PORT ANGELES — Local public entities and community organizations have lent a helping hand to Kenmore Air by pledging to help the company market its air service between Port Angeles and Boeing Field in Seattle.
But will it be enough keep the airline — which provides the only scheduled air service to the North Olympic Peninsula — flying to William R. Fairchild International Airport after this year?
“Not by itself, but it will definitely help,” Craig O’Neill, Kenmore Air marketing director, told the Peninsula Daily News after a Port Angeles Business Association meeting Tuesday.
Due to four straight years of losing money on its Port Angeles flights combined with declining revenue on other routes, Kenmore Air may end its flights between Port Angeles and Seattle after this year.
That decision is dependent upon whether the company breaks even on its Port Angeles route this year — which Kenmore Air is not projecting will happen.
While speaking to PABA, O’Neill said Kenmore Air has no time line for making that decision, and it has no plans to leave.
“Kenmore Air Express is alive and well,” he said.
“We’re in Port Angeles to stay. We expect to be here for decades to come.”
But, he added, the poor economic climate is resulting in fewer passengers.
With the help of an expected bump in passengers during the six-week Hood Canal Bridge closure beginning May 1 — when Kenmore Air is adding eight flights a day to Port Angeles without increasing rates — the company expects to have the same amount of passengers on the Port Angeles route as it did last year.
Last year, the Port Angeles route operated at a loss.
The company will also provide seaplane service at Port Ludlow and Port Hadlock to Lake Union in Seattle during the closure.
O’Neill said Kenmore Air needs between 1,500 and 2,000 more round-trip tickets sold a year to break even.
“It’s not a great leap,” he told PABA.
“We absolutely feel that it is doable.”
O’Neill said after the meeting that marketing support from the city of Port Angeles, Clallam County Economic Development Council, three local chambers of commerce and possibly Clallam County and an interline agreement with Alaska Airlines — which allow Kenmore Air passengers to book transfer flights with Alaska Airlines through either company beginning in June — will help the company come closer to getting out of the red on its Port Angeles flights, but the company will still likely fall short of breaking even on the route.
“There is no silver bullet,” he said.
“A lot of things have to pull together.”
O’Neill added that the marketing support and interline agreement will resolve about 75 percent of the revenue issue, so the company is looking for other ideas.
“We have to do everything we can think of,” he said.
“If the economy tanks, it won’t be enough.
“We’ve got to do everything we can think of and let the chips fall where they may.”
Losing Kenmore Air would cost the Port of Port Angeles $1 million of Federal Aviation Administration funding for capital projects at its airport.
Also fearing that the loss of air service would be detrimental to the local economy, the Port Angeles City Council has allocated $10,000 in city lodging-tax revenue to be used by Kenmore Air to market its Port Angeles flights to the Seattle area.
The Clallam County commissioners are also expected to consider allocating the same amount of its lodging-tax revenue.
“In the grand scheme of things, $20,000 is not much,” O’Neill said after the meeting.
“It will definitely help. We are grateful to receive it.”
The New York Times reported in January that almost 100 small cities in the United States have lost commercial air service in the past two years, and many of those cities’ economies are suffering.
O’Neill has said that Kenmore Air spends between $30,000 and $50,000 a year marketing its flights to Port Angeles.
He said on Friday that any local assistance “will not be used to replace what we spend anyway.”
On top of the lodging tax money, the city of Port Angeles has pledged to purchase 110 tickets, a contribution of about $9,000, for city employees to use on travel for city-related business.
Also, the Clallam County Economic Development Council has pledged to donate 50 cable television ads of 30 seconds each on Wave Broadband to Kenmore Air to market itself to Peninsula residents, and the Port Angeles Regional, Sequim and Forks chambers of commerce have pledged to more aggressively advertise Kenmore Air on their Web sites and in their publications.
The effort of those public entities and community organizations to help Kenmore Air began at the request of the port in December.
The port is promising to continue to waive landing fees for Kenmore Air, which it has done for each of the four years the company has flown to Port Angeles. Those fees add up to about $23,000 a year.
Kenmore took over the role of providing flight service in and out of Port Angeles in June 2004 after Horizon Air, citing low ridership and annual losses of $1.5 million, ended its Port Angeles service in January 2004.
O’Neill said Kenmore Air is doing a few things of its own, other than advertising, to attract more passengers.
That includes adding a one-way rental car agreement and attracting more cargo on its flights during the Hood Canal Bridge closure.
O’Neill declined to identify the rental car company.
He said he is meeting with three or four businesses in Port Angeles on Tuesday about its cargo service, but declined to identify them.
In response to a question asked by a PABA member, O’Neill said that removing trees at Lincoln Park would save the company possibly $200,000 a year, although he wasn’t sure of the figure.
The existence of trees at Lincoln Park, at the east side of the airport, force the company to land from the west during poor weather — adding about 30 minutes to the flight.
O’Neill added that the company is in favor of the city of Port Angeles removing enough of the trees to allow it to land from the east during all weather, but it has “no big push” to make that happen.
“We play the cards we are dealt,” he said.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
