Aero Expands Routes so Customers can Travel in Luxury
Aero is one of the leading names in in-flight luxury. With convenience and comfort at the heart of their focus,
Tristan Green
Aero is one of the leading names in in-flight luxury. With convenience and comfort at the heart of their focus, Aero provides customers with luxury at their fingertips while flying through the air. CELEB sat down with Zain Richardson, Chief Marketing and Customer Office for Aero, to talk about the company and what the future holds. With brand new routes into Las Vegas, it’s an exciting time to be an Aero customer.
The History of Aero
First, let’s take a look back at how Aero came to be. Richardson shares, “Aero is actually the brainchild of someone called Garrett Camp. Garrett is an entrepreneur probably most well known for founding Uber through his venture capital fund Expa. Garrett was looking to build businesses where he sees problems in the marketplace, or looking to solve problems that he sees personally. And at the time he was in Europe, in Ibiza, and looking to fly to Mykonos. But he realized that there was no way to go directly from Ibiza to Mykonos. That struck him as an opportunity to rethink and radically change premium travel. The only real option was to hire a private charter, which is out of reach for most people. There’s a huge gap between business class commercial travel and private travel.”
So Camp decided to meet the market’s needs. “With all of that in mind, he started in 2019 to charter jets between Mykonos and Ibiza, and sell by the seats. He had real runaway success with premium travelers looking to experience both of these iconic destinations. The team started to acquire aircraft in 2019 because we realized that to really service the guests the way we want to – establishing a true premium brand with an experience we control end to end – we needed to operate the aircraft ourselves.”
Camp and the Aero team built the company with a focus on personalized service and design. In early 2020, Aero was flying between London, Ibiza and Mykonos, before expanding to the US in February.
Luxury in Mid-Air
Even though the company was conceived of and brought to life before the pandemic, it was perfect timing. People have changed the way they travel, and offering a more intimate and private way to travel for business or pleasure has turned out to be exactly what the world needed, when Camp brought it into being.
But having a plane in the right place at the right time isn’t the whole story; the jets themselves are luxury craft designed to make people feel at home in the air. Richardson explains, “All of our jets are retrofit into a private jet environment. Most of our jets have 16 seats. Some have 13, but the industry average is 30 on many of the other operators flying out of Los Angeles, so we offer the comfort and privacy of fewer seats for the space. We built and designed our seats from scratch, with Italian leather. And guests can come to the terminal very close to takeoff – 40 minutes. We also provide concierge services. Our concierge service can help with booking. If you want to access some of the experiences in the destinations, we have exclusive partnerships with hotels such as Nobu and the Cosmopolitan Las Vegas, and our concierge service can arrange it.”
Each guest – as they call them, not customer – has a customized experience to meet their needs. The smaller number of seats allows more room to stretch out and feel like your neighbor isn’t eyeballing your work over your shoulder. It’s the perfect luxury-meets-practical niche between business commercial travel and chartering a jet.
New Routes Means New Adventures
Aero works hard to continue their company’s mission: finding a need and meeting it. The routes arise partly from guest comments left on cards after a flight, and people were overwhelmingly asking for a Las Vegas route. In Aero style, they met the need. Now, Aero flies multiple US destinations including Los Angeles, Aspen, Austin, Miami, New York and Las Vegas. In Europe, they’re adding destinations in Geneva, Nice and Milan starting in December.
Richardson explains, “Our flights to Las Vegas are priced at $950 one way. And that doesn’t change whether it’s a day before or three weeks before. We like the transparency of this model. And we won’t be changing prices for the Winter, even to Winter destinations.” People’s travel habits have changed during the pandemic, and it’s requiring travel companies to adjust to keep up. Having been brought to life during the pandemic, Aero is ahead of the game – from the ground up, they’re already poised to meet traveler needs in the new era. With Aero adding Las Vegas to its routes, the opportunity for people to nip over to Vegas for a quick business trip without the headache of commercial travel is an exciting development. As Aero continues to grow, the team will keep providing top notch customized service.
The Aero website explains their mission; “We believe a life well lived is not about getting from A to B. It’s about getting the most from the entire journey. We value curation over endless selection, authenticity over influence, and ease over extravagance because we are committed to making your travel experience exceptional from the moment you are inspired to take a trip.” The only way to see it for yourself is to book a flight, kick back, and enjoy.