Throughout the last eleven months, the Company Chronicles column has highlighted small-to-medium-sized, mostly private aviation companies whose roots go way back to the beginnings of general and business aviation in the United States. We can also find compelling stories surrounding some of our younger organizations. This month, for our final chronicle, we focus on one relatively new aviation company that has not only demonstrated much success but has attracted the investment of other organizations looking to expand their service capabilities.
In 1995, a couple of aviation business leaders in Salt Lake City (SLC) determined that the time was right to bring an all-encompassing aviation one-stop shop to the area. The Million Air SLC FBO was up for sale at the time, and Bill Haberstock, a local charter guru, pilot and sales pro, saw an opportunity. Haberstock was a partner in a turbine specialty business in SLC called Business Aviation Management. “I saw some untapped potential for growing an even larger general aviation company at Salt Lake City International Airport,” Haberstock told NATA’s Aviation Business Journal. “[It] had been nearly 15 years since the airport had a full-service general aviation business. What did exist was a lot of small companies that offered different services.”
SLC had FBOs providing fuel, some charter work, and some aircraft sales and distributorships. That’s when Haberstock brought in Leon Christensen, who at the time was managing the Hudson General FBO, to partner in the formation of Keystone Aviation. The sole purpose was to purchase the existing Million Air FBO at SLC. “Leon brought expertise in FBO operations, which we combined with my experience in aircraft management, charter operations and sales,” Haberstock told the Aviation Business Journal. “With financial backing from one of my customers at Business Aviation Management, we began to build a team of believers in offering superior customer service at Salt Lake City.”
Prior to Keystone’s Million Air acquisition, the FBO was mainly just selling fuel. There were two maintenance technicians on staff, but they weren’t really focusing on growing the maintenance business. That was all about to change. And along with Million Air SLC, the group was eyeing potential operations in Provo, Utah, about 40 miles away. In addition, they were buying up and bringing in businesses with expertise in aircraft and parts sales and distributorships, as well as charter, management, brokerage and maintenance services. The clientele ranged from operators of single-engine pistons to large business jets – and airlines.
Million Air SLC got into the airline ground handling business, including fueling, baggage and cargo handling, push-back services, ground service equipment and some line maintenance. “Some of our customer airlines asked us to handle their retail cargo, which allowed their customers to drop off the package at our facility,” Haberstock said at the time. “Then we do all the paperwork, screening, and put the package onboard the airplane. Inbound, we unload the packages from the airplane and move them to our facility for customer pick-up.” Million Air SLC also provided retail cargo services for five airlines and line work for nine. One airline also contracted out both baggage and cargo handling to Million Air. And with ten deicing trucks at SLC, they were even taking care of deicing services for seven airlines.
However, their primary goal was growing the general aviation business and bringing products and services to market that would help their customers and be profitable at the same time. “We tried to be a company that would help introduce new people to general aviation, and at the same time, support those already involved,” Haberstock said. “If we felt that we could make money with a particular service or capability and at the same time provide a better product for the customer, that’s what we would do. [Maintenance] was seen as a natural, complementary component to fuel sales as well as aircraft management, charter, sales and brokerage services,” he said.
In 2001, as luck would have it, the city of Provo released a request for proposal (RFP) for a company to come in and develop a new FBO at Provo’s municipal airport. They had already been considering Provo as an expansion area. With the successes they had demonstrated in Salt Lake City, they easily won the RFP and immediately bought the existing general aviation services infrastructure at Provo, which included two FBOs. New hangars and a terminal were built. The new Million Air Provo boasted around 28,000 square feet of hangar space, with maintenance conducted under Million Air SLC’s Class IV Part 145 certificate, bringing the combined hangar space to almost 80,000 square feet between the two city’s facilities.
Since Haberstock had brought his Part 135 charter certificate along with him when Keystone was formed, the team was also inclined to grow that part of the business. Their managed fleet, also on the charter certificate, boasted charter capabilities ranging from Pilatus PC-12s all the way up to Gulfstream G550s. In fact, Million Air SLC was one of the first charter organizations to implement a robust safety management system (SMS), which further separated the operation and helped solidify trust with its customers.
As Million Air expanded in SLC and Provo, the Keystone umbrella also expanded into aircraft sales. Its subsidiary, IntermountainAir, became Piper’s exclusive distributor for several western states. Two DBAs of IntermountainAir, Northwest Aircraft and Arizona Piper, managed sales for the Pacific Northwest and Arizona, respectively.
By the end of 2009, after almost 15 years of success in Utah and abroad, Haberstock evaluated what he thought the future would require and how Keystone could continue its success. He said, “The important thing to ask is, ‘Can we as an industry introduce people to general aviation in a simple and economically justifiable manner?’ Really, that’s the challenge right now. I think we can.”
Fast forward a few years to May 19, 2012. A press release from The Arnold Companies announces the acquisition of Keystone Aviation by TAC Air, immediately expanding its FBO presence to the west with the facilities at SLC and Provo. The FBOs would immediately be rebranded as TAC Air. “This move brings many positive things to the users of SLC and PVU, as well as the other TAC Air locations,” stated TAC Air’s then-VP & COO Christian Sasfai, who is now president of Stevens Aerospace & Defense. “We’re going to deliver the best of both operations to our customers in the 14 markets we serve.”
All of the other Keystone subsidiaries were to be rebranded under the Keystone Aviation brand. Haberstock was to continue his leadership role as president of Keystone Avi-ation, with all other supporting cast members remaining intact. “The integration of Keystone Aviation’s FBOs into TAC Air, along with the backing of Truman Arnold Companies, will allow us to place a renewed focus on our aircraft sales, maintenance and management services,” stated Haberstock. Sasfai went on to state, “Consolidation and resource sharing has become a necessary component of today’s aviation services industry in order to provide high quality, low-cost products and services to aircraft owners and operators.”
Over the next few years, new aircraft sales became less of a focus and leadership at TAC Air and Keystone was evolving. In July 2019, The Arnold Companies announced that Joe Gibney, director of business development, was being promoted to vice president and chief operating officer, reporting directly to Greg Arnold. In addition, the same announcement also highlighted the transition of Keystone’s controller to a new role as vice president and chief operating officer for Keystone Aviation, now reporting directly to Gibney.
Two and a half years later, in January 2022, another big announcement hit the airwaves: TAC Air was divesting Keystone Aviation. Keystone’s new owner, a New Hampshire-based company, Elevate Aviation Group, would be looking to grow its charter and management services business to the west. Elevate has a palette of worldwide charter and management operations, and the addition of Keystone Aviation made a lot of sense to Elevate CEO Greg Raiff. “Elevate Aviation Group and Keystone Aviation are both focused on delivering outstanding white glove service and mission-critical solutions to our clients,” said Raiff. “We believe the business aviation industry needs a provider large enough to deliver benefits at scale to its clients without sacrificing the personal touch so critical in a high-end service business. Together our teams will continue delivering high-touch experiences with more business aviation options than ever before.”
In the deal, TAC Air (since July Signature Aviation) continues to operate the former Keystone Aviation FBOs at SLC and PVU. Elevate and Keystone continue a strategic partnership and preferred service at former TAC Air FBO locations throughout the United States.
While speaking with Elevate Aviation Group’s new chief marketing officer, Will Dent, I got the impression that the acquisition of Keystone is just the beginning of a lot of great things to come. “Keystone Aviation’s team has been managing and maintaining business jets for 30 years now, and with the integration of Keystone Aviation into Elevate, we see a bright future for this group of integrated companies. Keystone Aviation was founded on superior customer service, and we feel the same way.” Adding to that, Bill Hoddenbach, Keystone’s long-time director of aircraft maintenance, said “things are moving at 100 miles per hour” and that they’re all excited about what’s to come in the future.
But that’s not quite the end of the story. Just a few weeks before we all got to enjoy the 69th edition of EAA’s Airventure at Oshkosh, WI, the aviation world learned that Signature Flight Support had purchased TAC Air and was to add 13 of its FBOs to the Signature portfolio, including the two Keystone FBO locations at Salt Lake City and Provo, Utah. So, as the saying goes, “In aviation, the only constant is change.”
And with that, we will sign off from 2022’s Company Chronicles column. It has been an eye-opening and seriously fun endeavor to research and learn about some of the company beginnings in our general and business aviation industry – and the families and leaders behind them. Thank you for reading, and please let us know if you would like any additional stories about the people and businesses that serve you and me as we fly.
