Frustration, and commercial travel are for other people. Or, rather, people that don’t use Silverhawk for their travel needs. I had the distinct pleasure of hopping on a deadhead down to the Ozarks – where I’m currently writing this bad boy a couple days before it’s due (So much for not procrastinating like I’ve promised in previous blogs, huh?). You know what? This experience reinforced my position that we’re the best value operator in the Midwest for business or personal use, and was a bit of a learning experience for me with respect to the pivotal role pilots play – aside from the very obvious flying of the aircraft – in our business.

It was my four old’s first time flying and, suffice it to say, there was some trepidation and excitement (?). Four year olds are weird like that, I’m learning. The captain met us in the lobby of the FBO, was immediately engaging with my oldest, and started grabbing the mountain(s) of luggage we had with us to start loading. In a span of 30 seconds, my oldest was calm(er), my frustration at unloading 5,000lbs of luggage from the car were assuaged as someone else took the burden, and it felt like the vacation started early. It’s been a full 24 hours since our takeoff as I write this and my oldest still has not stopped talking about the airplane, the snacks, how he wants to fly airplanes when he’s older, and how he can’t figure out how we went from “home” to the Ozarks without driving. And the craziest part? That’s an average experience for Silverhawk. The pilots had no idea I worked here (no bias) until after we’d landed and got to chatting about work.

Moral of the story? There are a lot of companies that do what we do – putting people in a metal tube in the sky and moving them from place “A” to place “B” and (often) back again. It sounds simple, and it’s probably simpler than a lot of operators allow it to be. That said, there’s a difference between putting people in a metal tube – as described above – and delivering an experience. We got an experience, as do all of the friends of Silverhawk. Know how I know that? Because our values won’t let us deliver anything less. They aren’t just words on paper as they are most places; they’re lived by everyone here and if they’re not, those people aren’t here. There simply isn’t room.

So stop settling for shitty experiences, stop settling for feeling like an inconvenience, stop settling for less than, and come experience what travel should be.

Mark