General Aviation

Building a Positive Aviation Future

June 16, 2014 by Scott Spangler

At American airports these days is hard to find a good word from pilots about their aviation future. After covering the 57th Sonex Aircraft Builder’s Workshop at the company’s Oshkosh, Wisconsin, hangars it seems clear I’ve been looking in all the wrong places and talking to the wrong people.

From as far away at Guam, the Netherlands, and the four compass quadrants of America, 21 people attended the workshop, and 14 of them brought guests—wives, sons, brothers, and building buddies—who attend the workshop free of charge and learn metal working by building an abbreviated metal wing section.

Most were first-time builders. Some already had Sonex kits at home, awaiting the courage the new workshop skills would give them to open the boxes. Others were still deciding on the model that best met their needs, and their future flights guided their decision making.

Most remarkable is that not once did I hear a work-shopper complain about anything aviation related. And all of them, except for one who was a student in training, were pilots. The closest one of them came was criticism of his own work; “I can do better,” he said.

Can’t we all.

Are US Investors Trying to Tell GA Something?

October 14, 2013 by Scott Spangler

Time will ultimately confirm or deny the recent rumors that the Chinese will become the controlling investor in another venerable American manufacturer of general aviation aircraft. Looking at this possibility from another vantage point … is the US business community trying to tell the general aviation industry something by their lack of interest and financial participation?

Their action, or lack of it, speaks volumes. Given the pragmatic bottom-line focus of business and those who invest in them, clearly American investors see little or no return in GA. Ruminating on why this may be offers several possibilities that pose questions about the industry itself, and about the changing focus of American business.

On the industry side there is supply and demand: Interest in flying and aircraft ownership has been in decline for some time. Part of this is surely the result of social change and the willingness of each succeeding generation of Americans to invest the time and money to participate in what captures their attention and interest. An iPhone is easier to master—and is more useful—than learning to fly. GA is not the only one suffering here: today fewer American teenagers get a driver’s license.

The Slow Death of a Great Brand

November 7, 2012 by Robert Mark

One of the first things I learned as a graduate student at Northwestern’s Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) program 20 years ago and years later as a teacher in that same program was the value of a brand. Managing a brand is so important people earning college degrees focused entirely on how to protect this important asset. A brand like McDonald’s is much more than its golden arches however, as Apple’s is more than its intriguing white fruit logo.

While a brand is really an intangible, its value to any successful company is immense. In the most simple of terms, a brand is really all about a company’s reputation in the marketplace. How reliable are its products? How clever are employees at developing fresh solutions to old problems? Just as important is the faith a corporation’s name conjures in the minds of consumers ready to hand over their money. Would iPod’s have become household words if Apple had turned their back on customers when a unit failed? Not a chance. A brand then is everything a company does that makes consumers return for more … the employees, the products, the service. Screw any of these up and the brand’s in peril.

Case in Point

Hawker Beechcraft’s troubles aren’t new since the 90-year old aircraft builder’s been wallowing in Chapter 11 bankruptcy since May. No surprise that investors Goldman Sachs and Onex wanted out after struggling with HBC’s $2.5 billion debt, but when the Chinese deal with Superior Aviation fell apart a few weeks ago, on the eve of the industry’s biggest show at NBAA in Orlando, Hawker was trapped between a rock and a hard spot. [Read more…] about The Slow Death of a Great Brand

The FAA and its Centers of Excellence

October 15, 2012 by Scott Spangler

Those with a proclivity for cynicism might judge this headline an oxymoron equal to military intelligence. But before you snigger and stop reading, consider this: under its Center of Excellence banner, the FAA has selected a team of universities with renowned aviation programs to conduct general aviation research and test things that will enhance its safety, accessibility, and sustainability into the future.

No idle, unpaid for political promise, the FAA will invest at least $500,000 a year for the first half of the COE’s 10-year run. And this is not the only—or inaugural—COE. The FAA established the first GA Center of Excellence in 2001. During its decade run its participating universities researched and tested pilot training, human factors, ADS-B, remote airport lighting, and other facets of GA. And the FAA has established other COEs dedicated to other aspects of aerospace endeavors.

Bragging Rights & The Future of Flight

September 8, 2012 by Scott Spangler

Here in Wisconsin, a swing state, we have been incessantly pummeled by political ads of both parties. This onslaught has been painfully punctuated almost daily by political surveys whose questions do little more than support the delusions of the person who paid for it. Add two weeks of intellectual drown proofing in the tsunami of lies and half-truths taken out of context that emanated from the thankfully ended conventions, and it’s hard to have a good mental outlook about anything, let alone aviation.

Try as I might, I could not escape the tentacles of cynical aviation apathy, the feeling that there was no place in aviation for people like me. This metaphysical predator ambushed me in, of all places, the travel section of the New York Times. The headline says it all: Space Tourism is Here! Wealthy Adventurers Wanted.

Reading about all the ways rich people can get into space was interesting. Yes, there’s some training involved, but in the article it seemed secondary to wining and dining with their economic peers at something akin to an aerospace spa. In the end, what matters more than acquiring a skill is the bragging rights, which is what they are really paying for.

What pulled me under was the realization that, for the most part, rich people don’t invest the time and effort needed to truly accomplish something hard, like climbing Mount Everest or flying a plane. They hire someone to take them there by the hand or in the back seat. This confirmed a dark notion that’s been lurking in my subconscious, unless we revive the middle class and restore the economic vigor it exercised three or four decades ago, general aviation as we’ve known it is doomed.

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