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Originally Posted by Blademaster
Hmmm so you are better off flying first class or chartering a private jet for a couple hours?
I often wonder why the big airlines have not gone down the path of buying lots of private jets and outfitted them with luxury seatings and goods and offer the services and conveniences of private jetting at first class prices where the consumers do not have to pay for acquisition costs and operating costs themselves. I bet a lot of companies would go for that since it would save a lot of money and not to mention taxes.
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A guy named Warren Buffet owns a company, Executive Jet Aviation, that does something like that. It's strictly a charter operation though, Warren owns the planes. He also has a company called NetJets where you can buy a part of a jet yet have access to dozens of similar jets for your transportation needs. It's more expensive than charter, but offers some tax benefits for the corporation that doesn't need a whole jet. I've also seen NetJets used to fill in for corporate flight departments when they are just too busy to handle the traffic, but not so busy as to justify another plane.
The big business jet manufactureres own their own fractional operations as well. Cessna calls theirs Citation Shares, Bombardier calls theirs FlexJet, Beech/Hawker owned Flight Options for a while, but sold it this year. Lufthansa has a pair of all first class configured Boeings that they fly from Frankfurt to Newark on a daily basis. You can buy seat rights from LHA, not really ownership. Piedmont has a couple of Boeing 757s in all excutive configuration that fly some dedicated charter routes that are not really open to the general public. Their 75 used to call at our hangar. It's a nice plane. Not as nice as the Citation X I flew, but for it's cheaper to buy a couple of seats on Piedmont's 75 than buy another Citation for a dedicated route.