Rani Awad

Q&A| BRETT FORRESTER
Selling jets and building relationships
a winning combination
EVA talks to Jet Sense Aviation, LLC founder
and CEO Brett Forrester
Q: How did you get started in business
aviation?
A: My father has been in the aviation business
his entire life. He was a Beechcraft distributor
in South Africa. I’ve been fl ying ever since I can
remember and have been in the business for my
entire working life.
Q: What led you to launch Jet Sense?
A: I started Jet Sense two and a half years
ago. I put in 20 years working for General Aviation
Services, a company founded by Dan Dickinson.
I enjoyed it, but the time had come to move on
and do my own thing. I funded the business with
my own capital and the company continues to be
privately owned.
Q: Jet Sense specialises in the buying and
selling of aircraft. What do you need to
succeed as an aircraft broker?
A: Clearly you need to build up a solid client
base. We buy, sell and lease aircraft on behalf of a
wide range of customers, from private individuals
to Fortune 500 companies. This year we will move
about 25 aircraft, which gives us a very good revenue
base to continue to grow.
We are in the business of looking after our
customers and we go to great lengths to be as
knowledgeable about the pre-owned market as
possible. Customers vary widely in the extent to
which they have already defined what it is they
are looking for when they set out to upgrade their
existing aircraft. A typical scenario is the customer
expresses an interest in buying a certain model of
aircraft, then asks us how that fits with what is
happening in the market. From there, we are able
to guide our customer through the process of buying
their aircraft.
Q: Do you have a market niche, such as midsize,
or light jets that you particularly focus on?
A: We have sold everything from a small
Beech King Air up to a Gulfstream 550. Typically
though, the aircraft we buy tend to be mid-cabin
jets for resale.
The other thing is that due to our extensive
knowledge regarding the pre-owned market, our
reputation for being able to find the appropriate
model to meet the client’s needs quickly, is growing.
If a client comes in and defines their goal as:
“I want an aircraft to fly away in within the next 10
days,” Jet Sense is capable of meeting that goal.
Innovation is another trait of Jet Sense. If
someone wants to sell an aircraft right away, but
also wants to participate in the transaction as a
business partner, we can accommodate them. We
can do a profit share that allows some income now
for the aircraft and has the potential to become a
future business partner in a separate transaction.
Jet Sense has experience with handling unique
opportunities. Remember the Legacy jet whose
wing tip hit the Boeing in the Amazon? Gantt Aviation
and I partnered to obtain the Legacy from
the Amazon and today it’s a normal flying aircraft.
If you want to know more, we can talk on that
separately because it was quite the adventure!
Q: It seems that your willingness to take on a
measured amount of risk by buying an aircraft
for later resale is being well received by the
market?
A: We calculate the risk very carefully. However,
this is a pure, entrepreneurial business and it
is based fundamentally on accurate information,
knowing the market and knowing the aircraft that
you are taking a position in. A broker without
that skill set will lose opportunities while trying
to accumulate that knowledge after the request
74 International | Autumn 2015