The foray of membership-based private jet services like JetSmarter, Wheels Up, and Surf Air in Europe is redefining its aviation sector. This has been confirmed by a research done by a veteran charter jet program- PrivateFly in collaboration with a German aviation data company, WingX Advance.
These new and innovative private jet operators are introducing new aircraft programs infused with user-friendly technologies that focus on comfort and accessibility offered by jet services. However, the most important advantage of membership-based private jets is the affordability of their private services. Flying hassle-free on a charter jet now only costs a fraction of what it used to a decade ago.
Surf Air is a great case study to show how chartered jet services have become cheap. Their unlimited All-You-Can-Fly plan provides three packages that start from a meager price of $1,950. The Premium package offers six reservations on a single booking along with a monthly complimentary guest seat. The basic package has a limitation of destinations that only include San Francisco/Bay Area, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and Carlsbad.
JetSmarter is an even better example because it has four packages to choose from, along with a membership plan. These are named- Charter Broking, Shared Charter, Shared Shuttles, and Jet Deals. Two of the most used packages are Shared Charter and Charter Broking. Shared Charter allows booking of a seat on a shared flight, and Charter Broking provides you an entire flight where you’re free to sell some of the seats.
Free shared flights are available to members with the condition that only two seats may be booked in advance. Because of its app where one can book a chartered jet speedily, JetSmarter has been dubbed ‘Uber of private jets’.
Private jet operators are using innovative approaches to reduce the cost of flying through seat-sharing and utilization of under-used private jets owned by various private jet services and individuals. The statistics confirm the success of such business models which offer cheap private jet flights without owning a single jet.
WingX estimates that business jets flew over Europe for more than 450,000 hours in 2017. That’s a stark increase of 10%, compared to last year. Jets, both long-range and domestic, saw a steep incline in usage by 15% this year.
To add more weight to the numbers above, WingX Advance reports a boost in the number of departures across Europe, between June and September. Paris and Geneva were recorded to be the top destinations sought by charter customers.