Page 11 - January 2022

“... as you grow, you build relationships and see opportunities.”
Stockton said they opted for a philosophy of operating at least three aircraft of the same make and model to improve efficiency and ensure safety.
“For years we only did on-demand charter and that’s still a huge piece of our business,” he said. “But as you grow, you build relationships and see opportunities.”
Among those opportunities was operating flights for app-based air travel membership services considered the “uber of private aviation,” including Surf Air and the former JetSmarter (acquired in 2019 by XOJet, now XO).
“Instead of flying an aircraft maybe six hours for a weekend golf trip, we could fly an airplane six hours a day or more with scheduled service,” Stockton said. “We were flying West Coast routes and it was adding up to about 40 hours of flying a week consistently. Having that kind of set amount of flying was interesting to us as a company because it allowed us to go and get more aircraft. We could sit in front of an aircraft owner and show them how much we could use their plane.”
That led to another big step for Advanced Air.
“We were limited to four and a half round trips per week between city pairings unless we got our Commuter Air Carrier authorization from the DOT,” he said. “So we went through that process and became a commuter airline, and now we can operate between city pairings as many times as we want.”
KING AIR MAGAZINE • 9
JANUARY 2022