The ACS Sydney management team of Paul Crook, Lea Vesic, Rob Emanuel with Justin Lancaster

Around the world with ACS

California

Air Charter Service's Los Angeles operation has moved to newer, larger premises on Santa Monica Boulevard following a record year for both the company and the LA office itself.

Thomas Howe, director of ACS California, comments: “With this move we have almost doubled the size of our office space, and we have big plans for expanding this already strong team.

“The location on Santa Monica Boulevard is ideal for client relationships, it being a popular, thriving area and fairly central. A lot of our clients are involved in the entertainment industry and we are only a few miles from Hollywood.

Australia

ACS has opened its first office on the Australasian continent in Sydney, Australia. Commercial director Justin Lancaster says: “Our Hong Kong office has built up a strong customer base in the region over the past few years and we felt now was the right time to have a local presence in order to strengthen the current relationships and to help build new ones.

“We had launched online late last year and have so far received a good response from the site. We are hopeful that the office will get off to a flying start.”

Europe

The volume of ACS' aircraft bookings for this summer's European football championship in France is growing as demand from travel agents and supporters' groups increases. Group CEO Justin Bowman says: “As soon as the draw was announced people were on the phones enquiring on behalf of teams, supporters, sponsors and the media. With new budgets coming into play this month and next, we are seeing a lot of those initial enquiries turning into bookings now.”

ACS reports that in 2015 it arranged more than 10,000 charter contracts in a year for the first time in its history. Bowman says: “It is a testament to our global strategy and growth that 12 years ago we arranged less than 1,000 and now we are booking more than ten times that amount. We broke our monthly record five times in the space of six months over the spring and summer last year, including two consecutive months of more than 1,000 charters.”