Crisply ticking off a series of how-to techniques, a Colorado-based air service consultant Monday painted a rosy picture of how and why the Wood River Valley could persuade Frontier Airlines to launch Denver service with perhaps twice-daily flights in 2007 to add as many as another 20,000 travelers to the area's year-round economy.
Kent Myers, who once masterminded expansion of Vail's airline service that now totals 13 non-stop winter markets and three non-stop summer markets with 300,000 annual airline seats, was in the valley for a series of presentations aimed at organizing community-wide support for Denver-based Frontier to add Friedman Memorial Airport to a planned expansion of its routes.
The combined total of seats available on SkyWest Airlines and Horizon Air serving Friedman is 42,750 in the winter and 52,500 in the summer, Myers said.
Myers and valley business leaders plan a January pitch to Frontier for the Denver service.
In the first of several appearances sponsored by the private sector Blaine County Air Transportation Advisory Group, which is paying his consulting fees, Myers told a small but attentive group of some 25 area business people at the Sun Valley Lodge that Frontier has requested proposals from 50 communities interested in new air service. Frontier is purchasing 33 new aircraft over the next two years, including 70-plus passenger Bombardier Q400 turboprops that could serve Friedman.
Myers told the group the key is to form a large private alliance of businesses and individuals throughout the valley to collect financial contributions to help Frontier market service to the valley on its nationwide system, as well as lend their business facilities to help in marketing.
Sun Valley Co., which has shouldered most costs of developing new air service, should not be solely responsible for financing an ambitious air service expansion, he said. Rather, the effort must be a "collective" program in the community that "comes from the heart and wallet."
Ketchum city officials said they were reluctant to agree to participation in a minimum revenue guarantee agreement, if that would be a condition of service.
"There's an opinion on the books that it's illegal to participate in (those) agreements," Mayor Randy Hall told Myers Monday, Dec. 4. "Any time we stray from that opinion we get a room full of people saying they're going to sue us. We need to have that question asked and answered again."
Such small gimmicks as companies adding "Fly Sun Valley" stickers to monthly bills or slogans to their company advertising would help generate traffic for Frontier, Myers said. The presence of Frontier would increase interest by other airlines, especially with the opening of a larger new airport to replace Friedman.
"It will relieve some traffic during peak periods. It gives people an alternative, and it breeds competition," Myers told the Ketchum City Council. "You are a very attractive community to fly to."
Some funds might be needed to help Frontier with startup costs at the Friedman terminal. The community alliance could provide those funds, Myers said.
In other Rocky Mountain ski resorts such as Jackson Hole, Vail, Telluride and Steamboat Springs, Myers said, community alliances raise more than $1 million to help air service.
He cited Vail's program to start non-stop American Airlines service to Dallas-Fort Worth with 176-seat Boeing 757 service. The community raised $450,000 to help American and gladly absorbed a $20,000 loss because of the new infusion of visitors.
Myers said that air service to Boise is the Sun Valley area's biggest competition. If 5 percent of the passengers using Boise for departures or arrivals could be diverted to Friedman, that would be a boon to the economy.
To the question of whether helping Frontier launch service would chase away SkyWest or Horizon, Myers said emphatically not. In fact, Frontier service probably might prompt SkyWest to consider purchasing larger turboprops to replace the present 30-passenger Embraer Brasilias now serving Friedman.
When Myers was asked what Frontier cities in the East would be targeted for travelers to the Sun Valley area, Sun Valley-Ketchum Chamber & Visitors Bureau Executive Director Carol Waller joined in to explain that a sophisticated study is under way to determine potential markets east of Denver. Frontier, he said, is in a battle with Southwest Airlines at the Denver hub to increase passenger activity.
Myers said luring Frontier is not just about generating more skiers. He said expanded air service would attract more professionals to locate here. "It's hard to recruit good doctors," Myers said in using an example, "if you don't have good air service."
Sun Valley Co. marketing director Jack Sibbach echoed Myers by saying the resort is interested in more business overall, not just more skiers. He said more lodging facilities are over the horizon at the resort.
Myers also met with the Blaine County Commission Tuesday morning to issue the same presentation. The commission's questions focused mainly on the technical aspects of air service, but Commissioner Tom Bowman later said he believed that the prospect of securing Frontier air service would be "great."
"It also (reiterates) that we need a bigger airport," Bowman said.
Express reporters Rebecca Meany and Steve Benson contributed to this report.
