Island Air says aloha to Joplin

May 09, 2008 07:42 pm

— By Debby Woodin
dwoodin@joplinglobe.com
Suitcase? Check. Airplane ticket? Check. Hawaiian shirt? Check and recheck.
Joplin’s new airline service will sport a Hawaiian theme on its planes and its employees when it lands this summer.
The U.S. Department of Transportation has awarded a contract for Essential Air Service (EAS) at the Joplin Regional Airport to Island Air, a Hawaiian carrier that will expand to the mainland by serving Joplin and some of its EAS sister cities: Grand Island, Neb., and Harrison and Hot Springs, Ark.
“We want to bring our sense of Ohana to the community,” said Jeffrey Hartz, spokesman for Island Air. Ohana is the Hawaiian word for family.
“Our airline is like a family atmosphere,” he said. “We try to treat everybody like family. We like to treat our customers more like family than just customers.”
That includes bringing Island Air’s tropical-painted airplanes to Joplin, he said, and decking out employees in Hawaiian shirts.
“We don’t want to shy away from our heritage,” Hartz said. “We want to bring it as a unique market tool.”
The bid approved will provide three trips a day to and from Kansas City for an annual subsidy of $1.27 million to be paid by the federal government. Ticket prices were estimated in Island Air’s bid to be about $49 for a one-way fare, but that will be set when service starts and fuel costs are known.
City and airport officials had recommended a bid by another company, Mesaba Airlines, doing business as Northwest Airlink, for three trips a day to Memphis. That would have required a federal subsidy of $2.1 million a year.
Airport Manager Steve Stockam had said the Mesaba bid was preferred by he city because Northwest Airlink is a national-brand carrier that might make for easier transitions for passengers to connect to flights with other national airlines at Memphis. The company that is ending service to Joplin because it is liquidating, Mesa Airlines, is flying passengers to Kansas City.
“It will work fine,” Stockam said Friday of the Island Air service versus flights to Memphis. “We have already proven that the Kansas City service has revitalized our air-service issues.”
A third bidder for the Joplin service was Great Lakes Aviation, of McCook, Neb. That company proposed service to Kansas City at a cost of $671,977, but that option did not provide enough seats for the number of passengers using the Joplin airport, Stockam told the DOT.
Hartz said Island Air will serve Joplin with Dash 8 aircraft that are larger planes than those used by other carriers. The planes have a restroom and will be staffed with an attendant, he said.

Airline kickoff
Island Air will target late June to have plans and equipment in place to start airline service at the Joplin Regional Airport this summer, spokesman Jeffrey Hartz said.