← The Code To Winning
The Code To Winning
BORN TO FLY: BREAKING BARRIERS IN AVIATION AND BUSINESS || ROBIN PETGRAVE || EPISODE 076
00:57:08
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- [00:00]
A
In fifth grade, instead of spending my lunch money on lunch, I would save it. And then after school, I'd get on the buses to see where they went. And I explored the whole Boston transit system. One day I wound up at Logan Airport and I'm seeing airplanes take off and land. And I thought that was the coolest thing ever. And then one day I saw a helicopter. And the helicopter came in, hovered above the ground, floated around the airport. So you see this little black kid running through the airport, went to college, got out of college, went to New York just to act. And then all the good jobs, all the big parts, I was getting little parts and commercials and TV shows and stuff. But all the big parts were here in la. They were all casted in Hollywood. So I'm like, I'm in the wrong place. So I moved out here to la. And then when I was out here, I went on a sightseeing flight. And the pilot was a guy that was about my age. And I was like, man, you must have joined the army when you were young, because, like, you healing about my age, I thought I'd be old when I could fly it. And the guy's like, no, you just paid and took lessons. I was like, you can do that? He said, yeah. I'm like, okay, well, hell, if you can do it, I can do it. And I opened up the phone books, right? Phone books. That was a long time ago. Like, you know, phone pages. Yeah, that was before. Like, cell phones and stuff. And I saw flight schools and I went there and I was like, so I could just pay and take lessons. And they said, yeah. And I was like, well, let's go. I had $2,000 credit on a credit card, and I wiped that thing down. Like I was in Vegas. I'm like, racking up. Let's go. A Matra for an entrepreneur, if you got something you love and you want to do it, you just start taking steps in that direction and things will place. And sure enough, a year later, I was teaching people to fly helicopters.
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B
When you have that mindset that if somebody can do it, we have the capability and we have unlimited potential to reach our full potential if we can dream and execute the dream as well. And I want to know, in the business side of things, when you are running all these companies, how did you acquire your first helicopter? Where was the financing and backing behind that?
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A
Well, see, that's the thing. A lot of people get stuck when they, you know, going to pursue an entrepreneurial goal, right? They think, where do I get the financing? How do I, how do I, how do I, how do I. Like I said, like, when I wanted to be a pilot, the guy was telling me, do you know how much it's going to cost? And I'm like, whatever. I mean, it's nice to have an idea.
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B
How many hours would I need if I want a helicopter license or, like, qualification to fly?
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A
The minimum you need to get a private pilot's license is about 40 hours. Most people do in about 54 to 65 hours.
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B
Would you say because you've flown for so long that sometimes it may bring an level of too much confidence?
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A
Overconfidence is one of the biggest killers of all pilots. Right? And that's the thing that you have to look for at the level of.
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B
The code to winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow. Today we have a very unique guest. It's going to be a very exciting interview. We have a gentleman who is the founder of Celebrity Helicopter out here in Los Angeles, ranked number one helicopter tour by National Geographic. We're going to find out a bit more about the industry. We're going to find out a lot about, like, what he does. Like I said, again, this is a podcast for business and entrepreneurship. So we are excited to actually learn a bit more with Robin Petgrave. Welcome to the studio, sir.
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A
Thank you for having me.
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B
Awesome stuff. I like. I like stories, I like journeys. Obviously, you and I both pursuing our own version of, like, the American dream, coming out the country as well. Can you tell us a bit more about your background as well?
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A
I was originally born in Jamaica. I lived there until I was 10, and then I moved to Boston, Massachusetts. I grew up there. And then after that, you know, I went to college in Connecticut and everything. But there's a whole. There's a whole bunch of stories with me. It's not quite that simple. We were very poor in Jamaica. We came to Belmont. We're the only black people in the whole town. And in the mornings, I used to see buses that we have trackless trolleys, you know, electric buses. And I used to see them go that way and this way. And I always wondered, how do they turn around? You can't just bust a U turn. So in fifth grade, instead of spending my lunch money on lunch, I would save it. And then after school, I'd get on the buses to see where they went. And I explored the whole Boston transit system. One day, I wound up at Logan Airport and I'm seeing airplanes take off and land. And I thought that was the coolest thing ever and then one day, I saw a helicopter. And the helicopter came in, hovered above the ground, floated around the airport. So you see this little black kid running through the airport to see where this thing was going. It landed, and then a blonde gets out. I'm like, annette's got a blonde? And then she gets into the building, the guy gets back in, the helicopter floats up in the air again and just flies off like Superman. And I thought that was the coolest thing I ever saw.
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B
Wow.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And is that what sparked up your interest and to pursue this specific career path for yourself?
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A
Yeah, so I, you know, of course, you know, you go to school and you get into middle school, and you get in high school and career days and, hey, so what do you want to. What do you want to do? And I'm like, well, you know, I don't want a job where I have to sit inside all day. I want a job where you got to go do stuff, you know? So I'm like. And I'm thinking about all the cool jobs, right? I'm like, oh, being a cop would be kind of cool. I'm like, wait, no, they get shot. Like, oh, firemen. That would be. No, they get burnt up. I'm like, all the cool jobs are dangerous. So they were like, yeah, but, you know, if you could do anything, what would you want to do? And I'm like, you know, when I was in fifth grade, I went to this airport and I saw this helicopter, and that was really, really cool. How can I do that? And they all told me you had to join the military and you had to do rotc and then four years of college and an officer training school and then flight training school, and you could wash out at any time if you, you know, don't pass all the tests and stuff. And then you owe the military four years. They told me all this stuff, and I was like, oh, no, no, that's not gon work. Because, you know, I question authority. Like, if you telling me to do something, you know, I'll say, why? To make sure it's a good reason, you know, and if it's not a good reason, I'm not going to do it. That doesn't work in the military. When they tell you to march, you march, you know. So I. I said, well, then, you know, I can't do that, so forget about that. So I decided, you know, well, I'm going to go to college, so I got to get a scholarship, and I could run fast, but other kids could run faster. So I'm like, okay, so what am I going to do? How am I going to get a scholarship to college? Because my family is very poor. So I'm like, well, I got to get a scholarship, so I got to be better than everybody. So if some people are naturally born stronger than you or faster than you, you just make yourself stronger. So I just trained like crazy and I tore up the track and field world. I have records that I made in high school that are still there. In 1979 and 80, 81, I got a scholarship. I went to the University of Connecticut. I made records there that are still there. And you know, so after I got out of college, I was pursuing acting because I was acting already in, in high school. I was doing commercials and modeling. I didn't know what I wanted to do, so I just did everything right. Went to college, got out of college, went to New York just to act. And then all the good jobs, all the big parts, I was getting little parts and commercials and TV shows and stuff. But all the big parts were here in, in la. They were all casted in Hollywood. So I'm like, I'm in the wrong place. So I moved out here to la, and then when I was out here, I went on a sightseeing flight and the pilot was a guy that was about my age. And I was like, man, you must have joined the army when you were young, cuz like you, you my age. I, I thought I'd be old when I could fly. And the guy's like, no, you just paid and took lessons. I was like, you can do that? He said, yeah. I'm like, okay, well, hell, if you can do it, I can do it. And I opened up the phone books, right? Phone books. That was a long time ago. Like, you know, phone yellow pages. Yeah, that was before, like cell phones and stuff. And I saw flight schools and I went there and I was like, so I could just pay and take lessons? And they said, yeah. And I was like, well, let's go. I had $2,000 credit on a credit card. I whacked that thing down like I was in Vegas. I'm like, rack them up, let's go. And the guy was like, you know it's going to cost way more than that. And I said to him, okay, look, do you know how many things in my life I've done just because I went to college because everybody else was going to college? I graduated high school because everybody else is graduating high school. I've done all these things just because now I have something that I want to Do. I said, I have no idea how I'm going to pay for it. I just know I'm going to pay for it. And I mean, that's like a mantra for an entrepreneur. If you got something you love and you want to do it, you just start taking steps in that direction and things will fall into place. And sure enough, a year later, I was teaching people to fly helicopters and I was working as a full time flight instructor.
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B
Awesome. And do you kind of, do you balance that with running your business right now? Or you completely shifted into running your business as a helicopter but a pilot?
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A
Oh, no. So like I said, there's stories, but I was working as a flight instructor and the guy that I was working for wanted me to fly a helicopter that didn't have the right maintenance. I said, no, I'm not going to do that.
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B
Too risky.
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A
Questioning authority. And he told his mechanic, take your time doing it because I know he needs money. So we'll punish him for not breaking the law like we asked him to.
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B
Wow.
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A
I was like, oh. So I started a helicopter company right next to him. I went to a company that I knew that had brand new helicopters that they were looking for leases for and they were going to make all this money off of them. And I said to them, you know, while you're waiting for these leases, I could take one of those helicopters down to the airport that I work at and I could start teaching the rest of my students to fly. And then I'll pay you more money per hour than, you know, your lease will. And when someone decides they want this helicopter for a lease, you could take it back anytime you want. And they were like, well, while it's sitting out there, it's not making us any money, so all right, yeah, you can do that. They agreed to let me use one of their helicopters. And that's how it all started. I kept flying it, I kept making money, I kept paying them a lot of money. And my first flight school was started. It was called Bravo Helicopters and Wing. It was in Torrance. And it grew to be the largest African American aviation company in North America. I was rocking 16 helicopters, 12 airplanes, five stretch limousine, 20 exotic rental cars. I owned three houses. I mean, it was a huge. I had 22 full time pilots working for me. I was on Oprah, I was Black Enterprise, Ebony, Essence magazines, they even wrote a book called the New Color of Success. They called me the fly guy.
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B
Let's go.
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A
So it was really huge, right? And because I was on all these things, teachers would see it and say, hey, you know, can you come to our school for career day? And I'm like, the first school that asked me was the 96th Street School. And they're like, yeah, we're in Watts. I'm like, watts? Yes. And they're like, it's really bad part of town. I'm like, dude, I came from Jamaica. You talking about bad parts of town. I was like, yeah, okay. What time do you want me to come there? And they're like, well, school starts at 8. And I was like, 8 in the morning? And I'm like, traffic.
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B
That.
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A
I'm thinking traffic. You know, they're thinking, I think it's dangerous. And so I'm like, how big is your playground? And they said, well, it's pretty big. I'm like, okay, I'll come. And so I made arrangements with Caltrans, got all the permits, and 8 o' clock in the morning, they brought the whole school out. And all these kids are sitting around, and this helicopter comes flying by first. You know, the gates open up, all these stretch limousines pull in. And the kids like, oh, is P. Did he come in? What's. What's going on? The limos pull in, these exotic cars pull in. All these guys get out. Then this helicopter goes flying by, only this time it comes and it lands in the schoolyard. And when it lands in the schoolyard, I get out of the helicopter, I shut off the helicopter, I get out, I walk to the stage, and I get on the mic. I'm like, hey, it's great to be here. And the kids are still looking at the helicopter. And finally this one little kid raises his hand and I go, yes. And he goes, when's the pilot getting out? And I was like, I am the pilot. And the kids are looking at me like they just saw a unicorn. They're like, you the pilot? I said, yeah, not only am I the pilot, I own the helicopter and those limos and all these guys work for me. And. And they were like, well. And they were just like, that's the coolest thing we ever seen. And I said, wait, do you guys think I'm telling you this because I think I'm cool? No, I'm telling you this because I didn't even think, think or figure out that I could do any of this until I was 27, after I got out of college. That's when I decided to follow my. My real dream, right? And I said to him, if you guys start right now, while you're in elementary school, don't think about what job you want. When you get out of school, think about what you like to do, whatever it is you like to do, your most favorite thing you could do, like if you won the lottery, what would you do? And make that your job, make that your career. Because whatever it is you like to do, somebody will pay you to do it. If you like. Right? You know, the kids, I like riding roller coasters. I'm like, I did the Magic Mountain commercial. All those people riding that roller coaster for what, two hours? They got paid 750 bucks each. I'm flying a helicopter over to do what I like and they're all getting paid doing what they like, riding a roller coaster. Whatever it is you like to do, whether it's sleeping, eating, shopping, traveling, doing podcasts, doing whatever it is you like to do, there's a way to get paid to do it. That's an entrepreneur. Forget about what job you want. Think about, you asked me, when do you have a day off? And I'm like, my job is my day off.
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B
Love that.
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A
Like if I, if I won the lottery, I'd be doing the same I was doing yesterday. I'd be doing, I just have more helicopters and more stuff and be able to help more people. So, yeah. So anyways, I decided wouldn't the ultimate entrepreneur be a person that is making other people entrepreneur. Make that your job. So I got rid of my company and formed a museum called Tomorrow's Aeronautical Museum at the Compton Airport. And that thing, we've had eight kids, set 15 aviation world records. Because I thought about all those kids at that school, right? They had no idea that school is actually practiced for the future. You know, going to class on time. Why? Well, like for example, if I didn't come here on time, would I be on, on your podcast? No. Right. So kids like, oh, I'm like, it's, it's practice for the future. And once you put things in that kind of perspective for kids, the grades went through the roof, attendance, perfect attendance, the fighting, the black on brown fighting, all that stuff stopped because I explained it to kids in a way they understood. So I said, okay, well, I'm gonna make that my job. And so my museum kids from all over LA would come to the airport and I make them do homework, I make them wash airplanes, I make them sweep handle, do customer service things, you know, show people around the museum. And for that I taught them to fly starting at 8. So I had 8 year old kids that could actually fly an airplane better than most adults. And I had kids fly Airplanes around the country. I had a little 15 year old girl. She came to us when she was 12, wanted to be a cardiovascular surgeon. I was like, what the hell is that? And she wound up flying when she was 15, one of our airplanes from Compton all the way across the country to Newport News, Virginia, where we had. She was 15.
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B
She flew that far?
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A
Yeah. She had a Tuskegee Airman in the back. All of our airplanes are painted red tails. Because I wanted to let people know about the Tuskegee Airmen because most people had no idea. I met him in an airfare, all right. And I didn't even know their history. And so I wanted to bring that to light. Everywhere she stopped, Tuskegee Airmen came and met her autographed airplane. It made every news market in the country, if not the world. Essence magazine labeled her one of the top 25 most influential African Americans because of that trip.
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B
That is so powerful.
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A
Yeah. What's powerful? Now she's doing her residency at Cedar Cyanide Hospital to be a neurosurgeon.
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B
So she's still fulfilling her dream.
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A
Yeah. She decided being a neurosurgeon would be more difficult than being a cardiovascular surgeon. So she's now pursuing a career of being a neurosurgeon.
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B
It's all in the mind. She believes she can literally achieve her dreams and get what she wants as well. And I'm so grateful you shared that beautiful story. It's just so powerful because when you have that mindset that if somebody can do it, we have the capability and we have unlimited potential to reach our full potential if we can dream and execute the dream as well. And I want to know, in the business side of things, when you are running all these companies, how did you acquire your first helicopter? Where was the financing and backing behind that?
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A
Well, see, that's the thing. A lot of people get stuck when they gonna pursue an entrepreneurial goal, right. They think, where do I get the financing? How do I, how do I, how do I, how do I. Like I said, like, when I wanted to be a pilot, the guy was telling me, do you know how much it's gonna cost? And I'm like, whatever. I mean, it's nice to have an idea, but I just know one foot in front of the other. Just, you know, every time you get an opportunity, take it and keep moving in that direction, and sooner or later you'll get there. And like the kids that come to the museum, we've. We've mentored and trained thousands of kids. I mean, we've Exposed hundreds of thousands of kids to aviation through airfares, outreach programs that we've done. You know, I ran that museum for 24 years, right. So we had a huge impact. In fact, when you go to the Smithsonian museum in Washington, D.C. they have a display called Black Wings. It's about African Americans achievement in aviation. And the last two entries, that girl that I was talking to you about and me for the present pinnacle of achievement of African Americans in aviation and for the future, because of what I've done and how many kids I've impacted. But when these kids, a lot of them decide to, almost all of them decide to be an entrepreneur. That doesn't mean working for yourself. It just means finding what you like to do and getting paid to do it. It could be working for somebody else doing it. That's perfectly fine.
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B
Exactly.
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A
But the one thing that I tell them is, you know, there are so many people with resources that are apathetic, lazy, don't know what to do, or looking for an opportunity to expand those resources. And all of these people are looking for somebody who's hungry, who's got the legs, who's got the youth and the ability to make those people money. And they will let you use their resources to make you both money. So you don't necessarily, necessarily have to have a lot of money. You just have to find and associate with people with that money. You have to find and associate with people that want to do those things. You know, so let's say you like aviation, hang around with aviation people, you know, and there are people like you want to, you want to be a pilot or you want to learn to fly. There's people who have airplanes that are just sitting in their hangar. Aircraft, when they're just sitting, they devolve. They, they. Airplanes break just from sitting there. You need to exercise them. You need to know, take them out and you got to fly them to keep all the, the, the seals lubricated and everything moving so rust doesn't happen and all those things, right? So there are people that have airplanes that, you know, after a while, it's a pain in the butt to go all the way down the airport, pull it out, clean it, check it, fly it, put it away and all that stuff. But that airplane still needs to be exercised. There's your opportunity. So if you meet one of these people and say, well, can I exercise your airplane? Yeah. Even though you're getting the flight time and the training and all that stuff, you're doing them a favor. And if you're telling Them, well, I can start flying other people and I can charge those people and give you some of that money. Well, that's how you get your first airplane. And so now you're both making money. And then once you're paying them and, and doing the regular thing like with my first company, the lease payments that I was paying that guy, I had no problems paying him more than he would get on a normal lease because I didn't have to give him deposit down payment one month. I didn't have to do any of that stuff. He just let me use it. So I paid him a lot. Well, when the bank saw how much I was paying them, they're like, you know, if you own that helicopter, your payments would be a fifth of that. And I'm like, really? So then they say, well, we see your history. You've been paying this guy this much for this many years, why don't you pay it to us? And then you wind up owning the helicopter. I'm like, that's a great idea. I never even thought of that. And then that's how I started owning helicopters.
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B
And how much was your first one?
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A
The, actually the first helicopter was a Robinson R22. It was at the time they were selling for 116,000. And now that same helicopter is like 250,000.
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B
Okay. Because I've never really like figured the pricing for what helicopter is. Obviously you see like sometimes private jets and so forth. So I was just trying to figure out like that, that amount for that. What would you say is like a good range for a helicopter? If somebody wants to start like a.
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A
Good cheap one again, you could buy a helicopter. A good. Okay, there's, there's two place helicopter. Those are good for flight training and for like maybe aerial photography where you take one person and you fly. It's limited, right, but they're not as expensive as something that's more useful like a four place helicopter. A helicopter with four seats that can carry a pilot plus three people. And then you have a lot more uses you can do with it. You could do sightseeing flights, you could do the same aerial photography, you can still do the same flight training, but you charge more per hour, you get more per hour, it costs you more per hour. But the, the margin from what it costs you to what you can make on it is significantly higher than the 2 seat. The 2 seat is a lot less expensive to get into. So you could buy a good two seat helicopter with maybe half time left on it for probably about maybe 150, 180,000 now, because new there are about 250, maybe 280,000. And then, you know, in 2200 hours, you overhaul it, and then it's good for another 2200 hours and so forth and so on. But again, if you're starting a business, it's not a good idea to buy them right away because you're tying up a lot of capital. You're using a lot of money with credit that you could be using for working capital to purchase the equipment. So in the beginning, for almost any company, it's easier just to lease the equipment than it is to buy it. Once you start establishing your customers and you start establishing your cash flow so you can see what kind of money is coming in now you can budget and decide to go ahead and start purchasing things. And plus it, it usually takes you a little while. By the time you figure that out, you will have had enough track record to actually develop some credit to where you can finance it. And then there's lots of people that'll finance based on what your credit is, based on what kind of assets you have as collateral, but they'll also finance you based on your cash flow. If you have a lot of receivables where you know you got a certain amount of money coming in, well, they figure, well, you know, there's a certain amount that they're willing to risk because you have receivables that they can attach if you decide you're not going to pay them. So when you're starting a business, don't think, I'm going to go buy a helicopter. Just think, okay, let's find the least expensive helicopter or airplane that we can lease and lease that, and use that as your stepping stone towards purchase.
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B
So obviously the concept of arbitrage, which I kind of like what you touched on, and you obviously touched on the funding portion as well, but you also stressed on the importance of, to summarize, networking, because you're finding out the people that have hangers that need to get their equipment out there, and you can end up trying to negotiate and leverage and try and like, you know, add value by paying them and so forth as well as well, for those people that may be watching a young, young person, young male or man or woman, whatever it may be, they feel inadequate, shy they getting out their comfort zone is such a stretch. What advice would you give them? Because, like, I just asked you three questions and it's already such a fun podcast because you just have the natural, contagious and exciting personality that I'm like, Just shut this darn laptop down. Let's have a conversation. Because I've hardly asked anything yet. But for advice for those, what would you say they should do because you've achieved so much success? But what advice would you give for them if they don't have the same personality trait that you have?
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A
Well, it's not necessarily a personality trait and it's not necessarily a trick, but people like to be around people that they wish they were or people that are kind. If you go around being abusive, abrasive, just obnoxious and annoying, nobody wants to hang around with you, right? I've found that people, especially people who've achieved success where they own a lot of assets or own things that you might need, they get inspired and they respond when they see that you're kind. If you are just. I mean, some people call it being nice, but if you're just nice to other people and just kind to other people, it's contagious. That stuff comes back to you. So when I got my flight instructor certificate, I wanted to go and, you know, work. And the first few people I talked to, they're like, no, we don't have any spots open for flight instructors. And I was like, okay, all right, cool. And then I went down to Torrance and I went to a place and, you know, I looked out there, they had two helicopters. And I said, how many flight instructors you have? And they said, we have two flight instructors. And I said, oh, okay, cool. And they were like, well, we don't have many students. And I go, okay, but is there a possibility that maybe, like, I could come and maybe just, you know, hang out and see if I can find some students? And they said, well, but yeah, sure, but there's no students. So yeah, but you can come and hang out and, you know, we'll let you use the helicopter if you can find some students. And I said, okay, great. And so next morning, 8 o' clock in the morning, I'm there. And they were like, why are you here at 8 o' clock in the morning? And I said, oh, well, because I'm here to work. They said, well, there's no students. And I said, well, okay, but you know, I could be home watching tv. And there's no way I'm going to fly with somebody that day. But if I'm here at 8 o' clock in the morning, I might fly with somebody this day. And even if there's no students, at least I can help you guys out. So, you know, if you guys need some sweeping, I could do that because I could be home watching tv, not doing anything, but there's no opportunities there. But if I'm here, I'll help you out. And then, you know, it'll give me something to do while I'm waiting to meet some students. And so I'm like, I want to learn everything, so let me go down and help the mechanics with whatever they need. You don't. You're not a mechanic. How can you help us? Well, let me clean up your shop. Let me, like, sweep some stuff around. Do you need some tools? What? And I was just like. I was the obnoxious person that wanted to help everybody. And they're like, who the hell is this guy? And I'm like, hi. And then so, you know, the people at the time, most of the people that were there were flying airplanes, and they would see me helping out, answering, you know, answering the phones, helping people with their. Bringing stuff to their car or whatever, and they're like, what. What. What is with you? What do you do? And I'm like, I fly helicopters. And they're like, well, what's that like? And I'm like, oh, well, helicopter is really, really cool. I mean, airplanes are cool, but you haven't seen cool till you've been in a helicopter. And actually, if you want to check it out, I tell you what, you don't even have to pay for me. If you just pay for the helicopter, I'll take you for a little spin in it. And I bet you. I bet you money when we land, you'll think it's cool, too. And they're like, I don't know about that, but come on, man. You're not even paying for me. Just pay for the helicopter. I bet you money almost 90% of those people wound up being my students. At the time, they had two instructors, two helicopters sitting there. By the time I was done that first year, I gave 1400 hours of flight instruction, which is unheard of.
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B
Unbelievable.
- [29:45]
A
I mean, I was literally giving instruction eight hours a day. I mean, that's how many students I had. Their helicopters was flying like crazy. They're like, how. How are you doing this? I'm like, what's easy? I'm like, I like flying. And people want to know why I'm so happy about it. Like, well, come on, I'll show you. I take them flying. And that's so. In other words, if you're at an airport and there's a guy there and he's got an airplane, and if you go up to them and Say, hey, man, can I fly airplane? That's never going to happen because that's everybody hitting up because they want stuff. But if you're like, hey, when you wash your airplane, is there any way I can come and help you dry it off or clean it or whatever? I just want to know everything about it that's your way in. Because they're like, well, that's kind of nice. Yeah, sure, come on, you can help me. People respond and will give to you if you're giving to them. You know what I mean? And when you don't have money, you have the ability to do work, you can give your time, you can give your attention, you can give your labor. And if you do that, it usually comes back to you twofold or tenfold or more.
- [30:48]
B
That's such an important lesson because often people feel like you need to have money to start something. But you, you have a talent, and that's, that's the beginning. You can always give a service as well. And, and I often believe in that concept as well. It's, there's, there's a phrase in African language that just by translating it, in other words, just give freely without expecting anything, and then you would get blessed by whatever. You may believe in a higher power, something tenfold as well. And I couldn't agree more with that, without the expectation of that. Of course, in business aspect, you have to make it profitable in, in some way or another. But there's always ways where you can get without expecting. And so I completely agree with them. Which kind of goes now to upscaling. Now, now, before we even touch on upscaling, what's the. How many hours would I need if I want a helicopter license or like qualification to fly?
- [31:42]
A
The minimum you need to get a private pilot's license is about 40 hours. Most people doing about 54 to 65 hours. That's to get a license to fly around people, your friends, whatever. But you can't really get paid to do it. They can share your expenses, but you can't really get paid to do it.
- [31:57]
B
And to fly people.
- [31:58]
A
Yeah, that's. What's your private pilot's license? Okay, Once you get a total of 150 hours worth of flight time, then you can get your commercial license. And when you get your commercial license now you can get paid to be a pilot. So you can do things like aerial photography, you can do things like survey, you can fly and look for, you know, you can do those kinds of things. You can flight instruct, you can get a flight instructor certificate. When you get your commercials license. And so now you can get paid to teach other people to fly, which is really good, because when you're teaching people to fly, it's not that they're trying to kill you, it's just that they're trying to kill you. So you get really, really good at flying a helicopter really, really, really quick. And so it builds up your skill level in a very short period of time. But, you know, one of the things that, that. That I include in everything people ask. Well, I tell people I'm kind of a perfectionist, and I'm not a perfectionist, meaning that, you know, everything has to be absolutely perfect. But it's like when I'm a pilot, whatever it is I'm doing, track and field, whatever, I have to make sure that I can do it as best as possible, that I could do it. My goal is always to be better than everybody else, which is my philosophy. A lot of people think, well, you know, there's competition, there's other companies, and, you know, if we could get rid of all the other helicopter companies, then you'd be making so much more money. And I'm like, no, the competition is good, and it doesn't matter how many of them there are out there. You have to be the best one. You have to be the best at it, because people will go to them, they'll find you, and they'll keep coming back to you. And it's like, with my company now, I. I teach that to all of our pilots, and I've taught that to everybody that I've trained to fly. And the safety record is incredible. I've been flying for 36 years. No incidents, never injured anybody. In 36 years, I have over 26,000 hours of flying. Most guys when they retire from the airline, they have about 20,000 hours. I have over 26,000 hours. No injuries, no, no, nothing. Right. Because when I fly, it's a whole different experience flying with me. And that's what you hear if you go online and look at the Google reviews and whatever, you'll find time and time and time again, people keep saying that flying with me is the best experience they've had in their life. And that's, you know, okay. But when you consider the people that are saying that is like, you know, I fly, I fly Janet Jackson, I fly Rihanna, I fly. I mean, I fly Roddy Ricch, YG, Dr. Dre, I fly all of these people. And time and time and time again, those are the comments that we get. And even with our tours Our average customer will fly with us four times. They'll do four different tours. Countless times. People like, man, I flew with you like 10 years ago for my wedding. Just on the way over here, I stopped in to see our accountant and she's like, hey, we just had our 15 year anniversary. You flew us down to Anaheim Hills and we were flying between the canyons and all this stuff. We never forgot that we did that on our right after. I was like, wow. And we leave a vivid memory in people's minds and the, the word of mouth referrals. Like when I started flight instruction, most of the students I got was from the other students telling them how cool everything was and what it was like getting trained by this guy. Because I'm like, you know, here's the thing. When I train you, you're going to be flying better than me because I've learned a whole bunch, a lot, a bunch of things during this journey. And I'm starting you off by teaching you those things right from the get go. So however good you think I fly, you're gonna actually be able to fly better because you're, you're starting off from where I am right now. So you're going to be trained as best as you could fly because whatever it is you got in you, I'm gonna bring it out. And so people really responded to that.
- [36:21]
B
You know when you speak about experience, when you say the 26,000 hours, I can't remember obviously was in helicopter pilot, but there was a commercial pilot that landed in Hudson. Is it Captain Phillips?
- [36:32]
A
Sully. Captain.
- [36:33]
B
Captain Sully. Sorry. Yeah. So obviously I watched that and often. And my dad and I, we recently. My parents and I recently watched the. When they came over to visit me, like for the first time in a year. We watched the one for Denzel Washington and flight.
- [36:47]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [36:48]
B
And so in both cases, experience ended up coming more into play rather than like the handbook. Because many people try to do exactly what they did and things actually, you know, end up becoming a failure. Would you say because you've flown for so long that sometimes it may bring a level of too much confidence?
- [37:11]
A
Oh, yeah. So overconfidence is one of the biggest killers of all pilots. Right. And that's the thing that you have to look for at the level of proficiency that I have paramount when I first started training is that's one of the things that you're taught right from the get go is about being overconfident. There's a saying that they have. You know, you talk about your South African saying, we have one. There's old pilots and there's bold pilots, but there's no old bold pilots because you're overconfident. It's gonna bite you, right? And that's the thing that you have to look for all the time. So when I fly, you have to constantly monitor not only the aircraft, but yourself, right? Most places that you're flying for will have a chief pilot or director of operations that monitors the pilots. And if a pilot starts doing stuff, you know, that's, that's reckless or things like that, they'll, you know, sit down and talk with them or you know, things like that. But when you own the company, you have to self monitor all the time. And before with my, my first company, the atmosphere, working there, the pilots loved it, right? And they would literally work seven days a week. And I had to make a company rule that they had to take off at least one day a week and they would take off the day a week and they'd still come to the office and hang out. And I'm like. Because it was just such an environment that they love being in, they love flying, right? And so they get to go down the airport and hang out and be with their friends and the other flight instructors and students. And it was like a big family. And I was just like, that was one of the ways that I had to monitor them. But with me, I have to definitely watch myself. And I've had a, a whole life of being able to do things that other people think are impossible or they think that I'm better than other people. Like for example, when I was in college, right, I used to do every event in track and field. The only event that I never did in track and field was a two mile run because I hated running the distance. But you know, when I did the decathlon, I'd have to do the mileage and I'd be complaining the whole time. Like literally in the race, my team used to run up to the track to listen to me as I ran by, because I'd be cussing the whole way. I'd be beating everybody, but I'd be cussing because I hated that race, right? And so when I go to track meets, my coach would never let me know what events I was going to do. And when you're in college, you're not limited. Like in high school where you can only do three events in a meet. In college you can do as many events as you can do, right? So, so when I'd go, I'd show up at the track meet in the morning, having no idea what events I was going to do. And the coach would never tell me because eventually I would tell one of my teammates, and eventually the other team would find out, and then they try and take whoever their best athlete, they take them out of that race because they knew if they left them in the race, I would destroy him. So my coach would never tell me what event. So I would be there, and he'd say, hey, you're doing the hurdles. Okay, great. I'd go on the hurdles and I'd run it trials. So we'd have competitions in, like. There was a Connecticut Intercollegiate Championship. I remember this one vividly. And I wound up doing seven events. Normally, at all the big championship meets, I would do seven events. When you think about it, trials, quarters, semis, finals. That's like the. All the sprint, have that. The jumps. And. And I would do seven events. And literally in the Connecticut Intercollegiate Championships, the only team that scored more points than I did was my team, because I was on it. And Yale University. Those are the only two teams that scored more points than me. Me, personally, beat every other team that showed up at this big championship. And it was like. And I was mad at the end because I was like, you know, I should have gotten. I know I got a second in that one, and I got like four first places, like two seconds. And I was mad because I. I thought I should have gotten all. All of them should have been first place. And I was mad the whole time. And they're like, what are you doing? So my point is, I've done things that other people have watched, and they think, wow, that's. That's so good. And me, I never get a chance to. To gloat or to think I'm good because I know what I was shooting for. I'm like, you might think that that was good, but I wanted to beat all of the colleges there. And because I didn't beat all of the colleges, I didn't live up to my expectations. So although you think it's good, I'm not overconfident because I didn't get as far as I wanted to get. You know what I mean? So thank you very much. But I live me, I know me. I'm not doing what I need to do yet. I got to work even harder.
- [42:12]
B
That's powerful. So now. So you were the Jesse Owens of high school?
- [42:17]
A
Pretty much.
- [42:18]
B
Pretty much, no. What has been the most rewarding experience or rewarding thing that's happened for you? Being a helicopter Pilot in Los Angeles in your career so far?
- [42:35]
A
Well, okay. There's been a lot of different things that are rewarding things that I like to do. Right when I'm doing production work, movies, that's like, that's my thing because that's what my workload is to the point of where I actually feel like I have to concentrate. You know what I mean? Because other stuff is so easy for me, just because I've been doing it for so, so long and I'm really adept at multitasking. Like, for example, the, the U.S. bank Tower. I've done movies where I've landed on top of there. There's a movie called Dragon and Dragon wars, and when we did the movie, the Santa Ana Winds are Blowing, and it was literally 70 miles an hour of winds going through LA, so not many helicopters were flying that day, period. And I'm on top of that building doing a movie, doing these maneuvers with the helicopter. And, but, but I know what the conditions are. I know what the helicopter is capable of. So for me, it was like child's play. But that was, it was really good because I had another production pilot that was with me and he was looking at me like, I can't believe you just are able to do that. And I'm just like, you know, so that's, that's a compliment. Even though they didn't even know they were giving me a compliment. Right over there, the building that says Ion. Yeah, yeah. I've literally landed in the streets doing a movie with Chico DeBarge where I had to fly down the streets between the stop lights and the light poles, bank a 90 degree turn to go down another street with an. A star helicopter, really big helicopter, literally right over there. We got permits and did everything and it was all, I mean, like, that was really cool when you get Chico DeBarge and the directors saying, you know, they said we couldn't do it, but you're doing it. So those things are really rewarding. When I do production work because, you know, you're, you're not only dealing with the helicopter, you're dealing with the actors, you're dealing with whoever it is you're interacting with on the ground. You're dealing with the director who wants a certain thing. You want the director of photography who wants a certain look or certain angle that the helicopter has to be in. You're dealing with, you know, the FAA or other aircraft that are flying with you. If you have to interact with a vehicle or something, you're. You're doing all of Those things at the same time. And to me, I'm like, I'm still playing my music and having a good time, and that's my workload. Those things are tremendously rewarding for me because those. I feel that they're a test of my skill set, because it's not just flying the helicopter, it's flying a helicopter and interacting and coordinating with all of those other elements. And that's when I really have to concentrate. But things that are, like, really rewarding, like I'm flying Janet Jackson out to Michael's ranch and landing there, and. And every time I land, the SUV pulls up. Michael's in the back, he winds down the window. He's like, hey, what's it like flying in the helicopter? I'm like, he asked me this every time I come out here, you know, and he's like, come on, let's go inside. And so we go inside the house, we're sitting there with Michael and his kids and stuff, and we're talking and, and, and joking around about stuff. And you're like, going, when I was a kid, I used to watch you on tv. And, you know, when I was a kid, I used to think to myself, you know, I bet you he doesn't have a whole lot of friends because he's Michael Jackson. I mean, he's so famous. I mean, how does he go to a, like a movie or to a department store? I bet you when he walks into, like, a Walmart, everybody goes nuts because he's Michael Jackson. How does he do anything? I bet you he has a hard time finding friends. This is me at like 12, 13 years old saying, you know, if I met Michael Jackson, I would be his friend. And so you think things like that when you're a kid, right? And it's so weird when you're flying a helicopter and especially when you have the level of proficiency that I do in the, the recognition and the, the word of mouth that I do. I find myself in these positions where I'm like, there's no real. No way, no reason why I'm supposed to be here. I'm hanging out with Michael Jackson, a guy who I said if I met him, I would be his friend. And I'm now in his house and he's thinking, I'm cool. I was like, what? You know, when I'm doing movies with, you know, John Travolta and stuff, they're when, when the shooting day's over, they're like, hey, Robin, can you fly us to Vegas? And I'm like, yeah, Mr. Travolta. Yeah. I mean, it's. It's just so weird where when you're doing movies, I've met people that I have no business meeting. And I've gotten respect from people that are, I mean, incredible people. And they think I'm cool because I can do stuff that they can't, right? So rewarding is, to me is just like, I'll show you some videos on my phone and stuff. But when you see the people that I hang out with, I mean, okay, so Ebony magazine, they selected me as the Power 100, the 100 most influential African Americans, right? So I go to this thing and I'm in there, and when I'm sitting there, Magic Johnson, everybody thinks that they're really cool, right? Al Sharpton's there, all these people are there. What's it? Nick Cannon's dj? And everybody's there. Everybody thinks they're cool. And then Magic Johnson gets off the elevator, and everybody goes, whoa, that Magic Johnson, man. Man. And then I was there with my wife. My wife said to me, she goes, don't you fly him? And I said, yeah. And she goes, well, shouldn't you go over there and try and say hi to him like everybody else is? And I'm. I mean, that wasn't being a smart ass, but I kind of am always being a smart ass. So I'm like, nah, just wait till he sees me. And then right after I say that, all the way across the room, Magic Johnson looks up and he sees me, and he goes, hey, Robin. Hey, man, come here. And I'm like. So I go walk over to Magic Johnson, and the crowd is moving apart. And in the beginning, when I was there, they're all looking at me like, who is this guy? And now they see me walking over to Magic Johnson, and they're all like, who is this guy? I get over to Magic Johnson, and Magic goes, cookie, this is my pilot, Robin. And Cookie goes, oh, yeah, he talks about you all the time. And I'm sitting here going, okay. And then the. The show starts going, and the Jackson 5 come out on stage and they start performing. And then I'm looking around the room and I keep seeing all these people. And I was like, you know, I could take out my phone and I could blow up all these people's cell phones because I have their phone numbers. And I'm sitting there going, how does this happen? Well, it happens because when you have something that you like to do and you're determined to be the best at it, that kind of Work ethic turns into success, it turns into money, it turns into fame, and it's contagious for everybody around to want to get with you. You know what I mean?
- [49:50]
B
I love that, you know, with that whole story, because I usually ask people towards the end, what does winning mean to them? And I think you just tied it up by just talking about the happiness there, which I want to skip that question now, but I know people have listened to this for like about 50 minutes or so, and I want to make this actually the, the new last question. Now that you obviously engaged with all these different people. What was the secret to that? Networking. And, and how did that help you build leverage, try and get their business well?
- [50:25]
A
So, okay, once you decide that you want to be an entrepreneur and once you decide that you want to do something right, you could be the best at whatever it is you do. But if nobody knows about it, how do you get them to use your service? So you have to advertise. You have to advertise. And that doesn't mean just buying an ad in a magazine. It means you have to let people know you exist, what you do and how to find you. And you have to figure out, you know, before it was just like, let's put an ad in the paper. And then it was like, so it's changed now with the Internet and social media and all of that. Now it's, I don't want to say it's easier, it's just different. Right, because there's ways to get your, your product and your information out there. So again, if people can find you, they're looking for you, they just don't know you exist. So how do you network? Well, you gotta. Word of mouth is really, really good. Getting on the Internet, posting things about what you do. If you're gonna do advertisements, there's a bunch of different ways you could do that. You can make flyers, you can getting get in newspapers, magazines, whatever it is that your niche market is, you want to make sure that you're present in those spheres so people who are looking for that can find it. You know, there's, there's postmates there, there's, there's Yelp, there's all of these other social media and all these other information, search engine type things that are out there that you can, for a modest amount of money, you can have a presence in there so people can find you. Adjusting your website, first of all, you got to make a website, adjusting your website. And now with ChatGPT and all that stuff, you could start asking Chat GPT. Those questions like, how do I get this to be ranking number one in search engines? Because now you can have a it technological answer to how to be ranking number one and number two or number three. And the things before, you had to figure that out and pay some guy a whole bunch of money to tell you, oh, you got to do meta tags, you got to do this, you got to do that, you got to, you know, put your stuff out there so the, the bots can find you and rank you up, or you got to pay for advertisements. And now you can use Chat GPT to ask those types of questions. For example, we have a TikTok. We have an Instagram, right? My Instagram is Robin period, the word at. At, period. And the museum I built tomorrow's aeronautical museum. T A M. Right? That's my Instagram. Well, you go on there and you can, you can put ads, you can do all this stuff, right? Well, people will see a post, they'll see an ad, and they'll send you a response like, hey, can I have more information on this? And I'm like, oh, man. And you got to type all that stuff out, right? And you, you type it out. You try and tell them, well, you know, we have different tours. They start at different prices. They. We have tours that start $129 in the helicopter. You can live that lifestyle and, you know, experience what celebrities or people with a lot of money experience without breaking your bank, you know, so you could say that and type it out over and over and over again. Or what I did was I just said, hey, Chat GPT, go online, look at my reviews, look at our website, find all the information about us and, and find a compelling way to respond, to tell people to make them want to book a tour. And so chatgpt wrote my response for us, and we looked at it and it was pretty dead on. And so now I send that to people and the conversion rate is crazy. It's like, you know, the computer, the artificial intelligence, knows us better than we know us. Like, I could guess and say, what. What are the things that'll make you turn this into an action item and actually call me or actually go on the website and book it. But AI can give better insight into that than most people can. So what I'm saying is those people that are out there, they're looking for you. They just don't know where to find you. And so if you are not, it's not. They have to be social and you have to go out. But word of Mouth works great. It works better than any ad that you could put. So if you're social and you're letting people know about what it is you do and you're having a way to expose yourself to a lot of people, they will then tell their friends and their friends. And their friends have vetted them so they know that what they're saying is legit. So if you can convince them that your stuff is cool and they tell their friend, your friend, automatically they come to you knowing that you're cool because you've already been vouched for by this person that told them about you. Wow.
- [55:29]
B
Wow. Well, Robert, if you could let our viewers know where they could get a hold of you if they want to try and go on a helicopter tour or if they want to try and get some form of, like, lessons and stuff, can you let the people know?
- [55:41]
A
Well, the thing about our company is, is we really pride ourselves on being the best at it. So when people fly with us, more than often, they'll say, this is the best experience I've had in my life. Because it's all the little things that you're not expecting that we do. People who are scared to fly, they want to fly with us, and they want to fly with us again and again. People are really terrified to fly. By the time we land, they're already planning their next trip. To reach us, you can go on our website, which is www.celeb, which is short for celebrity. C e L e B and heli h e L I short for helicopter. Celebheli dot com. That's how you can find us on our website. Our Instagram is Robin. Period. The word at period. Tam T a m Tango, Alpha, Mike. That's how you can reach us. We have an Instagram. It's called Celebrity Helicopters. I mean, I said Instagram. I meant TikTok. It's at Celebrity Helicopters. You can also find us Facebook and YouTube. We do a lot of YouTube short posts, but yeah, you can reach us. We're open eight days a week from eight to eight, and be prepared to have a great time.
- [56:55]
B
The code to winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow. Robin Pitgrave. Thank you. Great. Honestly appreciate that.
- [57:03]
A
My pleasure.