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All she needs is money. . . .

Welcome to Flightinfo.com

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University Of Memphis WOW now those are impressive credentials Oh and the fact she has no airline experience where do I buy this Greaaaat stock.

What a joke can believe some fools are taking her seriously
 
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh yes the elusive Padre'. Wonder whatever happened to him. He did exist, I met him in SYR. Nice guy though, just full of too many underfunded dreams.
 
needsumluv said:
University Of Memphis WOW now those are impressive credentials Oh and the fact she has no airline experience where do I buy this Greaaaat stock.

What a joke can believe some fools are taking her seriously

No airline experience? Good. Look at what the dudes WITH experience have done lately. I'd say that's a plus for her...and her (potential) employees.
 
MAGNUM!! said:
No airline experience? Good. Look at what the dudes WITH experience have done lately. I'd say that's a plus for her...and her (potential) employees.

Dude you can't be serious? Let me guess 8 years active and then straight to FedEx....yep your living in the real world. Get out of your little green house world were you believe everything your master tells you.
 
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05285/586682.stm

Memphis attorney hopes to succeed where others have failed -- launch a Pittsburgh-based airline

The only things Penelope Turnbow needs are money and planes

Wednesday, October 12, 2005
By Dan Fitzpatrick, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Penelope Turnbow must be crazy.
Why else would a 41-year-old Memphis lawyer quit her corporate job to launch a Pittsburgh-based airline? Doesn't she know the industry is a mess?
Doesn't she know three of the nation's 10 largest carriers are in bankruptcy, tens of thousands of jobs are being shed and high fuel prices are making a full recovery impossible.
And doesn't she know that both Pittsburgh and the nation are littered with proposed airline start-ups that never got off the ground or, if they did, quickly entered the "former airline" stage?
Raise these questions with Ms. Turnbow, who was in Pittsburgh last week on a fund-raising tour, and the chief executive officer of the start-up Victory Airlines acknowledges that some think she is "absolutely crazy" for wanting to launch a new air transportation venture during the worst economic stretch in the history of the airline business.
But "we did walk on the moon," she said. And "the airline industry, I believe, will be reborn. It has to be."
A former attorney for Memphis, Tenn.-based FedEx Corp., Ms. Turnbow needs at least $100 million to $125 million to lease aircraft, hire support operations and, before all that, get a required operating certificate from the U.S. Department of Transportation. She may need as much as $250 million over time.
To start, Ms. Turnbow is hoping to raise $20 million to $25 million in Pittsburgh, a possible headquarters city for Victory Airlines even though it is a place where US Airways pulled up the welcome mat because it felt the region no longer was worthy or able to serve as a hub.
Just raising funds will be hard enough, but there also is the legacy of other start-ups that came and went. Nations Air, JetTrain and Citijet are among local attempts that failed in the late 1990s. Last year, an effort known as Project Roam wasn't even able to raise enough money to put a plane in the sky.
"I wouldn't put my retirement money on the line for something like this," said Darryl Jenkins, a well-known airline consultant based in Marshall, Va. "It is a very difficult environment for startups right now, with jet fuel so high. That scares investors away."
Two local venture capital firms already have turned down Ms. Turnbow's requests for money, according to people familiar with her efforts, and it appears she does not yet have any hard commitments from anyone willing to step up and be the first big investor.
At the same time, she has support from a bevy of well-known figures in town, including former Allegheny County Chief Executive Jim Roddey, iNetworks Chief Executive Officer Tony Lacerne, law firm Buchanan Ingersoll CEO Thomas Van Kirk and Gateway Financial owner David Malone, all of whom have introduced her to potential investors. Last Thursday, Mr. Roddey hosted such a meeting at a local law firm office.
"I give her a lot of credit for trying," Mr. Lacerne said. Mr. Malone even said he believes Ms. Turnbow "has a reasonably good chance of success."
Ms. Turnbow admits the last year of fund raising has not been easy. "Convincing people to part with their money is a difficult task," she said last Thursday, while seated in the lobby of the Omni William Penn, in between meetings.
But she would not disclose how much money has been raised so far, other than to say that she has enough to pay for a business plan and legal fees -- costs that can run into the "millions."
It is clear, though, that Ms. Turnbow brims with the confidence of the newfangled entrepreneur.
She traces her thirst for independence to a childhood in Savannah, Tenn., only two miles from a Civil War battlefield, where Ms. Turnbow started working for her father's trucking business when she was 8, and became the first person in her family to attend college.
She earned degrees in law and business from the University of Memphis. She then worked nine years as an attorney with FedEx, in Memphis, and another seven years as counsel for electrical products maker Thomas & Betts.
In starting Victory Airlines two years ago, Ms. Turnbow consulted with more than 200 people across 30 companies to gather ideas and plot strategy. She consulted with Boeing Co. on the possible design of a plane and Unisys on pricing and reservations and operations, according to several people familiar with her efforts.
"We left no stone unturned," she said. "We are still waiting for the question we can't answer."
When local business consultant Richard Danforth, himself the veteran of several airline start-up attempts, heard about Ms. Turnbow's effort, he was skeptical as to whether she or her team had the expertise to pull it off. But "when I read the business plan, I was very impressed," Mr. Danforth said. "Perhaps the best airline start-up plan I gave ever read. I was immediately interested."
What Mr. Danforth likes:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/newsimages/dot.gifVictory's reliance on outsourcing of bookings, ground handling, training, crew scheduling, marketing and other services -- doing all of it more cheaply than if handled in house.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/newsimages/dot.gifIts proposed use of a transparent pricing system, in which everyone will know what the price of a seat will be, eliminating wild fluctuations. "We want to sell certainty, predictability," Ms. Turnbow said.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/newsimages/dot.gifUse of electronic ticketing.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/newsimages/dot.gifA program of profit sharing and easy-to-understand wage structure for employees.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/newsimages/dot.gifLow operating costs. Mr. Danforth claims the business plan shows the airline spending 7 cents to move one seat one mile -- a statistic that is in line with Southwest Airlines, the most profitable low-cost carrier in the industry.
Victory could also carry cargo, according to Mr. Roddey, who said Ms. Turnbow wants to build an "international freight center" that could create lots of jobs in Pittsburgh.
"I particularly like that idea," he said.
Mr. Lacerne, of the venture capital firm iNetworks, likes Ms. Turnbow's enthusiasm, above all.
"Sooner or later, people with that tenacity win," he said.
Mr. Danforth added: "You have somebody at the helm who is not going to take no for an answer."
Such confidence is crucial if Victory Airlines is to get off the ground, said Mr. Jenkins, the airline consultant in Marshall, Va.
"There are a dozen airlines out there trying to get started, all of whom have good ideas," he said. "A good idea in and of itself is not enough to raise money. You have to have the management team and a certain swagger to you that the others don't."
JetBlue Airways founder David Neeleman had that swagger when he founded the successful New York start-up five years ago, according to Mr. Jenkins. "You knew he was not going to fail," Mr. Jenkins said. Of course, it helped that Mr. Neeleman had extensive experience in the airline business, having formed and sold his own airline start-up to Southwest Airlines, then working for the discount giant and then helping other start-ups get underway.
As for Ms. Turnbow, having people question her ability to make Victory work does not bother her. "Most people are not visionaries," she said. "They will say 'That's great, but how will you get it from here to there,' " using her hands to illustrate the perception gap.
But she pledged to keep trying.
"I am an entrepreneur," she said. "I was born one."
(Dan Fitzpatrick can be reached at [email protected] or 412-263-1752.)
 
Max Powers said:
Dude you can't be serious? Let me guess 8 years active and then straight to FedEx....yep your living in the real world. Get out of your little green house world were you believe everything your master tells you.

Uh, what's the little green house and who is the "master?" The point is that most of the guys with airline experience in the "real world" are in debt up to their eyeballs, slashing pilot salaries, laying off mx workers, and staring bankruptcy in the face. She can't do much worse. And 8 years active and straight to FedEx sounds like a pretty good world to live in. Sounds like a world I'd like to live in, too. Oh, wait a minute...
 
Q....How do you make a million in aviation....

A.....Start with 25 million.

Give it up....But I'm sure some douche will be willing to fly here for free.
 

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