Building a Legacy

King Air B200 owner creates King Air Academy

Ron McAlister is a guy who should be retired, but he’s working two jobs and loving it.

“I gotta tell ya,” the 62-year-old said, “I’m having a ball.” One of the main reasons he’s having too much fun to stop is that he’s the owner-operator of a King Air B200 – “The King Air is the fifth airplane I’ve owned and there will never be another type.” – and he incorporates the airplane in both jobs.

His day job is as a founding partner with First Trust Portfolios, a financial services firm he helped start in the Chicago area in 1991. His second job is owner of King Air Academy, a training facility in Phoenix that he started in 2013 with Tom Clements and Kevin Carson.

“I was 60 when I started King Air Academy and people were asking, ‘why are you doing that?’ Because I love aviation, I love flying and it’s been such a part of all aspects of my life,” McAlister said. “I’m also a salesman and a business guy, and I like the idea of building a legacy business.”

Through the years, McAlister had reasons to never learn to fly (he was making $24,000 a year with a young family when he started flying lessons) or to quit (he had a heart attack at 55).

“My life is not airplanes, airplanes have been a part of my life that has made it magnificent though,” McAlister said. “The airplane keeps me focused to eat right, to exercise and do the things I need to do to pass my nuclear stress test every year. I consider myself one of the most fortunate guys in the world, I say that with humility and gratitude.”

A lifetime of airplanes

“I was 18 years old when I got engaged, and I didn’t have two nickels to rub together. I told the girl I got engaged to, ‘Someday I’m going to learn to fly. I don’t know how, I don’t know when, but if you have a problem with that, tell me now.’”

She didn’t have a problem with it, and a year later Ron married Donna. They finished college together, and the flying came nearly a decade later after they had started a family.

“I was 26 years old and had a six-month old son; the guy I went to work for had a little Cessna 172. I told him that I’d learn to fly but only when I could afford to buy an airplane. I was working for him for about six months and he came up to me and said, ‘Are you serious about learning to fly?’ He sold me the little 172 and he told me he wouldn’t touch my base salary but I paid a percentage of all the commissions I made until I paid off the plane. I started taking flying lessons every Saturday morning and it took me a year to get my license.”

McAlister, who has an MBA from Illinois State University, began his career as an IBM computer salesman, quickly learning that large companies and computers didn’t light his fire. “Then I got hired by a little bond firm and it became very successful,” McAlister said. “I was an institutional bond salesman there, so I sold fixed income securities to mutual funds and insurance companies and people like that.”

He mostly flew recreationally and not very often, until he traded up to a Beech Sierra. “It was kind of a baby Bonanza, and I got my complex rating, my instrument rating,” McAlister said. “I was a young guy with four kids, so I’d wedge a little time out here and there. Then I got to where I would incorporate the plane in my job by flying to customers. I’d fly out and play golf with them, fly up and play racquetball – in Minneapolis, Des Moines, Cincinnati and New York. But I still wasn’t flying a whole lot.”

His third airplane was a Turbo Saratoga. “It was more of a functional, fast airplane and I started flying more,” McAlister said. “Plus, my son was playing college soccer so I’d fly around and watch him play.”

He graduated to a twin-engine airplane when he and a business partner at First Trust Portfolios purchased a Piper Navajo Chieftain, then he made the decision to get what he considered the ultimate airplane.

“We’ve been unbelievably fortunate in life and I’m not going to leave all the money to the kids, so I think I’m going to buy a King Air,” McAlister told his wife. As always, he said, she was supportive.

Creating King Air Academy

King Air Academy is at Phoenix Deer Valley Airport, 17 miles north of Phoenix. It has two custom-built simulators designed off a base of a King Air 200, as well as a recently purchased King Air B90 for flight training and IPC and BFR check rides.

“We purchased the 1968 B90 from a guy who spent a lot of money on it. For example, engine instruments are typically horizontal across the dash, on this B90 they are vertical like the later models. It’s got new avionics: it has a Garmin 530W and a 430W, an Avidyne EX500 and an STEC-65 autopilot, among other goodies,” McAlister said.

McAlister calls the academy a labor of love.

“My idea with King Air Academy began because I had attended other flight schools and was disappointed by the lack of customer service and the wide variance in curriculum and instructors,” he said.

As a salesman and a businessman, McAlister felt he could create a better experience. His wife agreed, telling him, “I think you should do that.”

“The advantage that I have, with an ongoing business that’s been very good to me, is that this is a passion I have that I can invest money in and I can develop it the way I want to,” he said. “I decided to focus on only one airplane: the King Air. This is only possible because of the long history of King Airs and the sheer volume of pilots flying them. Then I had to surround myself with the best people. That’s where Tom and Kevin come in.

“A successful business needs three things. You need to know your business and the business you’re entering, you need the capital to sustain yourself in that business, and then you need to be able to execute your business plan. Tom Clements brings the knowledge, the curriculum and the expertise; I provide the capital strength and the salesmanship aspect; and Kevin Carson is the guy who makes sure all the things get executed.”

Carson, who runs the day-to-day operation for the King Air Academy, retired early after starting his own software company. He has been flying since he was 16, is King Air qualified, flies his own Beechcraft T-34 in airshows and has his A&P ratings.

Clements, author of “The King Air Book” and a writer for King Air magazine, oversees the academy’s curriculum and mentors its instructors.

“Nobody else has Tom Clements and nobody else has a Tom Clements curriculum that’s been edited and reviewed by the guy who is the highest time King Air pilot in the world,” McAlister said. “What I said that resonated with Tom was that we wanted to be the paramount school in this little niche, in the King Air.
I wanted to develop the best curriculum and training style and Tom related with that because he’s a perfectionist. He’s got a brilliant mind and high energy, and he’s gotten very involved.”

The King Air B200

McAlister bought the 1984 King Air B200 in 2006 and has flown it 1,100 hours.

“I absolutely fell in love with the airplane,” he said. “It’s so reliable and it’s just so functional. It’s the best airplane for me and I don’t see ever flying another type.”

The McAlisters, married 43 years now, have four grown children, eight grandkids and three more on the way. They still live outside Chicago and use the airplane for a mix of business and recreation.

As one of the founding partners of First Trust Portfolios, McAlister is now responsible for the Canadian segment of the business. He flies the King Air to Toronto once or twice monthly.

“I live 10 minutes from DuPage Airport in West Chicago, so I can leave my house at 8:30 in the morning and I’m in the air before 9 o’clock,” McAlister said. “I’m at the Island Airport in downtown Toronto an hour and 45 minutes later. I clear customs and I’m in the office by 1:00 p.m. I work up there and once I’m done, I reverse it and fly home. It saves me time and it makes my job fun.”

He also takes several golf trips annually and spends time at homes in Colorado and Arizona.

“In March, I flew with my wife, our daughter and all her kids to Arizona. There were strollers, bicycles and tricycles. It takes three minivan trips to get it all up to the house and it all fits in the King Air, and we’re all together. It’s just spectacular,” he said.

“Other guys get jet-itis. That holds zero appeal to me,” McAlister said. “The King Air will be the only plane I’ll ever fly. As far as overall airplane, as far as how it’s built – the King Air is the King of its class.”