"John Jones" wrote in message

Very good analysis. Two things seem apparent:

First, based on your number, I would say one thing
needed would be to improve cycle time, say from 10
flights an hour to 16 flights an hour. Since there
are two planes, each plane has to make 8 flights an
hours, or a cycle time of 7.5 minutes. This would
push profits up to $240 per hour gross.

Seems reasonable if there are two adjacent launch areas
and two trucks for independent auto-tow.

Second, how does the capital investment between this
2 plane, 2 truck business compare with the capital
investment of the indoor cart track? For example,
buy two used 2-33's @$10,000 each and two used trucks
@$5,000 each and you have $20,000 invested. I would
assume this is a lot less than the building and track
costs for the karting. Labor and insurance cost might
be the same, but the airplane business would have no
heating/electrical bill/etc. associated with a brick-and-mortar
establishment. Point is, maybe the airplane business
does not need to gross as much since there is much
less overhead in paying off building loans. Any feel
of the difference in investment needed between the
cart track and the glider operation?




The key to making it work is to be a FAMILY FUN CENTER.

This is where Soaring is doomed to failure. It is a LONE PARTICIPANT
GAME. Not family friendly. If you attempt to market it to
people by itself, it isn't going to happen.

Space lease is about 30K/mo
BUT you can operate until midmight, in the rain, in the wind,
under very controlled conditions. There are many many more
hours of operation available to you to recover your investment.
You also have to have OTHER STUFF there to occupy a
personstime and provide value to the customer.
Food, Music, Games I also seat 10 racers every 12 minutes.
When we get slammed, I can seat 50 racers/hr by hot seating the karts.
The best you can do with 2 gliders is 10 flyers/hr.

WHAT MAKES KARTING WORK is the competition between everybody on the track
and the adrenalin high you get. I can't see this happening in a sled ride
operation
where the guy in the seat is getting jazzed, but can't share it with anyone.
ESPECIALLY
when the rest of the family is on the ground waiting for little Johnny to
get down.

FEAR

I can't see MOMS letting their kids into gliders.... It's hard enough to let
them let
kids go race. I really think a sailplane op is a non-starter.

Sorry

Scott.