Business View Magazine | October 2020

143 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE OCTOBER 2020 MCKELLAR–S I PES REGIONAL A I RPORT on to Chicago or Dallas, or wherever. Their journey starts here, and we try to make that very pleasant for them. McKellar-Sipes also has a military contract. So, day in and day out, we see military aircraft from all over the United States, and we want to make sure that the military knows that we respect them and will do whatever we can to help them be a part of our Airport. “On the corporate side, which is where our growth is, right now– we want businesses to know that we’re a business-oriented business. We understand what it takes for them to make a go of what they’re trying to do. And we also want to be a pilot’s airport. So, if a pilot comes here and has to spend all day with us, we have courtesy cars to get them to town and we have a very comfortable pilot’s lounge. These pilots can spend eight or ten hours with us, so how we treat the pilots is important and that’s why they want to keep coming back to us. All of these things are what makes McKellar-Sipes one of the best airports in the State of Tennessee.” the helicopter pilots for the City of Jackson open their hangar so they can see everything that the aviation unit does here. So, outreach over the last three years has been our mission, here. Even though we are a commercial airport as defined by the FAA, and we are a Part 139-certificate airport, we still look at ourselves as a large general aviation facility. “We want parents, teachers, and businesspeople to know that if they want to have an experience here at the Airport, we’ll try to work with them. We’ve done a lot of things like weddings and retirement parties for county employees. It’s important to make sure that the door is open, and that people know that this is a community airport and that we’re here to be a part of the community. “On the commercial side, we work hard to make sure that people who come here have a very positive experience, whether they’re flying to Atlanta and going on to London, or whether they’re flying to St. Louis and going