NewLeaf using Enerjet ?

[URC]

Browsing NewLeaf's schedule it appears that half their flights are being operated with "EG" flight numbers. "EG" is the IATA code used by Enerjet. So is Enerjet actually operating these flights ? How involved is Morgan with this venture ? Is this his last stand, finally getting RevengeJet going, operating his own metal on scheduled routes directly against WestJet ? The EG operated, YEG-YHM-YQM flight must taste sweet to an ex WestJet employee with an axe to grind. Or is NewLeaf just using the standard airline business model of getting two airlines to bid against each other to get the best rates ? (aka Race to the Bottom).

There is no mention of Enerjet on NewLeafs website, could this be in violation of some CTA regulation? (Paging Gabor Lukacs, please report to the internet).

As far as I can tell using their website, this is NewLeafs schedule, grouped by aircraft utilization.

Route, DEP/ARR, flight number.

Monday

YEG-YHM 0800 1341 EG1100
YHM-YQM 1430 1725 EG1100
YQM-YHM 1810 1937 EG1101
YHM-YEG 2020 2228 EG1101

YLW-YWG 0800 1223 F8002
YWG-YHM 1310 1625 F8002

YHM-YWG 1000 1159 F8001
YWG-YLW 1310 1354 F8001

Tuesday

No Flights

Wednesday

YLW-YXE 0800 1036 F8004
YXE-YHM 1140 1644 F8004

YHM-YXE 0800 1039 F8003
YXE-YLW 1140 1228 F8003

YEG-YKA 0800 0813 EG1103
YKA-YYJ 0900 0957 EG1103
YYJ-YWG 1040 1524 EG1600
YWG-YYJ 1610 1721 EG1601
YYJ-YKA 1805 1858 EG1102
YKA-YEG 1940 2152 EG1102

Thursday

YHM-YHZ 0900 1201 F8900
YHZ-YHM 1250 1426 F8901

YEG-YXJ 0800 0815 EG1105
YXJ-YXX 0900 1009 EG1105
YXX-YWG 1050 1528 EG1500
YWG-YXX 1610 1705 EG1501
YXX-YXJ 1750 1906 EG1104
YXJ-YEG 1950 2200 EG1104

YLW-YQR 0900 1142 F8200
YQR-YLW 1225 1323 F8201

Friday

YEG-YHM 0800 1341 EG1100
YHM-YQM 1430 1725 EG1100
YQM-YHM 1810 1937 EG1101
YHM-YEG 2020 2228 EG1101

YHM-YWG 1000 1159 F8001
YWG-YLW 1310 1354 F8001

YLW-YWG 0800 1223 F8002
YWG-YHM 1310 1627 F8002

Saturday

YHM-YXE 0900 1039 F8003
YXE-YLW 1140 1228 F8003

YLW-YXE 0800 1036 F8004
YXE-YHM 1140 1644 F8004

YEG-YKA 0800 0813 EG1103
YKA-YYJ 0900 0957 EG1103
YYJ-YWG 1040 1524 EG1600
YWG-YYJ 1610 1721 EG1601
YYJ-YKA 1805 1858 EG1102
YKA-YEG 1940 2152 EG1102

Sunday

YLW-YWG 0800 1223 F8002
YWG-YHM 1310 1627 F8002
YHM-YHZ 1710 2019 F8950
YHZ-YHM 2100 2236 F8951

YHM-YWG 1000 1159 F8001
YWG-YLW 1310 1354 F8001
YLW-YQR 1440 1722 F8250
YQR-YLW 1810 1908 F8251

YEG-YXJ 0800 0815 EG1105
YXJ-YXX 0900 1009 EG1105
YXX-YWG 1050 1528 EG1500
YWG-YXX 1610 1705 EG1501
YXX-YXJ 1750 1906 EG1104
YXJ-YEG 1950 2200 EG1104

[Brize]

Shell games and ricky business. Building a business plan on the supposed idea that customers are being unnecessarily gouged is arguable at best, considering some of the highest load factors the various Canadian airlines have ever seen. This has to be one of the weakest business ventures that has come around in a long time. There's more to this business than moving a person from A to B these days and NewLeaf's (even the name is poor) entire business plan is based on the idea that it is. It can only end one way.. badly for all parties involved.

[vrefplus5]

Not all parties.....Pretty sure Flair negotiated an ironclad deal on its wetlease.

[plhought]

Enerjet is being sub-chartered by Flair.

Was said so at the press-conference couple weeks ago by New Leaf's CEO.

[delta1]

YXX - YSJ ?! wtf new leaf

[flyinhigh]

YXX - YXJ.

Not St. John

[delta1]

whatever yxj. how the f**k are they going to fill a 737 to profit from that.

[Old fella]

Judging by that schedule/destinations/frequency, AC/WJ/Jazz/Porter/Encore et al are probably not that concerned about this new entry, especially here in Maritimes.........

[Realitychex]

The second Tim isn't paid on time by Flair, because New Leaf hasn't paid Flair because New Leaf are short of cash, Tim will pull the pin on the Enerjet ACMI charter work and then it's all over.

i am told the CTA is investigating various financial arrangements to find out who has control of the venture. Control is money so they want clarification on where the New Leaf money is coming from.

I'm told most of it is Minneapolis money from some Iranians and way over 25% limit, but being front ended by South Beach Investments, who run casinos in Manitoba on behalf a number of Canadian indigenous bands. If I were to venture a guess, Hemisphere Gaming out of Minneapolis probably is involved in some shape or form.

Should they actually operate a revenue flight, I'd give it a couple of weeks before the advance booking window moves beyond Labor Day and they hit a very hard wall.

If I were forced to invest in New Leaf or Roots Air, I'd have invested in Roots Air. They lasted about 32 days before they ran out of the $35m they started with. New Air has a fraction of that.

That's how bad this business plan is. They are going to lose buckets of cash very, very quickly. I doubt South Beach have any clue how much they are going to lose and how fast they are going to lose it. Sad, really. However, the plan is to play the indigenous card in the media, so we'll see how that plays out.

I would imagine Tim's CFO will be be watching their bank account every morning to ensure the funds have been transferred.

I wouldn't give Flair / New Leaf ANY leeway on this matter. No cash? No push back. Period.

Then there's KF Aerospace, who lease the 737-400's to Flair and do all their maintenance. Any guesses what sort of rope Barry will give Jim when it comes to paying bills on time?

This is like watching a train wreck in super slow motion.

[lazyeight]

But guys.. they're turning over a "New Leaf" in airline travel!!

[landshark]

http://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/fo ... 24901.html

[Realitychex]

Ben was probably sold a bill of goods including suggestions he could make the same sort of money DGN made off WJ. News of his involvement, which is strictly "name leverage", was circulating in the business in late March.

He's got no skin in the game and probably couldn't find Winnipeg on a map.

If it succeeded, he'd get a big payday. If it failed, so what? No one south of the border is paying any attention anyway.

As "chairman", he has no executive responsibilities. He has much bigger fish to fry elsewhere.

There are a number of smart airline guys south of the border who are collectively asking "wtf"? given a high profile story recently suggesting Ben could be a guy UAL could use.

As hard as it may be for folks in Canada to believe, when it comes to airlines, Canada is an "outta sight, outta mind" market for Americans. No one pays any attention to what's going on up there, least of all a silly ACMI "airline" marketing scheme. Screw up in Canada and no one is going to notice. It's a mulligan. Baldanza knows this. When New Leaf implodes, it won't leave a stain south of the border cause no one will care.

Besides, it's not as if he's going to be moving from the DC area to Winnipeg anytime soon with his family, who relocated there from Florida a few years ago for a very particular reason.

There was a reason WJ never had any US guys on its exec team during the first 10 years. The harsh reality was that none of the guys that were approached had any clue how the Canadian market worked. I recall one guy who knew the US market inside out and was very much involved with a couple of very successful US LCC's suggesting WJ should launch with 3x daily YYC-SEA.

Judging by New Leaf's route structure, or lack thereof, it would appear there continues to be a large void in their route planning department, a void that even their chairman has been unwilling or unable to fill.

I mean, seriously? No feed, no flow and routes like YXX-YXJ and YKA-YYJ in a 160 seat aircraft?

It defies belief.

['97 Tercel]

What did people say about Westjet when it first started? (honest question, i dont really know)

[flyinhigh]

Is lack of schedule not smart to start.

Seriously, why go all in on one route 3 x's a day. At least once a week to many communities you get to gauge the market.

Who know's maybe Fort St. John will be a hit, after all it does have 3 other operators going there.

[Realitychex]

Is lack of schedule not smart to start.

Seriously, why go all in on one route 3 x's a day. At least once a week to many communities you get to gauge the market.

Who know's maybe Fort St. John will be a hit, after all it does have 3 other operators going there.

The differences between what WJ was up to in 1996 and what New Leaf are trying to do are massive. I wouldn't even begin to list the top 10 fundamental mistakes they are making. If New Leaf hasn't learned from others, I'm not about to give them any insight.

If I had $10,000 for every start-up who choose to purposefully ignore virtually every strategy and practice that made the very small percentage of new entrant carriers successful in the Americas and Europe over the past 20 years, I'd be a very wealthy person.

I wish them luck, but I doubt luck will do them much good.

Don't be fooled by expansion announcements within a few weeks due to "overwhelming demand". The MO of these sorts of cash flow operations is to announce new routes so they can forward sell the largest inventory possible without having the expense of actually operating the flights, (ie operate 2 aircraft but sell 4 aircraft worth of forward inventory). In essence, its a ponzi scheme. Jetsgo did the same, but at least they operated and controlled their own lift, for better or worse.

I sincerely hope Flair and Enerjet don't buy into any New Leaf BS when the payments start to drag as they inevitably will. Fully allocated costs to operate a 737 per hour are probably close to $5,000 an hour these days so they can get in trouble very, very quickly, and then there's New Leaf's costs over and above this, and then a margin of some sort. I wouldn't like to see Jim or Tim's operation get flushed down the toilet as a result of this.

I can't think of a new entrant who's ever made this model work. Even DGN suffered a bankruptcy in his early days with a similar model using chartered lift from other companies. There were all kinds of problems that I won't go into. That mouthpiece Gabor Lukacs is actually on to something, but I won't delve into the details.

WJ looked at the sub charter model in the spring of 1995 to expedite a launch and immediately discarded it as an option as it was obviously not viable economic plan.

It's a dumb idea. If it was a viable scheme, you would have seen countless successful examples of it elsewhere.

[complexintentions]

Ahhh....now THAT's the Realitychex we all know and love! Prognosticating with confident arrogance on the cesspool that is the Canadian aviation industry.

Except, it's a bit like being able to predict an STD in a whorehouse.

Not really a towering achievement.

[Old fella]

Not being a member of the "airline fraternity" but speaking as an exclusive member of the joe six-pack travelling public, I am unable to see the benefit of using the services of this new entrant and what the advantage will be in doing so. Feel free to point out the error in my ways..... anybody.

[gonnabeapilot]

Another twist in the NewLeaf saga...

Unpaid bills raise concerns about NewLeaf Travel Co’s financial viability

KRISTINE OWRAM, FINANCIAL POST

Two consultants who have done work for NewLeaf Travel Co. Inc. say the discount travel company owes them tens of thousands of dollars, raising concerns about the airline’s financial position as it gets set to offer its first flights later this month.

Invoices and emails seen by the Financial Post indicate that NewLeaf owes two companies approximately $135,000 for a range of consulting work.

Both vendors, who asked not to be named for fear of business repercussions, said they agreed to do the work with the understanding that they would be paid by NewLeaf once the company had secured funding, but have not yet received a cent.

NewLeaf’s lawyer, Orvel Currie, said the company that retained the services of the consultants was technically not NewLeaf, but a numbered corporation with common shareholders, and there’s a dispute with both consultants over the services they provided.

However, both consultants say it was their understanding that they were performing work directly for NewLeaf — invoices are made out to NewLeaf Corp. and New Leaf Airways — and have received no complaints about their services.

Full article here: http://www.calgaryherald.com/unpaid+bil ... story.html

[Hessie jones]

Hi everyone, I passed this to Gabor Lukacs of Air Passenger Rights.

Do you want to post it on his Facebook page? https://www.facebook.com/groups/AirPassengerRights/

Also he is on Twitter: https://twitter.com/airpassrightsca

[Hessie jones]

I was one of the vendors that has yet to be paid by NewLeaf btw.

In addition to the Financial Post Article I also posted my story through CBC: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/newleaf ... -1.3666666

and CTV http://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/newleaf-accu ... -1.2976292

I do hope the public is aware of NewLeaf and who they're dealing with before they decide to purchase.