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I grew up in a small town
called Humboldt, Tennessee, which is about

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an hour and a half outside of
Memphis. Basically, back then it was

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a small farming community, but it
was the epitome of an American childhood.

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So I have wonderful memories from Humboldt, Tennessee and still have family there.

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I then went to undergrad at the
University of Tennessee, transferred to the University

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of Mississippi Old Miss, and then
graduated Old Miss Law School, and sir,

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because of those two schools, because
I'm a sports guy, you've had

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some pretty good football over the years. Let me tell you we've had We've

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had two Mannings at Old Miss and
one at Tennessee. So sure, and

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I knew the third brother when I
was at Old Miss. So Mannings all

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around in the football round. By
the way, I hear when you go

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to a game at Tennessee, it's
an extraordinary experience, it really is.

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There. There is nothing like especially
the opening, you know, the opening

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of football at Tennessee in Nengland Stadium, and now it's over one hundred thousand,

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you know. And then I got
so Miss and we sat thirty nine

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thousand when I first got there,
and now it's almost at seventy So it's

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a great football experience, it sure
is, it, sure is. Well,

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Listen, we are here to talk
about surf air mobility and you being

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the CEO. And there's a merger
that we have to talk about too,

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because two smart companies came together and
now you're the CEO of them. That

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happened in twenty thirteen. But I
want to give our listeners context before twenty

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thirteen, because I know you did
a lot of really cool things before that.

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So out of school and before twenty
thirteen, what did you do you

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know for I wasn't associated with the
airline business at all. Back then,

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I practiced law for fifteen years in
Mississippi, and if you go back eleven

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years ago from now, I was
a lawyer, probably handling a case at

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the courthouse, and I saw a
need when it looked like Delta was going

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to shut down their hub at Memphis
International, which was our our hometown airport.

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There, I saw a need for
people being able to get back and

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forth on short haul trips, specifically
down to the Gulf Coast. So kind

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of out of the blue, I
called a college buddy of mine one night

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and said, come on over to
my house and let's talk about something.

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And he got there and I said, you and I need to start an

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airline. And of course he thought
that was a complete joke. And let

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me tell you, six months later
we had our first flight sold out Memphis

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down to destin On in the Florida
Panhandle, and the rest is history.

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Well that's fantastic. So let's take
us all the way up to twenty thirteen.

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You've got a company, there's another
company, there's a merger. Tell

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us about how it all came together. You know, we really didn't have

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a whole lot of association, really, not any with Surfair. Surfair started

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the same year that we did.
I think, actually we're the last two

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startup airlines in the country. You
just don't see new airlines getting started anymore.

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But that group started on the West
coast, based side of La flying

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a lot to San Francisco and to
Blake Tahoe, places like that. We

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were in the South, hence the
name Southern, and both going on our

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separate paths until COVID hit. And
about a week after COVID hit, I

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got a call. I didn't recognize
the number and I thought, you know,

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it's COVID. I don't have a
whole lot else going on right now.

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So I answered it, and it
was Sudan Shahani, the CEO of

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Surfair, and he said, I've
been reading that you want to be the

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first person, the first airline to
put paying passengers on an electric airplane.

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And he said, that's also exactly
what we want to do at Surfair.

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You and I should talk. He
said, so when COVID's over, come

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out here to the West Coast and
let's spend a little time together. And

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I said, you know, I'm
in the airline business. I don't get

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to say we're not going to fly
until COVID's over. We fly every day.

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So I hopped on a plane the
next week, and within a matter

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of a few short weeks, he
and I had signed a letter of intent

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to put the companies together and jointly
be the first airline to put a paying

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passenger on an electric airplane. Well, it's a great story, it's a

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great origin story, and I want
everybody to buckle in literally because now if

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you move forward ten years, a
full decade, the growth has been incredible.

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What you do is incredible and The
business model is really neat too,

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and we're going to talk all about
that, but I first want to ask

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you just about mission statement. What
is that when it comes to surf air?

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You know, it's just what I
said a moment ago. It's to

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put paying passengers on an electric or
hybrid electric aircraft. Our goal in everything

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we do is green energy and moving
green energy and green transportation forward faster than

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most people think is possible. All
right, So I'm fascinated by this because

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I'm in the ev everything, and
I'm always on board with the latest tech

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windmills, solar power, electricity,
and it's the future and we're gonna have

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to do it. We don't have
to get into a climate change conversation,

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but I like what you and your
company are doing. Can you tell me,

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though, why you came up with
this idea and why it makes sense

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for you and your customers? Well, Number one, it's a better for

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the customer. It's a better experience. Think about how quiet an airplane would

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be if you didn't have engine noise. It just makes think about how much

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quieter your Tesla, if you drive
a Tesla or any electric vehicle is than

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an old school traditional combustion engine much
better passenger experience. But from the airline

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perspective, it's one place where we
can control costs and where we can actually

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reduce costs. We all know that
the cost of labor is going up and

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there's a scarcity of labor. You
look at where crude oil is and I

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find myself checking the cost of crude
on my phone three or four times a

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day because that's so affecting the price
of operating an airline. The cost of

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operating an airline, so to be
able to do it with electricity instead of

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being beholden to the price of oil
is a major issue for us, and

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that's what's going to allow us to
open up these new markets. So think

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back Dennis to twenty thirty, even
forty years ago. How many more airports

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had scheduled commercial service that don't now. It is a continually shrinking universe,

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and that's because the costs continue to
go up and you just can't afford an

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airline, can't afford to put service
into an airport that's not going to supply

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it with hundreds of thousands of passengers
per year. We want to be able

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to go back to that old model
of point to point travel. You don't

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have to change planes at a hub. You can use your smaller local airport.

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That's more convenient, and you can
do it for the same cost or

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less than what you would pay to
go have a connecting flight through Dallas or

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Denver or Chicago. All right,
Stan, I know that you're LABA.

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So what flight patterns and cities do
you do now and what's in the future.

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You know, we're all over the
place right now. We're we're the

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largest carrier enter island Care. You're
by departures in the state of Hawaii.

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We fly about one hundred and fifty
departures a day out there. We also

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have daily service between Santa Barbara and
San Francisco, LA. And San Francisco.

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We fly into the small airport at
Truckee, California, which is just

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outside It's on Lake Tahoe, And
in fact, my family and I were

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there for vacation a couple of weeks
ago, and I can't tell you how

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much more convenient it is to pull
your car up to a small airport,

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going to a small terminal there were
probably eight or nine people in the whole

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building, and then walk straight out
to your plane. And fly home.

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We're also throughout the Rocky Mountains.
We are at Denver and several small cities

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around Denver. Same for Chicago,
Dallas, Washington, Dulles. We're looking

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to expand soon into Atlanta, which
I think is going to be a great

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market for us in the next couple
of years. And then we've got projects

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going on internationally, So don't be
surprised if you see some surf airplanes down

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in the Caribbean doing some island hopping
in the next few months. Outstanding.

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And what about the size of plane. How many people do you have different

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kinds of planes, different sizes for
people. We do have different kinds of

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planes. We have five different aircraft
types in our fleet. But the backbone

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of the fleet and the one that
will be the first to be electrified,

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is the Sesna Grand Caravan. It's
made by Textron, the largest general aviation

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aircraft manufacturer in the world. It's
been made since nineteen eighty six, so

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there are about three thousand of them
in existence around the globe. This is

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a workhorse aircraft. It's designed,
as I said, for nine passengers,

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which is where electrification is first.
As you can imagine going to be possible.

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You can't electrify I owing seven thirty
seven yet, so we're going to

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make sure that on a regional basis, don't get in your car and drive

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three or four or five hours.
An airplane and for essentially the cost of

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an uber will get you there,
and will get you there with half the

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carbon footprint. I'm super curious how
long does it take to charge one of

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the airplanes that it depends on.
It depends on which type you're on.

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We're making two types. One is
fully electric, so it's nothing but battery

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power. The other is hybrid electric, so there is actually a turbogenerator which

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is charging the battery throughout the flight. The hybrid electric can go NonStop for

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pretty much the same range as a
traditional combustion engine powered aircraft. The electric

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will have a shorter range until battery
technology develops to the point where it can

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go longer, and we don't know
yet where that's going to go. Right

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now, you're looking at about one
hundred mile range on fully electric, and

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then it will have to charge for
a while before it can turn around and

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make the return trip. All of
that is still in the testing phases,

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so I can't give you a good
answer on that right now. But I

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can tell you that every route we
fly in Hawaii is under one hundred miles,

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so that's going to be a great
place to test this new propulsion system.

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Understood, and thank you for that. I did want to circle back

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on something that caught my attention,
and as you probably know in this CEO

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series that a lot of current leaders
and future leaders listen to this and what

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you have to say leadership, how
you run a company. But I'm fascinated

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on your merger. You two had
the same idea at almost the same time,

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and yet somebody reached out to you
and said let's be partners. That

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doesn't always happen, so that's unusual
one itself. But just tell me about

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it for all the people that are
listening that are that business acumen, want

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to start a company, or maybe
looking to partner up with somebody. I

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understand it was only in your perspective
in your situation, but tell us about

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how a merger works and the dues, the don'ts, and the challenges.

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But the good thing about it too, how did it all go down?

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You know, it's interesting that you
bring that up because Southern Airways, even

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before we merged with surf Air was
really the product of five different airlines.

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So my college friend and I started
Southern Airways, as you mentioned in twenty

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thirteen, and along the way we
purchased or merged with five other commuter airlines

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around the country. And one thing
that I'm really proud of is we selected

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our targets based on what they could
bring to the table, not just from

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the geographic footprint they occupied or the
aircraft that were in their fleet, but

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the human resources that were available at
those companies, and we brought them on

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board. So I truly believe that
the leadership team we have today is the

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best and brightest of five other companies
that were out there that said, yes,

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we can make something better and bigger
by doing it together than if we

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did it the part, and that
really has paid off off. And the

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same thing happened with Surfair. In
our merger with Surfair, there was not

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one layoff that occurred. There was
not one job that was eliminated or one

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person that was fired, because you
know what, we found that they had

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such a talented resource pool of humans
of people that they're now all part of

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the team. So I think that
there are a lot of companies out there

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that say, can I find somebody
to merge with, achieve greater scale,

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cut the ranks of the payroll,
and thereby increase profits. Obviously, we're

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looking to increase profits and that's a
large driver of what we or any company

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does, But in this environment,
human talent is one of the hardest things

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to find, and we've done it
through the merger process. Well, it's

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an extraordinary marriage that you have.
And I'm so happy to hear that nobody

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lost their gig, because that's the
big worry when people merge. You worry

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about all those layoffs and trying to
save money and do differently and different But

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obviously the business model was there that
people were there. I'm glad you talked

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about people because in this series two, beside the passion, the taking a

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chance and the tenacity that all CEOs
and founders have of companies, the backbone

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of the company are people. Can
you tell us about the eight hundred staff

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that are part of this company and
just a little bit about them. Sure.

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Absolutely. We've got two headquarters for
the company. Corporate headquarters is in

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la at the Hawthorne Airport, right
under the I'm in the shadow of SpaceX

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every day when I walk out to
my car and then our operations center in

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Palm Beach, and we have a
really talented group of leaders that are part

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of that. And one thing I
have striven to do from the beginning is

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to get people that do have a
long airline background and a long airline history,

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but also to try to have about
half of our leadership team be people

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from outside the industry, so that
we can look at every issue with a

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fresh set of eyes, not just
saying, well, this is the way

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it's always been done in the airline
industry, but to say, how should

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it be done in the future to
make it better for the company and better

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for the passenger. And that's what
we found in Southern Airways on is I

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don't want to do things the same
way everybody else has. I'm starting a

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company because I want a different product
than what everybody else has. And then

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from looking outside of headquarters in leadership, you look at the six hundred people

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who actually make the plane to run
every day. We've got about three hundred

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pilots in this company, and I'm
so proud that we are one of the

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largest creators of new pilots in the
industry. We've all heard of the pilot

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shortage. Everybody knows how we're going
through this crisis at the larger airlines of

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a lack of pilots. Well,
surf Air is not a consumer of pilots.

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Surf Air is a creator of pilots. We're one of the best places.

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This is that a young pilot out
of flying school, out of flight

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school, can come to us and
fly as a first officer, learned from

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an experienced captain in the left seat, and become a captain himself within a

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thousand hours or so of flight time. And then there are all the people

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at our station's forty eighth station around
the United States in every time zone.

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Some have been with us from the
very very beginning, some have been with

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us since last week. But I
hope that what all of them will tell

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you is it's a great place to
work. It's a fun place to work.

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Stan, thanks for sharing all that. And one thing really garnered my

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attention, if I may get on
my soapbox just for a second, to

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all the future entrepreneurs and CEOs out
there, that Stan went outside of his

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company and not just relied on his
echo chamber to be yes people and I

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love that about you, Stan,
that you looked outside of the company to

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get a freshet of ears and eyes
and everything. And that takes somebody that's

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checking their ego at the door,
sir, and I know that goes for

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a lot of your big team members
and your managers. And I just want

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to say I thought that was very
cool because I talked to a lot of

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CEOs of this series and not everybody
feels that way, So I think that's

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pretty darn cool. Thank you.
Thank you for saying that, And you

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not didn't discuss this at all prior
to this interview, but mentioning ego is

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something we talk about regularly at Surfair
because if we all walk into the office

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every day and check the ego at
the door, it's amazing how much more

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we can get accomplimented. Well,
I feel the same way in my business

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too, and we have people that
are on the air all the time,

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so that's a real balancing act that
we have when it comes to radio and

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the entertainment industry. Well, listen, Stan, I want to leave the

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floor to you and some final thoughts
on the company in Surfair. By the

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way, the website's gorgeous, we're
going to give that in just a moment,

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and it's beautiful to check out,
it's easy to navigate. But I

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did want to kind of leave a
takeaway for all our listeners that are listening

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to our great conversation. And we
can't tell you how much we appreciate your

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valuable time. But if you were
to give a few takeaways to our listener

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about Surfair, what would it be? Ste I think that what I would

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leave the listener with is that change
so often occurs faster than people think that

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it's going to and the electrification of
aviation, I believe, is one of

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those times when it will We're going
to look up one day and find ourselves

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sitting on an electric airplane and say, Wow, when did this happen?

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Surfair Mobility is going to be the
company that makes it happen. And I'm

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really looking forward into being able to
show you that airplane and take you for

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a ride on it two or three
years from now, not ten or twelve

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years from now. We're really on
the cusp of something great here. And

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just like you don't even blink when
you see a Tesla driving down the interstate

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anymore, you're not going to blink
when you show up at the airport and

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you can barely hear your airplane because
it's running on an electric motor instead of

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a combustion motor. I would also
say Surfair is always looking for talent that

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wants to be part of something special. We have job openings in just about

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every department in our company. So
if you'll go to the website, take

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a look around, see what we're
about, and if you believe you have

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something to contribute, send in an
application. Stand what's that website address surfare

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dot com. You can also access
it from iFly, Southern dot com or

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mogal lately airlines dot com. Those
are some of our brands that we operate

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under, but surfare dot com is
where you can find out everything outstanding.

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Well, listen, this has been
my pleasure. I geeked out a little

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bit because I love anything electric or
that's great for the environment. It's a

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brilliant idea. I know it's ten
years in the making, eight hundred plus

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employees, and I love talking to
disruptors, and I think that's what you

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and your team are. So it's
a lot of fun what you doing.

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I know the future looks bright.
Stan We really appreciate your valuable time,

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and thank you so much for joining
us on CEO. You should know it

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was a pleasure. Dennis. Take
care,