Southern Indiana Living MayJune 2012

Copas says. “And I learned
to fly on the cheap. I would
help people with their balloons…and
I started trading
in my ‘sweat equity’ with
these pilots in exchange for
lessons and flights to get
my license.”
Copas was commercially
licensed by the time he was
19 years old.
“It was a pretty big deal
back then, when I was a
teenager with a pilot’s license,”
he says. “I was very
proud of that.”
Following high school
Copas says he “annoyed”
his father long enough that
they found and purchased
a used balloon and started
building a small business
enterprise around the hobby
he loved.
“There are really only a
few ways you can make
money ballooning,” Copas
explains. “Chartered flights
(where you take people up
for a balloon ride), teaching
people to fly, or doing it
commercially for advertising.
So I got into that right
away.”
Copas partnered with
various businesses including
a local car dealership,
Dominos Pizza and others,
establishing credibility and
giving him experience as a
commercial pilot, and continued
to fly for various corporations
as he completed
his college degree.
He married his high
school sweetheart, Kathy,
who earned her pilot’s license
within the first five
years of their marriage.
“I’m proud to say that I
taught her how to fly,” he
says.
In 1992, after losing his
job as an art director for a
large company that was
sold overnight, he and his
wife began ballooning fulltime.
“I told Kathy I’d make a
Top: Jerry, Kathy and
Spencer Copas.
Bottom: Copas lands in a
local’s back yard, only after his
crew (usually his wife and son)
secure permission from the
homeowner.
few calls, and we would see
if we liked it, and within a
week we were on the road,”
he says.
For the next 13 years Copas
and his wife worked as
full-time commercial hot
air balloon pilots, flying
all over the United States
and the world representing
numerous corporations
in such varied locations as
the Australian Outback, the
Swiss Alps, and the Las Vegas
strip.
Much of his corporate flying
involved special shape
balloons, popular promotional
tools for many large
corporations.
“An older, more experienced
pilot once told me if
I was going to fly commercially
and for a living then
I was going to get to know
these special shape balloons,
and boy was he ever
right,” Copas says.
He has flown a giant
paint bucket for Porter
Paints, a bottle of Jack Daniel’s
for Brown-Forman,
the Michelin Tire Michelin
Man, a United Van Lines
semi-trailer, and many
other custom-made special
shape balloons.
Copas said the unique
shapes stand out, particularly
at events where most
of the other entrants are
standard balloons. “You
talk to people after the fact.
They are going to remember
those special shape balloons,”
he says. In fact, Copas
still vividly remembers
the first such balloon he
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