Consultant Costs

As I have mentioned, the costs that we have incurred with IMG seem extremely high. First there was the $100,000 study, which although good, did not seem to worth this much money. Since that time, I have calculated that we have spent an additional $100,000 on IMG to help us attract commercial air service. How are they doing? You can not find any mention of them in any Airport Board Minutes. Maybe the status of these negotiations are done in Executive Sesssions, but we have not had any.

I read this story below about Tuscaloosa Regional Airport and how they have retained Boyd Consulting at a cost of $8,500 to do the same work as IMG? Here is the story:

TUSCALOOSA City leaders are banking on a Colorado consultant to help them restore commercial aviation to the Tuscaloosa Regional Airport.But why is Mike Boyd, owner and CEO of the Boyd Group in Evergreen, Colo., so excited about touting the city to prospective airlines?“Tuscaloosa makes me say that," Boyd said. “This is not some backwater, some sleepy little town.“You’re part of the global economy."

At the recommendation of Tuscaloosa Regional Airport Manager Wayne Cameron, the Tuscaloosa City Council voted Thursday to pay $8,500 for the Boyd Group to market the city and the airport to major airlines, like Delta, Northwest, Southwest and USAir, the four main air carriers that operate in the Southeast, Cameron said. He hopes to bring a commercial airline to Tuscaloosa.Cameron is currently compiling data on which companies in the Tuscaloosa area use air service. Once he’s gathered this information, the Boyd Group will use it to solicit one of the major airlines to set up shop at the airport.

If the Boyd Group -- which has tentatively set similar goals for Latrobe, Pa., and Marathon, Fla., -- is successful, it won’t be the first time commercial aviation has operated out of the Tuscaloosa Regional Airport.Two commercial airlines, American Eagle (an arm of American Airlines) and Atlantic Southeast Airway, which became Delta, were flying out of the airport as recently as the late 1990s.But changes in the airline industry forced them out of the Tuscaloosa market.

Boyd said that now, almost a decade later, Tuscaloosa’s a different place.“When you look at the economic impact of a Mercedes plant, that’s not miniscule," Boyd said.Boyd said he hopes to begin marketing to the major airlines by early 2007 at the latest.And while nothing is a “slam dunk," he said, the growth and success of Alabama and the Southeast U.S. in luring new industry will make it a lot easier to convince an air carrier to return