Local group working to bring more flights to the Flathead

A group of Flathead Valley business and tourism leaders have organized to raise money to back airlines willing to bring more direct flights to Glacier Park International Airport.

The Airline Enhancement and Expansion Outreach committee (AERO) cites the Jackson Hole Airport in Wyoming as a successful case study.

“Jackson has a $2 million war chest,” AERO chairman Paul Johannsen told a Whitefish Chamber of Commerce meeting recently. “Their direct flights are phenomenal. Their business community came together.”

A long-identified problem is that airlines won’t commit new direct flights into GPIA without a guarantee of passengers. Formed about 18 months ago, AERO’s aim is to sell the idea of providing fund guarantees to potential airlines.

Financial guarantees are sometimes used when an airline is reluctant to take on the risk of entering a new market. Private funds are raised and paid up front to supplement an airline’s investment if seats don’t sell as predicted. However, if the flight proves to be profitable, funds are returned to investors.

Bozeman raised a $688,000 fund guarantee this past winter to help attract a direct flight from Newark, N.J. Seventeen businesses and groups made pledges to the guarantee, including Big Sky Ski Resort and Moonlight Basin.

AERO will ask the Flathead business community this summer to contribute annual pledges, with the goal of raising $500,000 to $750,000, Johannsen said.

“By fall we hope to have a fund big enough to go out and get flights,” Johannsen said. “We’ve got to have the money in hand first.”

AERO is currently working with the Sixel Consulting Group to conduct an economic impact study on the benefits of adding new flights to the valley. Based in Eugene, Ore., Sixel specializes in air service development. The study should be completed by the end of summer.

Markets of interest could include Los Angeles, Phoenix or a winter flight from Chicago. United currently offers a direct flight from Chicago in the summer. They’re reportedly asking for a $250,000 guarantee to add weekend-only winter service.