Super Bowl LX comes to San Francisco this weekend, and that means scores of wealthy football fans arriving by private jet.
For Andrew Collins, CEO of private jet provider Flexjet, it’s one of the busiest times of year and comes with its own set of challenges.
It “is really time-sensitive because you don’t know who’s going to be in the Super Bowl until almost the last minute,” Collins told Business Insider in an interview.
The deciding conference championships happen two weeks before the big event. Sunday’s Super Bowl will see the New England Patriots take on the Seattle Seahawks at Levi’s Stadium in the Bay Area.
Collins himself, a Patriots fan, said his son is “a little bummed out” because they were close to going, but “then my schedule sort of precluded it.”
Flexjet offers fractional ownership, allowing customers to buy a share of an aircraft based on how often they want to fly it.
The Super Bowl is one of just a handful of days when customers need to give longer notice to fly, which Flexjet calls “published peak days,” Collins said. Instead of a typical 10-hour notification, it would be as long as 72 hours.
Flexjet reports that its flight requests are pacing ahead of last year’s Super Bowl in New Orleans. It’s also operating nearly 30% more flights into the Bay Area compared to the same week last year
San Jose Mineta International Airport, a five-mile drive from Levi’s Stadium, said it expects more than 230 additional commercial flights this week.
But private fliers use fixed-base operators: dedicated private terminals, often luxurious, that also provide other services such as refuelling.
Compared to the commercial side of airports, they also tend to be “much more fluid and dynamic” during big events, Collins said. “So they will charge special amenities and things like that, that can get very high.”
At San Jose Mineta International, FBOs are charging special-event fees ranging from $3,675 for a single-prop plane to $28,810 for a Gulfstream G650.
“It has been a fact of life for the past few years, especially,” Collins added, of the event fees. He put this down to two things: the rising popularity of private aviation, and the acquisition of more FBOs by private equity firms.
Flexjet is also adding a pop-up private terminal at Oakland Airport with its own lounge.
Congestion in the skies
Flying private might help well-heeled sports fans avoid the crowds in airport terminals, but, just like roads during a big event, the sky also gets congested.
Due to the expected high traffic, the Federal Aviation Administration has implemented special procedures at 17 Bay Area airports to enhance safety and minimize delays. These include extended air traffic control operating hours and restrictions on the number of flights.
For private-jet operators like Flexjet, ensuring flights run smoothly often comes down to who you know.
“In order to do large events like that, you have to have a very robust set of relationships,” said Collins. “We have significant formal and informal relationships across airports and across fixed-based operators.”
As the firm plans its schedules and customers book flights, these contacts can help point them in the right direction.
“They might shift you in terms of, you might want to think about having somebody come in at this point versus this point because the traffic flow is going to be easier,” Collins said.
Planning flights already involves several variables, but big events add more factors to consider: From the surrounding infrastructure to special event fees and slot programs. Flexjet’s operations team spends months planning for big events, and works around the clock from its control center in Cleveland.
“It can be the Super Bowl, it can be an F1 race. It can be that slots are really in demand and limited parking. It could be weather,” Collins told Business Insider.
“There are a lot of things, but you have to be ready for that,” he added. “You have to be planning in as many ways as possible and as proactively as you can.”
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