After arriving in Washington, jobless, he landed a position in Vice President Dick Cheney’s press office, followed by stints in Iraq as a government operative and in Washington as a National Security Agency consultant.
This all helps to explain why Mr. Eyerly, while projecting a Ferris Bueller-like certainty that everything will always work out in the end, eschewed graduate school at Stanford to start an airline.
With Surf Air, Mr. Eyerly is bringing what he calls the all-you-can-eat-style pricing plan of the local gym or Netflix to air travel — pay a membership ($500), a monthly fee ($1,650) and fly as often as you like on six-seat, single-engine turboprops.
Surf Air started flying in June, with service between smaller airports in Burbank, Calif., and San Carlos near Palo Alto, tapping into those who do business between Hollywood and Silicon Valley and would prefer to do so without the headaches of major airports. It added service last month to Santa Barbara, Calif., and is considering additional destinations by the end of the year.
If it looks as if he is flying blind — a novice businessman diving into an industry that is plagued by contractions, mergers and failed enterprises — Mr. Eyerly views his fledgling Surf Air as an opportunity to fundamentally change the way business travelers fly.
It is a pitch to certain kinds of decision makers — the small-business chief executives, the bottom half of the one-percenters, those who have not yet made their fortune but are intent on making their mark. For his customers, Mr. Eyerly hopes Surf Air can be an incubator of ideas, where flights can be dinner parties in the air, where the membership can be a Facebook for entrepreneurs.
If the business model works in California, with expansion to places like Palm Springs and Lake Tahoe in mind, it will work in more than 50 markets around the country, he said.
“Forgive the Kansas City reference, but it’s Bo Jackson at the plate,” Mr. Eyerly, a 34-year-old Kansas City native, said, referring to the former Royals slugger. “It’s a home run or a strikeout. It works or it doesn’t. If this doesn’t work in a year, 18 months, we’ll know. It won’t drag out.”
Surf Air has raised about $11 million in capital, Mr. Eyerly said, from investors that include Velos Partners, Base Ventures and Anthem Ventures, as well as the actor Jared Leto and the developer Rick Caruso. The company has 60 employees, 25 of whom are pilots, and a fleet of three Pilatus PC-12 planes. Its membership is nearing 300, each of whom has made a three-month commitment.
It was not hard to see the lure recently when members arrived and departed from Burbank. It was possible to pull into the small parking lot outside the Atlantic Terminal, which is separate from the main terminal, walk a few dozen steps to the lobby, grab a snack from the concierge cart and walk out on the tarmac to board the plane. There were no tickets, no lines and no body scans. A valet parked the customers’ cars.
“It’s truly transformative for me on several levels,” said Heather Rafter, who runs her own small Bay Area law firm but travels frequently to Burbank to do business, visit children in college or attend concerts. She is an elite-level flier with United Airlines and Southwest, but because of early-booking requirements or change fees, her frequent flights are costly, she said.
“My whole brain is thinking differently,” Ms. Rafter said. “I do business development when I want, I do client meetings when I need to and if I forgot to come home for my daughter’s swim meet, I just come home without stressing about what it’s going to cost. I feel free in my personal and work life.”
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/business/airline-banks-on-a-buffet-style-business-model.html?partner=rss&emc=rss