Why is there no entrepreneurial mojo when it comes to owner flown in Europe?

One other reason is probably that many European businesswomen and -men are more conservative than many American ones. To lease or finance a business airplane would be considered obscene by many founders/owners of smaller companies.

If I take my own company (54 employees) as an example: Never would I give up our (100%) financial independence from banks for an airplane. I could take out the money for a nice used Meridian, but our strategy is to re-invest 50% of our profits in the company to make it stronger every year. Such an airplane would be “nice to have” for me, but it’s nothing that would make our company stronger. We also don’t really have the missions, or we don’t have them often enough. In general I don’t like it when company owners start financing their hobbies this way.

Also: With the Cirrus (more airplane then I dreamed to have for many years) I can use the glider field (grass) next to our company when the weather is good enough, with a SET I’d have to use the big airport 60 km away, € 200 landing fee …

Not all businesses operate on the “race to the bottom” concept in terms of price, like the major retailers Walmart, Aldi, Lidl. Apple, Oracle, Jeppesen, Volkswagen are just a few examples. The degree of competition is a function of the market and competition. Volkswagen is a good example of a company that leads their market but is far from the cheapest. It is still possible today to make a profitable business by offering a quality product with high service levels and creating a strong customer loyalty and/or desire to buy. Many complain about Apple, but swallow the bullet and buy their products anyway. So I don’t buy the low-margin, strong competition argument.

Certainly, the geographic and demographics is different from the USA, with so many countries, languages, and customs/attitudes about this as has been mentioned. So the particular product and its market play a significant role in the attractiveness of GA private/business aviation. Eg. There is a businessman that operates a DA42 out of my local grass strip, on business. He has operations in several countries, including the Czech Republic, and benefits from the ability to make direct flights (with staff) to airfields near them.

I agree with the comments about all the useful airports (IFR approaches, long opening hours) having excessive charges for most small piston aircraft. Not only are small business operations excessively expensive without the needed flexibility, the costs to obtain and maintain an IFR rating, for example, are prohibitive. For example, 2 practice approaches (ILS, RNAV) and 1 landing at LSZR in a C172 with 2 POB costs about €135/£115. The airfield is also closed from 1200-1330. This is not good value for money. I think profitable businesses have the money to use GA, but there needs to be value. Many airfields in Europe that would be useful for business GA don’t understand this concept. Many of the smaller airfields do, but business GA is not their market, or they don’t see the market as worth the effort which is the catch-22.

Vince

A number of good points already made.

However the most fundamental is that you must in nearly all cases conceal that you fly a plane, from your customers. This is any plane, not just a TBM but also a PA28. You don’t need to conceal it from your suppliers, obviously, but there is much less need to meet up with suppliers (they come to you, generally). I have a big customer who I used to fly to, and they knew I flew there (it was an 8hr drive, or a 1.5hr flight) but I told them I just rent it for the day. Today, they are a big political company and I would not dare try it again. Also the airport is VFR-only and among lots of hills…

GA does work at the top end of business where you are dealing with individuals who naturally talk in millions, or visiting clients who positively need you (e.g. you are lending them money). But that is just the tip of the iceberg of GA applications, and it happens already, and for this scenario it is a tool which works well.

Another factor is that most destinations are obviously in cities and Europe has generally poor support for GA access to major cities. There is no GA access to London or Paris for example (you need IFR for a decent despatch rate – not turning up is not an option when doing real customer visits). Biggin Hill is a very long way from “London” because the road traffic situation is so awful. Munich is Auchsburg which is quite a drive. At the bizjet end this is less of a problem because a €500 landing fee is readily accepted but then you need a long runway which rules out the use of the jet as a fun flying thing, and most people don’t want to keep two planes.

The weather difference is nonsense. The US has as vicious weather systems as any part of Europe ever gets.

There is also a long term cultural change in Europe. I don’t know if this is true in the USA but the old “travelling salesman” is a largely extinct animal. These men and women used to fill up the motorways in their Ford Granadas, costing the company some 50k a year (in 1970s money) plus the cost of lunching customers. I go back in business to 1978 and back them they were common, but today they are probably down to 1% of the 1978 numbers. Most companies who are sellers regard them as a waste of money, and most companies who buy stuff (well those who are well organised) have their employees working their balls off all day long and under a lot of stress and nobody has the time to get taken out for a 3hr lunch and come back to the office p1ssed. Even in France where a bottle of wine for lunch used to be common, it is less so today. Business is much less based around personal relationships – the traditional travelling salesman playground – and instead is done by email and phone and is very competitive. This cultural change has most likely much reduced the need to travel to customers, because the customer mostly couldn’t care less whether they ever see your face.

GA travel still exists as a good option in the right scenario, which will typically be between cities served by ILS airports.

OR it works well for “business travel” which is not really business travel i.e. visiting suppliers, distributors, business associates, exhibitions. Most of these, you don’t need to turn up on time or at all. It is still tax allowable business travel but it isn’t visiting customers. This is a crucial distinction without which a discussion of “business travel” is disingenuous. I could fly to visit an electronics exhibition in Berlin (lots of them there for some reason) or even in Greece, all tax allowable, but that isn’t business travel.

AdamFrisch wrote:

I think many are missing a trick if they think a business can be run via email only.

Very true in many (though not all) lines of business. A notable counterexample is businesses delivering their product/service by email, too.
It may also be true on the customer side – in some countries (e.g. Czech Republic), coming in person typically ensures a quicker and better service than arranging things over the phone. Email is only marginally better than phone.

I’ve also noticed that people in Europe (and in particular Germany) are much more likely to prefer ‘big’ business done in person than US consumers or businesses. On that basis alone and not withstanding all the other factors, I think aircraft would be quite useful for business in Central Europe – where in my experience people prefer face to face contact and relationships.

In the US, I think people fly for business because it’s fun, and a perk that comes with successfully starting and/or running a successful company. On that basis, I think it’s great, an effective way for a society to reward those who are dong the most useful work. On every other basis, I’m not convinced that US business aviation is aligned with the 21st century, except of course in particular circumstances like a manufacturing plant in a remote area with a nearby GA airport. Commodity purchases are going in the other direction and I think that’s the way to go: one example of aN effective US commodity purchase might be my recent US new car buy which was done entirely remotely, on a particular VIN number car that I’d identified on line before making contact. Then after a couple of emails, one 2 or 3 minute phone call for the final price negotiation. A day later I picked it up at a dealer about 120 miles from home, but the price and deliverables were already finalized and I spent only about an hour there including the test drive. I’ll never go back to that dealer with the car, likely never speak to the individuals who sold me the car again, and I doubt they’d remember me after a couple of weeks. Assuming I have no warranty issues the (Japanese) car likely won’t go to any dealer during my period of ownership. I have little interest in service, I want consistency and reliability that eliminates the need for service and/or simplicity that allows me to do whatever I may need quickly, without assistance.

Same thing for US home loans and refinances, I never meet the banker in person and sometimes never speak to them on the phone – it’s just a numbers game. Big purchases in 2017 USA get done by the most time and cost efficient method, not in person. I think that is less true in Europe.

In my US hobbies (e.g, aircraft) as opposed to commodity items like a car I do things on a lot more relationship based basis, pay cash, mostly deal with friends etc. but there’s relatively little money changing hands.

Yes, @Alexis I have written of direct experiences, either personal or that of immediate family and close friends.

Why conceal flying a plane, Peter? Try it the other way around and see what would happen – I bet you wouldn’t lose any customers at all. You might even gain some, because you can meet them, or perhaps deliver a part much quicker than anyone else.

A fair point. It depends on how “balanced” is the relationship between you and the customer you are visiting. Despite all the politicaly correct corporate bullsh1t statements emanating from big companies, I find that business is becoming less balanced in Europe (only about 20-30% of my sales go to the USA, and most are handled by a distributor out there) and big companies prefer to screw their small suppliers. Preferably all their suppliers, but they can’t quite screw the big ones.

But then I have always had a small business and thus selling mostly to much bigger firms.

Sometimes, showing you are successful does work well. The cases I have seen were ones where a salesman was visiting individuals with multi million net worth. This worked in finance and some hard-sell retail areas. A very successful solar heating salesman used to drive up in a Porsche, back in the days when a Porsche was worth something; now my 24 year old son has one

And you traveling to an electronics exhibition most certainly is business travel in my book.

Of course it is, in terms of a deductible business expense, and I am sure a lot of this does go on in Europe. I do almost none these days because I have better things to do than travel to exhibitions and most of them are not in places where a visit would be useful for seeing the place generally. I could get any number of flights to Birmingham “on the firm” if I wanted to

Not all businesses operate on the “race to the bottom” concept in terms of price, like the major retailers Walmart, Aldi, Lidl. Apple, Oracle, Jeppesen, Volkswagen are just a few examples.

You may be surprised that Lidl operates more business jets per employee than Volkswagen… Obviously the profit margin of the products sold is not directly related to the requirement for business aircraft.

AdamFrisch wrote:

I just disagree that businesses will always gravitate towards the lowest price.

Adam, you clearly have been away from Europe too long to remember, and then again, maybe your memories are of countries which are not part of the big austerity campaign which as crippled our lifes here since ever I can think back.

Let’s put it this way Adam: In Europe for many people it is the “good tone” to do so. Stinginess and cheapo deals are VERY much in fashion with a lot of folks, either out of economical necessity but much more often out of “fashion”. Heck whole governments behave like that and they do set the trend, austerity and spartan living is what they propagate and often enough enforce. Consequently, a lot of people get into an economic depression, that is they think they can’t afford anything at all anymore and become much more strict in their economy like they are actually capable of. Going to Aldi and Lidl used to be sneered at when they first opened, today they are full of people and the shops who used to be the top discounters in Switzerland for instance have lost half of their daily business and can only survive because of the larger sortiment.

Economical crisis and success are very often liked to crisis of confidence. Look at the stock market, it hardly ever behaves rationally at all and that is what then sets in motion the economical downspiral when everyone has the fear of being caught short on money, so people stop doing things.

Clearly, there are enough people who do not need to do that, and clearly there are some who don’t and who will buy expensive luxury goods like the watch industry provides or expensive motorcars, yachts and planes. But this is a small part of the population and those clearly do not care or moreover don’t NEED to care what their customers or neighbours think.

But in large parts of Europe the majority of the population live in self-imposed neighbourhood watch, where every detail of what neighbours do is scrutinized and badmouthed. And that extends to business as well as the workplace too. People don’t talk at all about what they have or what they do, much less about what they earn, which made it easy for years to keep salaries low as there was no comparison. And there is a huge rift between those who will confidently spend money and those who are on either neccessary or self-imposed austerity regimes, which also is massively provoked by the media.

In short, for a huge part of the pouplation particularly in German speaking lands, successful people are watched with suspicion, envy and often even hatred. Which then results in stuff like citizen uprisings against airfields (because that is where the filthy rich play) and other such things. Ignorance paired with carefully steered envy and hate mongering by many for whom an austere and in-fighting population is an interest.

If whole governments start complaining and crying to their tax payers that they are next to bancruptcy, sack employees, downsize as if there is no tomorrow, behave as if they can’t pay the next rent for the buldings they actually own and so on, no wonder the population grows uneasy and thinks that doom is all around. That these countries actually make huge tax surplusses (in other words profits) none of which go back to the taxpayer is largely unnoticed.

Biz Jets in Europe are viewed by most people as rich kids toys, totally disregarding the fact that a huge part of biz jet travel is purely business. What people do see is people like show stars and generally despised show offs from reality shows travelling with those things and that is the impression that is imposed on people, as wrong as it may be. Small GA is shunned because of noise, because of the people who can do when in the eyes of their neighbours they should not, because there is a totally wrong image presented again by interest groups of billionair hobby. The same goes for boating, yachting in particular, Golf, and so on. Politicians help this along, either because they are such leftist folks who actually believe this or because of other agendas. A scared and uneasy population is easier to fool and to coax into the direction of extremist views than those who feel confident and self-assured.

It all comes to the mindset which has been my “favorite” joke for decades about the European and American fathers with their boys at the boat show. America has always been the “can do” country whereas most of Europe has been the “How dare you” and “Who do you think you are” place. Before the slogan “Yes we can” became what it had 9 years ago, it was what most people saw America as, while Europe is the “No you can not!” place. This will not change, certainly not unless someone else runs the place.

Geez…reading this thread, I’m inclined to think “Glad I don’t live there!”. Then I realise I do live in Europe!

As someone who lives in one of the countries hardest hit by the economic collapse in Europe, and a country suffered most from austerity, I’m glad to say that I don’t recognise the description in Mooney Drivers posts. I really don’t think such views are strong in Ireland.

Maybe that’s because I’m not rich, so don’t suffer from sneering and jealous attitudes, but I don’t think so. I really don’t recognise such strong attitudes here.

Of course there will always be people who are jealous of someone else, but I don’t see such strong attitudes here.

Having said that, it’s not a good idea to arrive to a client who’s business is struggling for survival, in your shiny new airplane looking for a price increase! But that’s true everywhere. Look at the reaction to the car manufactures in the US to flew to Washington DC in their biz jets looking for a federal bailout. It didn’t go down too well there either!