Any info on Boutique air?

Jon Gandy

Jon Gandy

Well-Known Member
I looked over some of the requirements for boutique air yesterday with the life and several of their bases we are interested in moving to and I meet men's. I would like to know more about training and quality of life in the Dallas-Fort Worth, LAX, Phoenix, or even Atlanta bases. What the likelihood is of a new hiring getting placed in either of those.

Any other information will be good to know as well.
 
Found myself suddenly unemployed a few years ago and did a phone interview with them. The first gentleman I spoke with was polite and professional. He said I would need to have a short chat with the owner but that was just a formality as the guy always liked to welcome new hires. About 11pm that same night my phone rang and some guy was telling me to hold for Mr. SoAndSo. I hung up. If you're calling me that late at night it better be for an emergency, death in the family or similar. Never heard back from them or called myself. I've met two of their previous employees. Neither had good things to say about the company-but who does about every place they've ever worked as the negative tends to be easier to remember than the good.
 
From people I know there and from what I hear is they are realistically only looking at experienced applicants with higher hours and ratings, they have a massive amount of low hour applicants looking to build time the non-cfi route, that being said the people I know who have recently been hired said the application, interview, and training process is moving at a snails pace.
 
Roger Roger said:
They kind of sound like a Seaport Part II.
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You have no idea. Lets just say they have some splaining to do in the PNW area to a well known 3 letter agency. Lots of canceled flights. Only 1 airplane in PDX. And a lot of unhappy pilots. I could go on but we all know how this ends.......
 
hook_dupin said:
I've heard of a "Lifecycle of an EAS operator" concept from a fellow JCer where the phases are roughly the following:

1) Good intentions
2) Early wins
3) Uncontrolled growth
4) Hemorrhaging wound
5) Decayed carcass
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So they are probably in the uncontrolled growth stage then
 
Friend of mine is a captain there. A direct quote from him, "I'm lucky to go 2 shifts without a long delay or something breaking and grounding us." He can't wait to leave and told me to stay away, far away.
 
They have older planes. So yeah MX issues are to be expected. However, pay isn't great and I heard staffing levels were low.
 
I have been meaning to get this off my chest about Bro-tique. They had a funny incident in MSS. They outbid Cape Air on their EAS route from MSS-ALB. So they guaranteed the committee overlooking the selection of airlines that if picked as winners they will offer flights to BWI from ALB for $89. Well long story short, the company now says that they will have to charge somewhere in the range of $100+ one way. Have fun riding in a more "luxurious airplane that flies higher and faster" with 2 to 3 times the price Cape Air was offering.

Now I had my captain buddy who is based in MSS and was at the final hearing when the committee let the respective companies bring up their points. Boutique air paid people from the local town to say ridiculous, untrue things about Cape Air. There are quotes in the newspaper that has them reading from a script. MSS was a very efficient run airport by Cape Air, but lets see how many people pay for a cooler looking "executive" seated airplane.

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/...estinations-20161209&?gallerydate=2016-12-04Z
 
drupilot54 said:
I have been meaning to get this off my chest about Bro-tique. They had a funny incident in MSS. They outbid Cape Air on their EAS route from MSS-ALB. So they guaranteed the committee overlooking the selection of airlines that if picked as winners they will offer flights to BWI from ALB for $89. Well long story short, the company now says that they will have to charge somewhere in the range of $100+ one way. Have fun riding in a more "luxurious airplane that flies higher and faster" with 2 to 3 times the price Cape Air was offering.

Now I had my captain buddy who is based in MSS and was at the final hearing when the committee let the respective companies bring up their points. Boutique air paid people from the local town to say ridiculous, untrue things about Cape Air. There are quotes in the newspaper that has them reading from a script. MSS was a very efficient run airport by Cape Air, but lets see how many people pay for a cooler looking "executive" seated airplane.

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/...estinations-20161209&?gallerydate=2016-12-04Z
Click to expand...
If true, that's awful. Cape has always seemed like a good, well run operation.
 
drupilot54 said:
I have been meaning to get this off my chest about Bro-tique. They had a funny incident in MSS. They outbid Cape Air on their EAS route from MSS-ALB. So they guaranteed the committee overlooking the selection of airlines that if picked as winners they will offer flights to BWI from ALB for $89. Well long story short, the company now says that they will have to charge somewhere in the range of $100+ one way. Have fun riding in a more "luxurious airplane that flies higher and faster" with 2 to 3 times the price Cape Air was offering.

Now I had my captain buddy who is based in MSS and was at the final hearing when the committee let the respective companies bring up their points. Boutique air paid people from the local town to say ridiculous, untrue things about Cape Air. There are quotes in the newspaper that has them reading from a script. MSS was a very efficient run airport by Cape Air, but lets see how many people pay for a cooler looking "executive" seated airplane.

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/...estinations-20161209&?gallerydate=2016-12-04Z
Click to expand...
Bet you $10 they pull a Seaport and end up putting a Caravan on those routes.
 
They sell LAX-OAK...via Merced(MCE-OAK is a 1.5 hour drive)...with a 14 hour, overnight layover...for about the same price as the major airlines on the same route, but usually a little more expensive.

So there's that.
 
Roger Roger said:
If true, that's awful. Cape has always seemed like a good, well run operation.
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This may actually be a good deal for Cape Air.

I've looked at the financial side of EAS -it's just horrible. The standard bid is 5% profit margin on what are $3M routes. It turns into $150K of profit. It doesn't take much -increased training costs, early overhauls, increased fuel prices, etc -to erase that profit.

I see airlines as making the mistake of taking on too much EAS. By having too much EAS, companies end up making themselves too inflexible. Cape Air is better off putting their assets to high margin Nantucket or Caribbean runs.
 
drupilot54 said:
I have been meaning to get this off my chest about Bro-tique. They had a funny incident in MSS. They outbid Cape Air on their EAS route from MSS-ALB. So they guaranteed the committee overlooking the selection of airlines that if picked as winners they will offer flights to BWI from ALB for $89. Well long story short, the company now says that they will have to charge somewhere in the range of $100+ one way. Have fun riding in a more "luxurious airplane that flies higher and faster" with 2 to 3 times the price Cape Air was offering.

Now I had my captain buddy who is based in MSS and was at the final hearing when the committee let the respective companies bring up their points. Boutique air paid people from the local town to say ridiculous, untrue things about Cape Air. There are quotes in the newspaper that has them reading from a script. MSS was a very efficient run airport by Cape Air, but lets see how many people pay for a cooler looking "executive" seated airplane.

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/...estinations-20161209&?gallerydate=2016-12-04Z
Click to expand...

Huh, I wonder how they figure that'll work. Southwest runs multiple flights a day between ALB and BWI and a quick glance at a one way on 3/1 says $120.

Is your buddy Kurt?

I flew the ALB-ART route for about a year and half back in 2010-11 and we were usually pretty full with 10th Mountain guys so I suspect that was at least a somewhat profitable route. Not sure about OGS and MSS, the North Country isn't exactly a center of industry.
 
milleR said:
Huh, I wonder how they figure that'll work. Southwest runs multiple flights a day between ALB and BWI and a quick glance at a one way on 3/1 says $120.

Is your buddy Kurt?

I flew the ALB-ART route for about a year and half back in 2010-11 and we were usually pretty full with 10th Mountain guys so I suspect that was at least a somewhat profitable route. Not sure about OGS and MSS, the North Country isn't exactly a center of industry.
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Wow, ART was quite a long ways back it seems. I was there for the OGS-ALB-BOS route just last year. My buddy in MSS is Dennis, He has been at Cape Air for about 5 years now. Really good guy.
 
But regardless, i actually used this post as a Dr. Phil moment to get something off my chest about Boutique. To answer @Jon Gandy original question about them: I had my CTP instructor who was talking about them last week. He said his daughter works for them and she is planning to upgrade soon. She is out in the west coast somewhere. Now from him, i did not hear anything negative but that is all i know,
 
drupilot54 said:
Wow, ART was quite a long ways back it seems. I was there for the OGS-ALB-BOS route just last year. My buddy in MSS is Dennis, He has been at Cape Air for about 5 years now. Really good guy.
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Gotcha, yeah he would have been starting after I left it sounds like. Kurt was the lead pilot and based in MSS back in the day but I have no clue what he's up to now. I always loved the occasional jog over to BOS, felt like a totally different world lol. But 4 on/5 off commutable on both ends was the dream life at the time.
 
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