Aviation

The interview: Air Charter Service’s Brendan Toomey on rising demand and the future of private aviation

As the world’s largest charter brokerage, Air Charter Service (ACS) spans a global network and diverse client base of jet setters. Brendan Toomey, CEO of ACS Singapore, talks us through who they are, why they prefer private, and where the industry is heading.

Boulevard: What sets ACS apart from other charter services?

Brendan Toomey: One of our biggest selling points is the size of our company and also the number of offices that we have around the globe. We’re the largest charter brokerage in the world. We generate around a billion dollars in revenue a year, which surpasses a lot of our other competitors. When clients are spending $100,000 or $200,000 on a charter, our scale and global presence become important factors in their decision-making. Now you want a company that’s going to be financially secure, that’s not just going to disappear and fold overnight with your money—and you do hear horror stories of someone offering a deal that’s too good to be true, who then just disappear with the customer’s deposit. We’re too big for that, and we can’t just disappear—that’s what customers like, as well as the fact that we have 35 offices now worldwide.

So what happens quite a lot is, for example, I’ll have a customer here in Singapore and they’ll be travelling to Europe. Since a direct charter from Singapore to Europe is quite expensive, they often fly first class to a European destination and then use our charter services within the continent. With offices across Europe, including our headquarters in London, as well as locations in Spain, Switzerland, and beyond, I can easily connect with my colleagues to coordinate their travel seamlessly.

And they have the local knowledge, so it’s not just me working in Singapore, with no idea about the market in Europe. It’s someone who works that market everyday, who’s able to propose really good aircraft that we use all the time. Or, for example, somewhere in South America—I’ve got a client flying in South America next week. Not every aircraft operator in South America is legitimate or reliable. Some of them just aren’t—and we’ve got long blacklists of companies that we just don’t work with, because they’re not reliable enough. Usually, smaller brokerages won’t know that because they might have a few people here in Singapore or they might have a few offices, but we really have that global reach. And that’s normally what customers like. So they I’ve secured an aircraft that they’re flying around South America with a company that we know very well because our pilot used them many times, and we know they’re great. So we know the aircraft will be there when the customers arrive. It’ll be a lovely aircraft and we know they’ll be doing a really good job.

We also have 24-hour account management here. Being an ACS account manager is not just a nine-to-five job. And if they’re flying in other parts of the world, we’re there—they essentially have two account managers. They have one here and one wherever they fly to.

“When someone’s speaking to an ACS account manager, they really know what they’re talking about, they’ve done the groundwork, the homework. They’re going to be able to competently explain the different variations of aircraft that we’re presenting to the client.”

Before an account manager can sell a charter flight, they must complete six months of training with us; no-one else does that. Then we send them to our London office, where they do classroom training for a month to pass the test. And it means that when someone’s speaking to an ACS account manager, they really know what they’re talking about, they’ve done the groundwork, the homework. They’re going to be able to competently explain the different variations of aircraft that we’re presenting to the client, because we’re not just providing one option every time, we’re providing three or four others. And for somebody who’s new to aircraft charter, that could be quite daunting. So it’s good to have someone to go through and explain the differences why certain aircraft are priced as they are—that comes with just having account managers who know what they’re talking about.

Blvd: Would you say the hybrid model – where clients fly commercial for part of their journey and then switch to private – is a key use case for those transitioning from commercial to private aviation?

Toomey: Yes, and cost is also often a major factor. For example, chartering a flight from Singapore to London can cost around $220,000 USD, which prices out many travellers. However, once they arrive in Europe, chartering shorter flights between destinations can be much more affordable—sometimes as little as €10,000. So, price is definitely a key driver of this hybrid approach. Some customers won’t charter in Asia because it’s too expensive, but they will charter in Europe because the costs are different and there’s a lot more aircraft in Europe.

Blvd: Do you find that certain routes – where commercial involves a level of headache, such as Male Airport in the Maldives, or for Niseko, transfers in Tokyo through to Chitose – show a significantly higher demand for charter?

Toomey: Yes, for sure. We do a lot of flights to the Maldives. And every winter, we’ll do a good amount of Chitose. So, yes, we do a lot of those.

But the city pairs are still in demand, because for the business traveler, they can get a couple of cities done maybe in one day, whereas if you’re on a scheduled commercial flight, you can’t do any more than two cities in Asia. So they can get a lot more done in a day if they use a private aircraft. Or they might be doing a couple of different places in Malaysia—like Kuala Lumpur, Kuching, and then back. So we do those shorter sectors for the business travelers who want to cover a lot of distance in a short amount of time over a couple of days.

60 to 70 per cent of what we’re doing is business and then the rest is leisure travel, plus a small amount of medical evacuations.

Blvd: After covid, there was a surge of interest in air charter driven by the privacy and reliability. Have you seen that demand sustain or even grow? What’s the trend?

Toomey: Yes, covid was great for the private jet market because it brought a lot of customers, who previously might have thought, ‘You know what? Private jets are not for me. It’s too expensive. It’s not my style.’ But then all of a sudden, the value of being separate from everyone was suddenly top priority.

“City pairs are still in demand, because for the business traveler, they can get a couple of cities done maybe in one day… they can get a lot more done in a day if they use a private aircraft.”

So we had a lot of customers who we flew over covid, because they just wanted to stay away from commercial flights. And then, of course, once you’ve been on a private jet, it’s very, very difficult to give it up—especially if you’ve got the means. The market after covid is definitely bigger than than pre-covid.

What else has changed? I’m definitely flying more pets now than previously, and that trend started during covid as well. The number of pets we fly now is larger, and it’s often been the primary reason for the charter—because they get to stay in the cabin. We have a few customers who purely use charters because they get to travel with their pets.

Blvd: I think I might know one — a client showed me a photo of their whole family, all with their little chihuahuas on their jet. It reminded me of the story about people flying their pets out of Hong Kong because they were being culled. Maybe that trend took off in Asia from there.

“We had a lot of customers who we flew over covid, because they just wanted to stay away from commercial flights. And then, of course, once you‘ve been on a private jet, it‘s very, very difficult to give it up.”

Brendan: Yes, we did quite a few pet flights between Hong Kong and the US. A lot of people grouped together, and we’d transport seven to ten dogs per flight. We also have a couple of Havanese.

Blvd: How is the space evolving in terms of technology, amenities, and service? Are advancements enhancing the charter experience—or the jets themselves? What key changes are you seeing?

Toomey: In terms of tech, wifi is becoming much more prevalent in private aircraft. It is expensive to equip an aircraft with wifi – it’s over a million dollars – but some customers, particularly the newer generation of private jet customers, won’t fly without it. Maybe the older generation are used to it and don’t mind flying without wifi, but certainly, there’s a new wave of customers where wifi is a thing and they want it on board—that can sometimes be a deal breaker.

We’re also increasingly leveraging empty legs and dead sectors to offer more cost-effective options to customers. Tracking empty legs is challenging; ACS is investing in optimising flight data to identify dead sectors and better match them with potential customers or combine trips where possible. This is a key area of focus for us, as we see the market moving in this direction—especially with AI helping to maximise the use of empty sectors, reducing the number of private jets flying empty.

“There’s a new wave of customers where wifi is a thing and they want it on board—that can sometimes be a deal breaker.”

Blvd: Flexibility is obviously a key advantage, but what tends to surprise people the most when they transition from commercial to private aviation?

Toomey: I think what stands out is just the speed in which they can get on and off. In places like the US, for example, passengers can step off the aircraft and be in their car within minutes, heading straight to their hotel. That seamless experience is something people absolutely love. We’re not able to do that in Asia (although, we can do it in Kuala Lumpur actually). Whereas, if you’re doing a domestic sector in the US, then there’s no passport control. They can just go out to the aircraft, then straight into the car.

Blvd: How much of the customer journey are you able to customise?

Toomey: It’s however much they want it to be customised. If they want specific catering on board, birthday cakes, wine, caviar, even celebrations on board, or if they want something in the terminal. There’s a fair amount that we can customise. We’ve also done flights for filming, or for a certain company, where they want the company’s decal on the side of the plane. If the owner or operator is open to that, then we can do it. So we try to customise as much as we can.

“I think what stands out is just the speed in which they can get on and off.”

We work with a wide range of operators, from small management companies that handle a single plane for a private owner to large private airlines with fleets of up to 70 aircraft available for charter. And then there are handling companies that manage the logistics of each flight. For every flight, there’s a handling company at both departure and arrival points, and we liaise with them to coordinate details such as passenger arrival times, car transfers, and ensuring a smooth transition onto the aircraft.

A big part of our role is making sure everything runs seamlessly. Essentially, we act as a safety net, ensuring that all parties involved do their job properly—which is why clients rely on us.

Read next:

— Latest listings —