"Jay Honeck" wrote:
Right now we're seeing the perfect storm in our biz. First, personal flying
is down to the point of being almost immeasurable. In fact, if our fly-in
business went away tomorrow, I'm not sure how we'd even measure the loss --
sad to say. This is the single most disheartening part of the downturn,
since we never set out to be innkeepers in the traditional sense. Rather,
we created this place to be the ultimate pilot hang-out, and finished it --
apparently just in time to see the demise of personal flying in America. Of
course, we can't blame that entirely on this particular downturn, as GA has
been declining precipitously since at least 2005, and has dropped 50% or
more in the last 12 months.

Combine this with businesses cutting back or eliminating their travel
budgets since September, and we've lost two important parts of our business.
All we're left with is the weekend "getaway with your honey in a hot tub"
business, which -- while significant -- is insufficient to support a hotel
in the long run.

This current economic situation has everyone pretty scared. It isn't
only "businesses cutting back or eliminating travel budgets" ...
FAMILIES are cutting back, not taking time off work for getaways, and
eliminating travel budgets ... and rightly so. With all the talk about
higher taxes, retirement becoming a thing of the past, jobs being
eliminated right and left, and zero social security, people are not
taking vacations and are spending weekends with family right there at
home visiting local attractions that don't require hotel stays. If it
weren't associated with an economic crisis, returning the focus on
family/home life isn't a bad thing, though businesses like yours will
obviously take a huge hit, sad to say. The other thing is that people
who are already retired are going back to work, IF they can find jobs.

My own flying frequency is down. It isn't because of the fuel costs
(which have now come down considerably), it's because of the instinct to
keep nose to the grindstone and work while there IS work vs. opting to
go "play". Call it "guilty conscience," but while the passion for it is
still there, it's harder and harder to rationalize the expense.

Lastly, lots of people have lost a huge part of their nest-egg, if not
all of it, so money they'd allotted for extras like flying, vacations,
or "weekend getaways with honey in a hot tub" is now not "extra", and
the tub in the upstairs bathroom is looking pretty attractive!

Scary times.