Make Mooney great again !
What’s a TC for an aircraft which drove its holder into bankruptcy not only once but several times worth anyway? Giving it to the parts producer would at least enable him to occasionally assemble and sell a whole airplane if someone turns up and hands him enough money to at least make no loss. The days of a production line seem to be over forever.
Arne wrote:
Some news out of Kerrville
https://www.mooney.com/
Somebody’s been reading EuroGA. Or just GA.
Ugh. Must be one of the worst ways to put a message on a website. A very, very, very wide bitmap image, that gets scaled down to window width (so maximum screen width). For a wall of text. Instead of, you know, actual text. That will wrap depending on your browser’s size, obey your zoom settings, etc.
It appears that some people who are actually Mooney owners and have been involved for a long time have organized themselves and taken over. Apparently also Don Maxwell is involved in this as well as many other well known Mooney personalities.
I guess now we shall see how this turns out. The skill and knowledge sure is there.
A couple more details.
From what can be seen and what is heard in the grapevine, this rescue of Mooney from the Chinese investors was orchestrated by people within the Mooney community. They hold 80% of the company, with 20% remaining with the previous owner.
It also appears that current CEO Jonny Pollack has been involved with Mooney since January this year already, basically running the company from the background and making sure parts would be supplied to the fleet. It also emerges, that prominent support comes from Don Maxwell as well as others, who are either involved directly or in a supporting role.
What makes this different appears to be the intermediate goals the new ownership looks at. Producing airplanes looks like something they are looking at for later, possibly much later. Initially, they want Mooney to remain a parts supplier first plus they are working on much needed and asked for improvements and upgrades to the existing fleet. Those improvements will be targeting primarily the current Modell line of Ovations and Acclaims, but apparently will be at least in part also available for the remainder of the fleet. On the agenda are G1000 upgrades for legacy devices (of which ADSB adaptation has just been certified by the FAA) as well as upgrades to NXI as well as structural upgrades targeting towards gross-weight and payload increase those planes desperately need.
Seeing that quite a lot of demands by current owners are being looked at, it looks as if Mooney will also try to consolidate part sourcing as well as possibly popular STC’s under their OEM possibilities. Seeing that some STC holders may well reach ages where they can no longer provide parts and keep their STC’s alive, this makes a whole lot of sense.
The way it is written in various articles, the new ownership seems to be quite realistic about what they can do in the short term and what not. It is also quite obvious that the new ownership will be very much active in restoring the faith and connecting with the Mooney community looking for other possibilities than the ones mentioned above to provide sellable and profitable upgrades and go the way that community as been talking about for years. Whereas payload increases and goodies such as carbon fiber cowls e.t.c. are concerned, it is quite likely they will become hugely popular with the existing fleet. Also many Mooney owners have been frustrated about the inability to upgrade their G1000 installations, something which now will be addressed and a first certification has been reached.
Mooney is becoming Bellanca… which did essentially the same thing in Minnesota in the 80s. A natural enough progression until the passionate owners age out one day. There will regardless be a parts and service business for a long time, and I’d guess they’ll make a few planes to order.
Also important: ballistic parachutes are no longer a taboo.
Silvaire wrote:
A natural enough progression until the passionate owners age out one day.
What I notice in mooneyspace is that there is a LOT of youngsters who pick up a vintage model on the cheap and fly them with enthusiasm. It’s quite easy to see why, they are 140-150 kt airplanes (up to 160 with mods) at the running cost of a PA28 but 30-40 kts faster. Some of those upgrade after a few years to a J or even larger models, some of which are quite attractively priced. So actually, the Mooney owner base has got quite a few youngsters in it. There are a couple of them on youtube too.
Silvaire wrote:
There will regardless be a parts and service business for a long time, and I’d guess they’ll make a few planes to order.
I wonder in which direction they want to go. It strongly depends on who is on that board and I guess we will get the answer to some of these things eventually.
Fact is that Mooney did not do themselves a favour when they dumped the entry models, which at the time was the J. A make whose two models are in the 600-800k range simply have not got the entry level market Cirrus for example has with the SR20. Not that it matters how much of those they sell, that they are there is a huge psychological hurdle.
If I was on that board, I would set myself the challenge to make an entry level Mooney M20 with existing tools and materials which blows the price barrier and gets attractive for those shopping for a 300-400k airplane. 160 kts, 4 seater, 8 GPH, 250-300 kg payload at full, basically a J model with todays avionics which may well be the Dynon certified sets and of course the shute as at least an option. And then get the Ovation and Acclaim a decent payload and reduce the production cost to achieve a price which people can relate to.
As a second source of income I’d offer refurbishment of existing airframes to the new standards, 2 doors, modern avionics, redo of the cabin and deliver them better than new. This could well work from the J model on upwards. I could even imagine they could do upgrade programs on the vintage models to simply include all the available goodies, 201 aerodynamics and some other upgrades. Fabricate the kits and do it in house.
Well, this is one chance to see if the combined wisdom on how to run that company which has been expressed in their user forum will actually work. I hope so.
It looks to me that they are going along similar lines to many of the successful UK classic car clubs such as the MG Owners Club and the Jaguar drivers club where it is not the intention to be a manufacturer but very successfully keep the marque going and facilitate the renovation and in some cases their modernisation through the remanufacture of difficult to get parts etc. I believe the MG owners club has some 20k + members and has a very profitable parts section
