Category: News on the Homepage

By J.D. Allen

Some companies retreated from New York City to the suburbs due to the pandemic. Now, a survey of about 500 companies found there are big business opportunities to add more nonstop flights at Long Island MacArthur Airport in Islip.

For Bob Isaksen, a Melville native and market executive for business banking at Bank of America, that means more ways to bring business to Long Island.

“Business travelers much prefer nonstop air travel,” Isaksen said.

The MacArthur has three major U.S. domestic air carriers that currently provide service to 11 cities nonstop and connect to hundreds of destinations worldwide: American Airlines, Frontier Airlines and Southwest Airlines. The survey found there is appetite to expand those offerings.

The survey was conducted in August and September by HIA-LI, one of Long Island’s largest business advocacy organizations. Terri Alessi-Miceli, the group’s president and CEO, said it found corporate travel budgets could potentially expand if MacArthur airport had more flights, which could generate more than $1 billion in new airport revenue annually.

“The dynamic has changed considerably,” Alessi-Miceli said. “Many people are working from home, others getting back to work in some sort of work setting, whatever that looks like. They’re actually itching to get back [into] travel.”

“It’s really: the consumer wins,” said Joe Campolo, the group’s immediate past chair and managing partner at the Ronkonkoma-based law firm Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, LLP, which ran the survey. He said Long Island businesses would be willing to pay more to fly direct out of Islip and avoid the inconvenience of driving to LaGuardia or Kennedy airports. “There will be ancillary economic advantages to the town and the airlines for sure.”

Campolo said the goal of the survey is to make sure that the region’s business community remains viable. He said the businesses relied heavily on travel pre-COVID, especially for trade shows, and weren’t able to fly out of Islip as their airport of choice.

“One of the indicators right now, I think in a post-COVID world, is how much business travel is there actually going to be?” he said. “Zoom can only take you so far with clients, but meeting face to face is still an important part of business development.”

The survey said increased corporate travel to and from Long Island would generate…. Continue Reading

Allen, J., 2021. Long Island businesses see an opportunity to expand flights to Islip's MacArthur Airport. [online] Wshu.org. Available at: https://www.wshu.org/post/long-island-businesses-see-opportunity-expand-flights-islips-macarthur-airport#stream/0 [Accessed 15 October 2021].

By Adina Genn

By adding more nonstop flights, Long Island MacArthur Airport in Islip could more than double business air travel, generating more than $1 billion in new revenue each year, according to a new survey.

That’s according to an analysis of an HIA-LI-sponsored survey issued to assess the current and future travel needs of Long Island’s business community. The survey of 504 Long Island businesses was conducted between Aug. 3 and Sept. 6 by Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, a law firm headquartered in Ronkonkoma.

Now, as more people are traveling amid the pandemic, leaders in the business community are broadcasting the analysis as part of an effort to get more airlines to understand the additional revenue opportunity they would have by bringing nonstop flights to MacArthur. The airport is owned and operated by the Town of Islip, and serves about 2 million people a year. Commercial airlines at MacArthur include Southwest, American and Frontier Airlines.

In the recent HIA-LI survey, firms reported annual travel budgets ranging from under $5,000 to more than $20,000. Currently, the firms spend an average of 36.2 percent of their overall travel budgets at MacArthur Airport. This amounts to about $1.9 million out of their average, full-year, travel budgets of $5.2 million, according to the analysis.

The survey found that with more nonstop flights at the airport, businesses travelers would increase travel out of Islip, increasing their budgets at MacArthur to 78.8 percent, a 218 percent increase. That projected annual spending would then increase to $4.1 million.

The survey conductors than applied those results to Long Island’s business sector as a whole. It projected that there were about 61,076 businesses in Suffolk County with travel budgets, and would boost their spending at the airport to as much as $532.2 million, if more nonstop flights were added.  And Nassau County’s estimated businesses with travel budgets would spend up to $530.8 million additional at MacArthur.

Those projections showed the additional $1 billion in revenue, prompting the business community to join in on a call for more nonstop flights.

“This survey clearly demonstrates Long Island MacArthur Airport’s significant untapped value,” HIA-LI President and CEO Terri Alessi-Miceli said in a statement. “Long Island business, government, and civic leaders need to join forces to expand the number of nonstop flights offered by the airport.”

“Long Island MacArthur Airport already stands as an important economic development asset for Long Island,” Richard Humann, president and CEO of H2M architects + engineers and chairperson of the HIA-LI board, said in a statement. “A key goal of this survey is to help the airport build momentum toward expanding its schedule of nonstop offerings, and that’s how we’ll put it to use.”

“The potential revenue that stands to be made from adding more nonstop flights at MacArthur Airport is staggering,” Joe Campolo said in a statement.

Campolo is the immediate past chair of HIA-LI, and managing partner at Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, and a member of the Town of Islip’s Long Island MacArthur Airport Advisory Board.  He said that with his team, he “spearheaded this survey to demonstrate the power and cohesiveness of the Long Island business community. Together, we can effectuate this monumental step forward for our region and economy.”

The airport’s leadership seemed to appreciate the call for more nonstop flights.

“HIA-LI is a tremendous positive force and advocate for economic prosperity for all of Long Island,” Town of Islip Supervisor Angie Carpenter said in a statement. “They understand that Long Island MacArthur Airport represents an important asset and an economic engine for our entire region both now and in the future.”

That kind of support from the business community is taking place elsewhere in the United States.

“Around the country we see chambers of commerce, convention and visitors’ bureaus, local governments, regional economic development associations, universities, and elected officials coordinating with their airports in a cooperative and unified manner, pledging support and frequently marketing dollars to ensure the success of new airline service and the ‘Fly Local’ use of airport assets,” Airport Commissioner Shelley LaRose-Arken said in a statement.

“Business travelers much prefer nonstop air travel,” Bob Isaksen, market executive for business banking at Bank of America and an HIA-LI board member, said in a statement. “We want this survey to send a strong message to airlines about the payoff they’ll receive by deepening their commitment to Long Island MacArthur Airport.”

Read the original article on LIBN

The addition of more nonstop flights at Long Island MacArthur Airport in Islip holds the potential to generate more than $1 billion in new airport revenue annually, according to the analysis of a new survey of 504 Long Island businesses.

The Long Island MacArthur Airport Survey was designed to examine the current and future travel needs of the Long Island business community. Conducted between August 3, 2021 and September 6, 2021, the survey was sponsored by Hauppauge-based HIA-LI, one of Long Island’s largest business advocacy organizations. The survey was conducted by Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, LLP, a law firm headquartered in Ronkonkoma.

The surveyed firms reported annual travel budgets ranging from under $5,000 to more than $20,000. These companies currently spend an average of 36.2 percent of their overall travel budgets at Long Island MacArthur Airport. In dollar terms, this equals about $1.9 million out of their average, full-year, travel budgets of $5.2 million.

If the airport were to add additional nonstop flights, however, respondents said that this percentage would go up to 78.8 percent, a 218-percent increase. Their projected annual spending at the airport would rise to $4.1 million.

Grouping these businesses together as representative of Long Island’s business sector as a whole, an analysis of the survey results also looked at the potential for increased usage of Long Island MacArthur Airport by Nassau and Suffolk firms.

The analysis projected that Suffolk County has some 61,076 businesses with travel budgets. Applying the conclusions reached from the survey, these Suffolk firms would boost their spending at the airport by up to $532.2 million if more nonstop flights were added.

Nassau County is home to as many as 60,919 companies with business travel budgets. Applying the responses of surveyed companies to the Nassau business sector as a whole, firms in the county would spend up to $530.8 million more at Long Island MacArthur Airport if the airport were to add additional nonstop destinations.

Taken together, if the airport expanded its number of nonstop flights, the two counties hold the potential to generate as much as $1.1 billion in revenue.

“This survey clearly demonstrates Long Island MacArthur Airport’s significant untapped value,” said HIA-LI President and CEO Terri Alessi-Miceli. “Long Island business, government, and civic leaders need to join forces to expand the number of nonstop flights offered by the airport.”

“Long Island MacArthur Airport already stands as an important economic development asset for Long Island,” said Richard Humann, PE, who is President and CEO of H2M architects + engineers and serves as Chairperson of the HIA-LI board. “A key goal of this survey is to help the airport build momentum toward expanding its schedule of nonstop offerings, and that’s how we’ll put it to use.”

“The potential revenue that stands to be made from adding more nonstop flights at MacArthur Airport is staggering,” said Joe Campolo, Immediate Past Chair of HIA-LI, Managing Partner at Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, LLP, and a member of the Town of Islip’s Long Island MacArthur Airport Advisory Board. “My team and I spearheaded this survey to demonstrate the power and cohesiveness of the Long Island business community. Together, we can effectuate this monumental step forward for our region and economy.”

“HIA-LI is a tremendous positive force and advocate for economic prosperity for all of Long Island,” said Town of Islip Supervisor Angie Carpenter. “They understand that Long Island MacArthur Airport represents an important asset and an economic engine for our entire region both now and in the future. We are so grateful to HIA-LI members, HIA-LI President and CEO Terri Alessi-Miceli, and the organization’s Immediate Past Board Chair Joe Campolo, Managing Partner at Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, LLP,” she stated.

“Around the country we see chambers of commerce, convention and visitors’ bureaus, local governments, regional economic development associations, universities, and elected officials coordinating with their airports in a cooperative and unified manner, pledging support and frequently marketing dollars to ensure the success of new airline service and the ‘Fly Local’ use of airport assets,” said Airport Commissioner Shelley LaRose-Arken.

“Business travelers much prefer nonstop air travel,” said Bob Isaksen, Market Executive for Business Banking at Bank of America and an HIA-LI board member. “We want this survey to send a strong message to airlines about the payoff they’ll receive by deepening their commitment to Long Island MacArthur Airport.”

The Town of Islip owns and operates Long Island MacArthur Airport, which serves about two million airline passengers a year.

For a copy of the survey and an executive summary of the results, click below:

ABOUT LONG ISLAND MACARTHUR AIRPORT

Long Island MacArthur Airport customers enjoy flights on three major US domestic air carriers: American Airlines, Frontier Airlines, and Southwest Airlines. Together these carriers currently provide service to eleven cities nonstop and connect to hundreds of destinations worldwide. The airport serves 1.3M passengers annually and employs 6000 people, with a $16.1M annual operating budget and an economic impact of $600M to the region and local economy.  For more information, go to https://MacArthurAirport.com. 

HIA-LI. (2021, October 12). SURVEY OF OVER 500 LONG ISLAND FIRMS SHOWS THAT LONG ISLAND MACARTHUR AIRPORT COULD MORE THAN DOUBLE BUSINESS AIR TRAVEL BY ADDING MORE NONSTOP FLIGHTS. PROJECTING SURVEY RESULTS ISLAND-WIDE, AIRPORT COULD GENERAT $1.1 BILLION IN ADDED ANNUAL REVENUE [Press release].

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Building relationships is part of Santariello’s DNA. To that end, she has held many leadership and board positions and has worked with the LGBT Network to raise money for the education, awareness, and prevention of HIV/AIDS. The LGBT Network honored her, in 2017, for her work and dedication to the cause. She has also been recognized with the prestigious “Top 50 Women in Business” award.

Campolo, Middleton & McCormick, LLP is a premier law firm with offices across Long Island, including Westbury, Ronkonkoma and Riverhead. Recently recognized as one of America’s Top Corporate Law Firms by Forbes, CMM has become the firm of choice for clients with respect to their most significant business transactions, challenging legal issues and critical disputes.

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