Flight School Spotlight: Air Trek North

Air Trek North’s Randy Schoephoerster fits the profile perfectly. Formerly an executive at a major electronics company, he has a background in engineering and marketing, and a master’s degree in business administration. While still in his previous career, Schoephoerster became a flight instructor and decided to purchase a few airplanes and start a small school. Twelve years later, Schoephoerster’s “small school” is one of the largest in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area with 13 airplanes and 16 instructors.

Although he could have instructed part-time and stayed in aviation without the risk of running a business, Schoephoerster’s background guided him to striking out on his own. “Part of what excites me about the school is seeing the picture of the whole business,” he said. He loves to touch every aspect, including accounting, marketing, instructing, hiring, and more. And although he said no one is going to get rich running a flight school, the business is financially successful, and students rate it very highly. AOPA named Air Trek North a Distinguished Flight School in 2019, the most recent year the AOPA Flight Training Experience Awards were announced.

Schoephoerster credits the school’s success to a few key areas. One is financial discipline. “You have to mind your stats, and watch where your money is being spent,” he said. Schoephoerster said he’s seen aviation businesses with $1,000 paintings on the walls, but in a low-market endeavor like a flight school, he focuses intensely on income-generating items. Like an airline, the business makes money when the airplanes fly, so energy is directed to making sure that happens, whether it means taking care of maintenance or buying the right airframe.

He also tries to control costs on things like insurance. Schools tend to gravitate to new airplanes, thinking their students demand them, but the data doesn’t bear that out. And Schoephoerster said the cost of hull insurance would be a killer on a new airplane.

With such a tight focus on costs, it can be tempting to cut back on things like marketing, but Schoephoerster said it simply needs to be smart and well done. The school’s social media presence is prolific and jammed with photos of student success. It works. He said roughly 70 percent of the school’s students for more advanced ratings are from outside Minnesota. Word of mouth is huge, as it is for most flight schools.

In terms of student success, he said the instructors have empathy for their students. They share their students’ highs, their lows, and their successes and failures. “The people here care about their students,” he said. That’s evident from the great user ratings and the high retention rate, which Schoephoerster said is well above industry average.

There’s also close oversight. He personally interviews every CFI candidate, a senior CFI provides training, and Schoephoerster checks in with every new instructor after 30 days. They talk about what’s working and where the instructor may need help.

Schoephoerster said the thing that’s surprised him most about running a flight school is how much time it takes, mostly from managing employees and watching the books. He is also an airline pilot, although that came after the school started. He stays on reserve in order to be at home more, and when he does have a trip, he spends down time on the school instead of going out with the crew. Everything is remote, including phone contacts and accounting.

By focusing on the bottom line and ensuring students are happy and successful, Air Trek North has grown enormously over the past 12 years, and there’s no end in sight to this flight school’s potential.