Columbus Officials Want to Make Overseas Travel Easier

Parlez-vous Port Columbus?

Airport officials this week are making their yearly trip to Europe to try to persuade international airlines to make overseas travel from Columbus easier.

They will meet with Air France/KLM, British Airways and Lufthansa, offering loads of statistics showing that central Ohio should be one of the chosen few markets they enter next.

"It's very competitive," said David Whitaker, vice president of business development for the airport. "There are very few opportunities because of the state of the airline business right now, and there is obviously a lot of cost associated with going into a brand new market."

Easy international air access to and from a city has become a hotly sought-after prize among cities trying to attract businesses and conventions.

While an airport with a respectable number of flights to major U.S. cities once was adequate, the growing importance of international business has put pressure on cities such as Columbus, Indianapolis and Pittsburgh to attract nonstop international service.

Whitaker will be joined on the trip by John Malabad, manager of business development.

"Any increase in flights really helps us in terms of meetings, conventions and trade shows," said Joseph Marinelli, senior vice president of sales for Experience Columbus, the city's convention and visitors bureau. "As the world gets smaller, many national organizations have become international organizations. There's a growing trend on the part of planners to ask more about international access to a city."

Columbus Chamber President Ty Marsh said the issue also is a major factor when enticing companies to the area.

"Many times, air service is an issue with trying to attract business to a region," Marsh said. "At our annual meeting earlier this year, our speaker was a siteselector consultant from Deloitte & Touche. He said flat-out that our airport is a negative issue. ... I think there's a very positive trend here at the airport, but I think the needs are still much greater."

Several years ago, the chamber formed an Air Services Committee to try to address the issue. One of the major goals was just getting businesses and the airport to talk to each other and share information.

"They could see the seats, but they couldn't see who was filling them," said Sharon Roberts, manager of travel and conference services for Ashland Chemical Co. "Now, the companies supply data to the airport authority, and they can go to the airlines with a spreadsheet showing the travel patterns of all the local companies."

Big companies have clout with air carriers, which recognize them as high-value customers. Corporate travelers put a premium on convenience over price, and they are typically more lucrative for the airlines than leisure travelers.

Whitaker said Honda's Marysville plant was instrumental in persuading Delta to add nonstop service from Columbus to Los Angeles this year. The airport had been without nonstop service to L.A. since America West closed its hub at the airport in 2003, he said.

Los Angeles is one of the top destinations for Honda workers flying from Columbus, said Steve Bishop, manager of administration and travel at Honda in Marysville. "It's a pain in the butt anyway to go to California, so it was really not good to not have a direct flight," Bishop said.

That's just one example of Honda's clout, given that its U.S. operations spend $35 million annually on airfare. Bishop said Honda worked with Air Canada "to improve our air times to go up to Toronto," and was able to persuade Japan Airlines to add a second daily flight from Chicago to Tokyo recently.

Whitaker doesn't expect Port Columbus will offer nonstop service to Asia anytime soon, because of the large planes required for such longhaul flights. But he holds out hope for a few years down the road, as planes in the 200-seat range are introduced that can handle the trip, and as central Ohio continues to show demand for flights to the Far East.

Already, Tokyo is the No. 2 international destination from Columbus; Nagoya, in central Japan, is tied for fifth. Beijing, Hong Kong, Seoul, Korea, and Shanghai are among the top 10, although individually they rank far behind European cities such as Frankfurt, Germany, and London.

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