airport far closer to his final destination.
Not only does this save Will time, it is far more convenient removing the fatigue of multi leg trips he previously experienced.
So whether you’re flying Tumut to Taree, or Echuca to Emerald, the Mustang will get you there.
Will has a strong heritage in agriculture. A third generation farmer who’s seen it all.
Droughts and floods, through to the ups and downs of international trade.
Growing up as a kid, Will’s father was in charge of the family farming businesses. His father would spend weeks away from home travelling between farms, warehouses and sites.
And although his father would have loved to be in one place with the family, the conditions weren’t always perfect for crops so one location turned into three across multiple states.
The little family business grew quickly into a successful operation in numerous facets of agriculture.
When Will began working in the business, he would spend days on the road with his Dad. Great for bonding but horrible for efficiency.
As a father and son team, the fatigue and stress of travel took its toll over the decades of driving.
He knew the business wouldn’t reach its true potential unless the travel side of things became more efficient.
Will soon became familiar with chartering aircraft through his network in an attempt to eliminate long drives.
The time saving was profound, but it still felt disjointed, confusing and not having any jets based at his home airport ended up costing much more than he expected having to pay positioning fees.
Will reached out to us and signed up on the same day.
The biggest benefit of this program was Will didn’t have to pay the positioning fees, making private aviation far more cost effective for the business.
Prior to joining, Will’s day of travel from Regional VIC to Central QLD would take 2 commercial flights and 3 hours in the car.
We now safely get William and his team from A to B in 2 hours.
1st of June marked the first birthday of our Access by Airly program, the first of its kind in Australia.
Access by Airly was created by the founding team following constant feedback that customers wanted a pricing approach like the US and Europe: where you don’t have to pay for empty positioning.
We one upped that request by bringing in a level of simplicity and reliability not seen in the market locally.
Things started slowly, like all new business models.
The first 12 months
We launched 1 June, in the middle of a global pandemic with states closing and opening borders like a revolving door.
Regions were locked down making intrastate travel difficult, let alone interstate, great timing!
Our first card holder, Victoria, got the ball rolling making the most of weekends away at the snow.
Within six months we had 19 card holders and reached our first milestone of 100 card hours.
Fast forward to today, we’re proud to have 30 card holders. We’ve booked 200+ demand hours and our operating partner increased their fleet size from 3 to 6 Citation Mustangs to keep up with demand.
It’s been a battle, it’s been stressful, but it’s so rewarding to see how we impact the lives of our card holders.
Keeping their loved ones safe, getting them where they need to be on time, and transforming what used to be a day on the road into a 2 hour flight.
Big improvements are in the works – but for today (albeit a week late), cheers to you.
Sign-up fees are common with private jet programs in the United States, but the concept is less common or proven in Australia. This article helps explain what it is, why we have it in place, and how it enables our value-driven occupied hourly rate.
Our Access by Airlyprogram comes with an annual fee of $9,950 for two card holders.
For those who aren’t familiar with private, or perhaps have only chartered once or twice in the past, this can feel like quite a charge for no immediate product or service.
The reason the annual fee exists is to help smooth and flatten the fixed costs involved in operating, positioning, and making available six premium Cessna Citation Mustang jets for card holders. This enables us to deliver a consistent and low occupied hourly rate by reducing and removing unexpected operating costs caused by factors such as repositioning, holding, taxiing, and delays.
Additionally, the annual fee contributes to ensuring the highest quality service providers, operators, pilots, building an incredible team, and being able to update our platform on a regular basis.
So when real-world Access cardholder George was in the process of signing up, he also had some reservations about the annual fee. However, the fact that he was planning to fly 5-8 times a year made the cost savings compelling.
How soon did George make back his annual fee in savings?
Despite traveling mostly for business, George first utilised his Access by Airly card in taking his family to Byron Bay for a five-night holiday.
To charter, it would have cost him $20,500 return for a similar size jet.
Under Access by Airly, George paid $10,387 return, immediately saving him more than the annual fee he paid.
On average, our card holders make their annual fee back by the second or third trip – and that’s not including all the additional value the program provides outside of competitive flight pricing:
Six jets available to you on the east coast – no other provider can provide such coverage;
The most consumer-friendly booking, cancellation, and change terms;
Each month the Department of Infrastructure (their actual title is much much longer) releases data on the aviation industry.
And one report we enjoy reading is the Domestic airline on time performance report.
The Department measure the departure, arrival and cancellation performance of the major airlines along all domestic routes. This gives us key insight as to why we keep receiving phone calls from potential card holders like George.
Pre covid, when Sydney – Melbourne was one of the busiest air routes in the world we witnessed under half of all flights actually arrive on time (scheduled arrival time + or – 15 minutes).
But we felt that’s unfair looking that far back, so we decided to take a look at the January 2022 performance between Melbourne and Sydney, the results didn’t disappoint.
So how did the airlines perform in January 2022?
Even in January 2022, when the airlines desperately wanted your custom, they could barely get you into Sydney on time, cancelling a quarter of flights.
It’s horrid performances like this that destroyed our card holder, George‘s, schedule.
He wanted to fly to Sydney from Melbourne in the morning and hit the ground running meeting as many partners, investors and clients as possible without the need to spend the night away.
And when he was one of the 25% on average having their flight cancelled, his precise schedule was thrown into chaos.
If you travel frequently, even a couple of times a year, George’s story will be very familiar.
A busy self-made entrepreneur with a young family, George needs to travel for his business and put faith in the airlines as flying by private jet felt a little out of reach.
Like all of us, George was up at 4AM to catch the first flight to Sydney.
Trading the good morning cuddles from his kids for the lonely drive to the airport.
Knowing he would miss school drop offs for queuing with random travellers piling into the same plane.
His plan of attack once on the ground in Sydney was precise and had little margin for error.
Only while enroute to be sent an SMS by his airline that the flight to Sydney was cancelled.
That’s it, no “here’s what we’ll do to fix things”, just a recommendation to call the offshore call centre.
George’s day is now destroyed, meetings need to be pushed where possible and and then there’s the hassle and stress rebooking onto a later flight.
This is how the airlines treat their customers.
The very lifeblood that keeps them in the air, are their largest inconvenience.
A product that revolves around you, a company that adores its card holders.
George could book a four seat light jet, with as little as a few hours notice and know exactly what the cost was going to be via the fixed occupied hourly pricing.
He could now arrive into a private lounge 15 minutes prior to departure. No security, no queues, no hassles. Compared to the chaotic airport lounges, the Fixed Base Operator’s lounge was eerily quiet.
A safe, clean, and reliable jet paired with healthy gourmet catering meant George could hit the ground running, meet those prospects, and close more deals.
And the best part?
George could now get those good morning cuddles, leave his home in Brighton at 7AM for a 7:20AM wheels up out of Moorabbin and arrive at his first meeting in Sydney’s CBD by 9:15AM.
It gets better.
By the end of his busy day, George’s jet will be ready to fly him home in time for dinner.
Imagine having a travel platform that works to your schedule, not someone else’s.
Paying by Amex and Crypto, all of George’s flights are 100% carbon offset as part of his hourly rate.
Time is money, can you afford to be left behind by the airlines?
A neat, comfortable and super cost effective modern twin engine jet, for what it lacks in size it definitely makes up for in design.
When Cessna went to the drawing board back in 2002 they had a clear focus on the Mustang being that smaller family SUV.
One that could take the family to smaller airports but not restrict everyone to one piece of hand luggage each.
One of the design breakthroughs wasn’t in the cabin itself.
Found in the rear luggage compartment, Cessna specifically designed a 191cm long, rectangular tube dubbed the ‘Ski Tube’.
Connected to to the larger luggage hold, this ski tube allows passengers to take their skis, snowboards, golf clubs and even surfboards with them.
So we put the ski tube to the test. Rhys – one of our card holder’s favourite pilots sent us this video.
So this brings us back to Victoria. For those who don’t know, Victoria is part of our ACCESS by Airly program.
We transformed her A to B with the assistance of the ski tube.
Victoria would fly by private jet from Sydney to Cooma (then VIP chauffeur to the ski slopes) and was able to bring her skis saving money and plenty of hassles at the other end.
