#064: The Jet Business – Close to the money, not close to the airport

I just had to walk in. Who puts a jet in the front window of an office building in London's financial district? Dave Young: Welcome to the Empire Builders podcast, teaching business owners, the not so secret techniques that took famous businesses from mom and pop to major brands. Stephen Semple is a marketing consultant, story collector and storyteller. I'm Stephen's sidekick and business partner, Dave Young. Before we get into today's episode word from our sponsor, which is well it's us, but we're highlighting ads we've written and produced for our clients. So here's one of those. [BWS Heating & Plumbing Ad] Dave Young: Welcome back to the Empire Builders Podcast. Dave Young here with you alongside Stephen Semple, who shares amazing stories about businesses that start really small and do something just crazy, innovative to spark growth and then they become empires. And today you're going to share, are we... It seems like we're jumping the... Are we going straight into like private jets? Because that's not usually where we start with a business, right? It's usually mom and pop and you get some of the kids to work and the jets don't come along till a little later in the story. Stephen Semple: Yeah. We're going to be talking about a company called The Jet Business. Dave Young: The Jet Business. Stephen Semple: The Jet Business and they sell private jets. That's their business. Dave Young: Well, this is what we call a descriptive business title. Stephen Semple: That is a descriptive business title. It is. Dave Young: Yeah. Stephen Semple: So where I came across this, I was in London, England in the fall of 2021 and I was there speaking at a number of events. I was speaking at Oxford University, Cambridge University, the London Society of Medicine and the London Stock Exchange and I was staying near Hyde Park and the day I was speaking at the London Stock Exchange, I decided to get up early and walk to the exchange. It was about an hour's walk from where I was staying near Buckingham Palace over to the exchange and I'm walking along Park Lane, just beside Hyde Park and right at street level, I see this fuselage of a jet, you know, there's office buildings and there's kind of a retail level on the ground floor and there's this, what looks like a jet fuselage on the ground floor of this office building for this company called The Jet Business. Dave Young: Nowhere near an airport? Stephen Semple: This is blocks from Buckingham Palace in downtown London, right across the street from Hyde Park. Dave Young: Usually I expect people that sell jets to be, you know, located at an airport somewhere. Stephen Semple: Google it and look at the pictures. I'm going to also post some pictures on the website along with the notes on this so on the Empire Builders Podcast website so you can see some pictures. And since I do work with a private jet business here in Canada called Kreos Aviation, K-R-E-O-S Aviation so if you are in the market for a private jet, check them out, they're awesome. I decided that I would come back later in the week and drop in. I was like, what the heck is this? I couldn't at that point because I had my engagement so I was curious. Stephen Semple: So later in the week I walk into the lobby and I asked to be shown around and they were really awesome. I told them I work with a competitor in Canada, I'm in marketing. They were awesome. They were cool. They spent a whole bunch of time with me. So in the front of the office, right in ground floor, looking out at Park Lane, they recreated the fuselage of one of their jets and they set it up in a popular configuration so you can walk right into this fuselage, stand up in it, sit down, walk around, see what it's like and you can see this from the street. Stephen Semple: And here's what I found fascinating. If you think about it, their clients are really select, rich folks.