As AIN’s FBO beat editor for the last several years, I have been tasked with riding herd on our annual FBO Reader Survey, and as a result of that close involvement with the best FBOs in the country and abroad, I have gotten to know many of them well, particularly the perennial top finishers. Some I have also had the pleasure of visiting. For the independent FBO locations, our survey is their Super Bowl, their Oscars, Emmys, Grammys, Golden Globes and People’s Choice Awards, what-have-you, all rolled into one. They appreciate what being highly rated by their customers/our readers means to their business, and in most cases view it as a measure of recognition for the good work done by their staff.
Earlier this year I was surprised by the sale of Tampa International Jet Center (TIJC), a regular top five-rated location, to Sheltair. While the factors behind the transaction, once explained, made perfect sense from both sides of the equation, it meant another proud, fiercely independent FBO had vanished in the consolidation cauldron.
A lifelong aviation enthusiast who joined AIN in 2007, Curt came to the publication from the broadcast industry where he was a national science and technology television reporter and producer. He writes on the FBO field, aviation finance, and sustainable aviation and occasionally contributes to AIN sister publication Business Jet Traveler. Curt was a member of the AINtv reporting staff that won the 2008 Aerospace Journalist of the Year award for Best Airshow Daily. That same year, he was a finalist for another AJOYA award. He earned an AJOYA for Best Business Aviation Submission in 2018 and was a finalist in that category in 2021. He received the National Air Transportation Association’s Aviation Journalist Award in 2012 and won a Pegasus Sapphire Business Aviation Award for outstanding journalism in 2021.
Before joining AIN, Curt worked with Consumer Reports’ television division, CRTV, and for several local television news staffs. An honors graduate of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, he earned a master’s degree in broadcast journalism from Boston University in 1995. Curt lives in New York State with his wife and two young sons.
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