Evolution of an Enterprise, Chapter 12: Good Visibility

For members of the aviation community, who you know is almost as important as what you know.

It’s a fact of business life that Josh Somers and Binh Uebinger, founders of aviation detailing startup Voyager Industries LLC, learned early.

“That was the very first lesson we learned,” Somers said. “We knew some people who wanted to do (airplane detailing), but they didn’t know how to make the connections. The only way to make this business work is to know people, to build credibility.”

To that end the two entrepreneurs joined the Maryland-based Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, the country’s largest aviation lobbying organization with more than 415,000 members.

Membership, as American Express would say, has its privileges. By spending $39 each to join AOPA, Somers and Uebinger receive a monthly industry magazine – and, more importantly, the ability to immerse themselves in all things flying.

“Being able to be a member of that group of people automatically gives us credibility,” Somers said. “If you want to be a math teacher, you join the math club in high school. If you want to be in aviation, AOPA is the one you’re going to join. We know that as we grow, the benefit of being in an organization like this will grow.”

While Uebinger and Somers have yet to really put their membership to work for them by attending AOPA events, Somers said he knows it will come in handy.

“We can go to a client with a service to offer, a credible list of clients and also say we’re members of the AOPA,” he said. “It’s icing on the cake, but not the cake itself.”

The pair already has received references from AOPA Midwest representative Bob Dickens, who put in a good word with Tammy Warner, developer of Perfect Landing Airpark near Branson.

Flying in

Somers and Uebinger aren’t stopping their networking efforts with association membership. The two also have their sights set on national fly-in events, which draw aircraft owners and enthusiasts from all over the country -– or the world.

One of the largest is AirVenture Oshkosh, an annual event the Experimental Aircraft Association has hosted in Oshkosh, Wis., since 1953.

“It’s the annual convention for our membership – we have 170,000 members worldwide, and tens of thousands show up that week, plus a large number of the general public,” said EAA spokesman Dick Knapinski.

Voyager contacted event organizers too late to get a spot at the 2008 show, which runs July 28–Aug. 3, but Somers said his company is “at the top of the list” for vendor space in 2009.

The 2007 event brought in 560,000 people in its seven-day run; Knapinski added that while many aircraft trade shows and fly-ins are geared specifically toward corporate flyers or business-to-business connections, Airventure Oshkosh is for all aviation enthusiasts.

“It really is a people’s event, no matter what you’re flying,” he said. “I tell people that you can buy a T-shirt with a picture of an airplane on it, and then you can go next door and buy the airplane to match it.”

A good name

All of the duo’s efforts – joining AOPA, flying to various shows, making connections with everyone they can in the flying business – go toward one crucial goal: building a reputation.

“In so many businesses, the key is location, location, location,” said AOPA representative Dickens. “In aviation, it’s reputation, reputation, reputation.”

Uebinger said it’s easy to understand why pilots would want their detailer to have a strong reputation.

“When we put ourselves in their shoes, if I own a plane that’s worth several hundred thousand dollars, I want somebody cleaning it who knows what they’re doing and knows about planes,” he said.

Somers noted that Dan Robbins, chief pilot for Springfield charter company OzAir, expressed just that sentiment when Voyager first approached him about working on the charter company’s planes. They’re still awaiting word from OzAir.

“(Robbins is) fond of saying, ‘I’m not emotional about anything in aviation. Doing that will get you killed,’” Somers said. “He told us, ‘I may like you guys personally, but why do you think you can clean my airplanes?’”

With Voyager’s networking efforts, and the work and references that those efforts will provide, Somers and Uebinger hope to have a good answer.