Crew Meals at the Fractionals - Good, Bad & Ugly

[On Your Six]

Someone brought this up on another thread and I thought it was worth revisiting. How do crew-meals work at the various fractionals? I had heard good things about Rudy's and special arrangements at Netjets - menu options. Do some fractionals just provide per diem and "good luck" at finding food in the vending machines? What about crew meals at Flex, CS, FLOPS and Avantair?

So, what food options do you have at your fractional? Any memorable or favorite meals that you get offered frequently? Which airports provide the best catering for crews (TEB, VNY, RIL, etc.)? Are the meals that much better than first class food in the airlines that some 121 pilots (legacies) might enjoy? I am sure the SWA, Jet Blue, Air Tran and Spirit pilots get tired of chips and peanuts.

 

[dime line]

Just remember at Options you (a pilot) have no Options

 

[blueridge71]

CS offers crew meals. The only hitch is that they charge $10 for them. They are good, but I'd rather run to Subway for half the price.

 

[On Your Six]

CS offers crew meals. The only hitch is that they charge $10 for them. They are good, but I'd rather run to Subway for half the price.

Really? What food options do you get for $10? Any examples? Does the quality of the food you are offered vary by geography?

Is this the same for Netjets, Flex, Avantair, etc.?

 

[Ultra Grump]

At NJA, crew food available 24 hrs a day, provided you have trips on your line or are hot spare. No charge. Currently a menu of 21 meals, 7 each for lunch, bfast, dinner. The menu changes quarterly - we are given a bunch of choices and vote on them, supposedly the 7 most popular for each meal then make it to the menu. The crew food program is changing, though, and I like the look of the examples that were provided. Rudy's and Stevie's suck, BTW. They were good when we could order whatever we wanted, but when price points were instituted by the company, the quality really suffered.

 

[Jafo73]

At NetJets if we don't have time to get something to eat (which is most of the time) the company provides us food (no charge to us). We have a menu with a few options for (seperate breakfast, lunch and dinner menus). The complaints are about portions and people want more flexible menu. Having had to eat Air Force box nasty meals, I think we eat pretty good at NJ.

 

[CherryBomb]

Avantair typically buys crew meals if the crew has less than one hour turns throughout the day. If the schedule has gaps between flights that are more than an hour, then management is reluctant to buy meals.

But as with everything, the "policy" is constantly changing.

 

[DirtyBeech]

Flex meals:

Breakfast- croissant or burrito with extra helpings of cholesterol, cheese and home fries.

Lunch- Sandwich bag or salad bag. If you get lucky it's a salad bag or a sandwich bag.

Dinner- Usually pretty good with a variety of meals, but you never know what's coming.

Meals are only provided on live legs or if you are sitting standby for 6 hours I think?

 

[av8orboy]

Avantair typically buys crew meals if the crew has less than one hour turns throughout the day. If the schedule has gaps between flights that are more than an hour, then management is reluctant to buy meals.

But as with everything, the "policy" is constantly changing.

Ditto at Alpha

 

[SDCFI]

Flex meals:

Breakfast- croissant or burrito with extra helpings of cholesterol, cheese and home fries.

Lunch- Sandwich bag or salad bag. If you get lucky it's a salad bag or a sandwich bag.

Dinner- Usually pretty good with a variety of meals, but you never know what's coming.

Meals are only provided on live legs or if you are sitting standby for 6 hours I think?

Last night I had some tasty lamb stew over vegetables and pasta. Dinner roll was a little tough though. Got that in Leesburgh, VA. Had omelets twice in the last 4 days. Good ones though. Just this morning they sent us breakfast for a repo, we forgot it because we weren't expecting it and didn't look closely at the trip sheet until we were in the air. We called the FBO and told them to eat it with our compliments, and then when we landed there were two crew breakfasts waiting for us. Somebody must like us. For me about 20% of the meals are Great, 75% are edible, but nothing to write home about, and 5% are not worth it even though they're free. Also, I've gotten the best meals by far from the small out of the way places. Air Chef and Rudy's are hit and miss, mostly miss. I don't think you have to do a full 6 hours of stby to get a meal. I sat in IAD the other day and they sent something over pretty much right away. I just finished my 3rd full rotation and in that time I bought a total of two meals in 16 days. The rest were either free breakfasts or crew meals. Not too shabby. Sometimes I do wish we had a choice for the meals, but I'm more than happy with what I've seen so far.