Unpacking the Bonza Aviation Bust

Jason · 00:00Welcome to episode 176 of The Numbers Game. I'm Jase and I'm here with Nick and Marty. How are we, fellas?

Marty · 00:06Oh, going well, Jase. Just had a nice little holiday, just a little refresh up at Noosa, which was lovely, and flew Virgin, which is good. They're still in business, but we'll get to that a bit later. Um, put Penny Lane away into dog care for a few days.

Marty · 00:21Not the same dog's come back. It is the same dog, but I don't know what's happened. But, uh, I saw a lot of pictures while I was away, her doing things that were very, very naughty. So I'm hoping we're not going to get puppies in a few months' time.

Marty · 00:37But yeah, it was good, good to refresh. But hey, I only went locally. I know you went away to London. I'm sure we're going to talk about this. But Nick, how are you, my friend?

Nick · 00:47Yeah, I'm very good, very good. Good to have Jase back. No holidays for me, unfortunately. Booked a work trip to Barcelona of all places though recently, so I'm excited for that. So yeah, it's good that we're talking about airlines and travel.

Nick · 01:04But, um, before I ask Jase how he is, Marty, who's sending you photos of your dog in, um, in strange positions? What, what, where was this place that you, you sent Pennyline?

Marty · 01:18This is like to the, to to— they send out these pictures to show your dog's doing well, right? So every day there's a— on social media you get a picture about 70 dogs. And all I've got, I've got one nice picture of my dog, but in the background of all these other pictures, my dog's getting humped.

Marty · 01:36And I'm going, I'm not paying $60 a day for this dog to just, you know, turn it from a pup into a woman. And I just was not— well, I spent half the holiday just perusing the pictures going, this is not right.

Nick · 01:53But anyway, any commentary? Was there any commentary with the photos? So Penny Lane's fitting in really well.

Jason · 02:00So someone delivering a pizza, somebody delivered a pizza in the background.

Marty · 02:03They said she's having a good time. I said, no shit, I can see it.

Jason · 02:07There's a photo, she's on her back with a cigarette lit up. She's just living.

Marty · 02:11She's just absolute— we couldn't believe the behavior. We thought we brought her up to be better than that, but But obviously, you know, not.

Nick · 02:20So is she— is she giving you the weird looks because she's not happy? Maybe she just wants to go back, wants to know why you picked her up.

Marty · 02:27I think she's depressed. That's what's worrying me. She's running around with 40 dogs every morning and now it's just me patting her on an armchair. It's just not the same. Not the same thrill.

Nick · 02:39Anyway, Jase, how are you, mate?

Jason · 02:41Mate, I'm good. I go away for a couple— I go away for a few weeks and all hell's broken loose here. It's, you know, dog, dog humping and won't go back there. I'll skip past that. I'm good. I'm good. Fortunately, we are talking flights or airlines and things like that today.

Jason · 02:58But to give you a quick recap of the travels, obviously went to the UK. Greg and I ran the London Marathon, which was a nice little bucket list, something, you know, pretty, pretty epic to be able to do. I think each year only 1% of people that apply actually get to run the marathon. Very, very prestigious and hard to get.

Jason · 03:17850,000 people people have applied for next year's London Marathon already. Like, so a year in advance, they're trying to sort out the numbers.

Nick · 03:22You applied? No, no, is it a lucky dip thing or a time based on your times?

Jason · 03:28There's a bit of everything. So, so of the, let's say, 60,000 places, or, you know, they do a little bit more than that, of the 60,000 places, let's say, I think roughly 15,000 is ballot. So you, you just lucky dip for those 15,000. So that for next year, they're trying to squeeze 840,000 ballot applicants into 15 thousand positions.

Jason · 03:50So that's the Lucky Dip bit. Then beyond that, you've got charity tickets. So the charity partners get provided X amount of tickets and people have to fundraise a certain amount to then get their charity entry. And then you've got, I think, 7 to— or there's another up, let's call it around another 10,000 that are like people who got a qualification time.

Jason · 04:11So I think it's like 2 hours and 55 minutes, or it changes based on your age, male or female, but you got to run a pretty elite marathon time to get automatic entry through your qualification time. But yeah, the world of marathons is, uh, yeah, that might be an app where we bring Greg back on.

Jason · 04:27He's now done nearly 1,400 days straight of running or exercise, and he was there obviously running the marathon too. So we might get into the world of marathon numbers when we have Greg back on.

Marty · 04:39How'd you go in regards to what you expected on time? You finished the race, I saw pictures.

Jason · 04:44Yeah, yeah, got the medals, that was important. Um, I wanted to go under 3:45. My last target was under 4 hours, and I just missed that by 2 minutes. I thought, screw it, I'm gonna do a 3:45 target. So I know that I've got to put in the training and the work to, to at least beat my last time.

Jason · 05:01And once again, I went 2 minutes short. I did 3:47. So I now, I think I know the trick, that I've got to add an extra couple of minutes to it. Um, I do have the Gold Coast Marathon coming up where I'll go for 3:38, which means I'll get 3:40, which is what I really want.

Jason · 05:17And then Chicago later this year, 3:28, which means I really want 3:30. Um, so just, I'm just about improvement, just plugging along, not I'm not a professional runner, just enjoying myself getting out there. And, you know, I think one of the big things you have to— one of the things I say with this, and Greg as well, is if you've got to enjoy the process, you've got to enjoy running if you're going to put in the amount of work you have to put in to run a marathon.

Jason · 05:39Like, if you don't enjoy it, you're just not going to have a good time doing it. I smiled for 42 kilometers, almost the whole 42 kilometers of the London Marathon. You know, the Tower Bridge, London Eye, the streets, the streets are pumping. There's hundreds of thousands of people lined up.

Jason · 05:57There wasn't a meter of the 42 kilometers where there wasn't a crowd on the sidelines. Like, my mind was boggled by this thing of like how many people come out on the day in support. There's people outside pubs with pints cheering. There's people holding up signs.

Jason · 06:14If you get your number printed on your chest, which I was silly enough not to sign up for, but Greg had Brammer written on his chest, he said there's moments where he starts to get tough and people screaming, come on, 'Come on, Brahmo, you can do this.' And you kind of get that little bit of a lift to kind of get through it.

Jason · 06:29But yeah, epic experience. Looking forward to unpacking that a bit more with the Greggy Marathon that we might do in the next couple of weeks. But on the flight story though, I happened to be flying over and it was the day that Dubai had its epic 75-year flood, 1.5 years of rain in one morning.

Jason · 06:50So we landed in Dubai, airport was closed, roads were crushed, it was chaos. Emirates lost, or Emirates misplaced, or 30,000 bags basically didn't make the journey with the people that came and went in that period through the airport.

Jason · 07:07So I landed in London, checked the old AirTag on the phone, you know, as Case and I do when we land, and hit refresh, and it said that it was still sitting in Dubai. And I went, oh, and she goes, oh, surely you were smart enough to to pack your running gear that you need for 3 days or 4 days.

Jason · 07:26Now, we landed on the Wednesday, the marathon was a Sunday. So surely you packed your shoes and all your running gear in your carry-on. I went, nah, it's in the bag back in Dubai. So, uh, it was a stressful 48 hours waiting for the bag to arrive.

Jason · 07:42And, um, yeah, I got lucky. I was one of 4 bags that got released from the airport out of 1,000, and that was because of sheer determination. I rocked up and said, I'm not leaving here without my bag. I know it's I can see it on the bloody AirTag. It's over there in a factory.

Jason · 07:58Like, let me into the warehouse. I'll get the bloody bag myself. But it's not how it works. And I'll spare the details of the story, but it's a tale of just, yeah, just as I got lucky and I happened to, you know, those random things that happened, like, to some people.

Jason · 08:13I feel like I get a few of them, but I met one of the marketing managers for New Balance on the plane on the way over, and him and I exchanged details. And his bag had the running gear for 4 of their amateur athletes in his bag. And when I went back to the airport and demanded to get my bag out, he Instagrammed me, said, hey, no pressure, but can you ask them if they can grab my bag while they're there?

Jason · 08:35And it happened that the employee that was helping me saw the bag with the big New Balance sticker on it, and he said, okay, like, I'll grab that bag and another one while I'm there, but I'm not doing it for anyone else. So he released 4 bags to me out of the 1,000 that were backlogged.

Jason · 08:51And I ended up being the savior for a bunch of these New Balance athletes that ended up with their clothing.

Nick · 08:57So I assume that means we see you in New Balance on the next marathon.

Jason · 09:03I'm not going to lie. I might have to get this little snippet from Tommy for afterwards, but Mitch from New Balance did say he was going to hook me up with a new pair of New Balance shoes. So I will be running if he comes through with the goods.

Marty · 09:17Mitch, Mitch, don't forget Jason's friends.

Jason · 09:21Mitch looks after me, sent me into New Balance in London. I did get a bit of a kit on behalf of Mitch. He did help me out. So I've now got a New Balance t-shirt. I've got some New Balance threads. I never thought I'd be a New Balance guy. I've always been Nike, but I'm telling you now, I'm converted.

Jason · 09:37New Balance have got some really cool things. And I'm not just saying this for the amateur athlete sponsorship that I'm trying to work on, influencer role, but New Balance is pretty pretty on fire at the moment. So check it out.

Marty · 09:50Fantastic. Your power knows no boundaries, Jase. Well, you're very, very influential and you're always meeting people wherever you go around the world. I love it. And what a remarkable experience to share with the audience. I felt like I was there with you when you were talking about it.

Marty · 10:07But we are talking about planes today though, and I wanted to bring up a local story, bring it back to local. Bonza Aviation and their collapse. They've only been up and running since January '23, so they haven't been in the game for very long.

Marty · 10:25But I thought it was an interesting thing to look at from a point of view of, you know, starting a business and some of the don'ts, uh, in regards to what to avoid when you are starting a business. Because in theory, when you read the business premise, it kind of makes sense.

Marty · 10:41Like, they wanted to set up a budget regional airline and they wanted to fly paths that work getting flown, uh, just to connect more people, uh, to more regions. So you go, that's, it's, yeah, it's a good idea, seems a good idea. And I like that, um, the chief executive Tim Jordan, one of his quotes was, we're about connecting communities and giving Aussies the chance to fly directly to see loved ones where before it was either too expensive or took too long.

Marty · 11:10And I thought, okay, That seems like a reasonable premise, but in 14 months' time, it's all over. And, um, there's many reasons as to why it is over, but I'll run through a couple of the things and I'll, I'll get, I'll get you boys to comment on it to see what you think about it.

Marty · 11:29Um, they had an app-only booking system, so app-only booking system. So they had an exclusive reliance on their mobile app. Uh, alienating segments of the population, particularly the elderly, and limited its visibility compared to competitors on traditional booking platforms.

Marty · 11:50So I thought that was big because you couldn't even go to, you know how you get those aggregation Webjet apps and things like that to see what's cheap? They're not on there. They were never on there.

Jason · 12:00I was about to say that, Marty. Like, I've never seen a Bonza flight pop up in any of my searches. Like, are you flying to the sunny coast? You know, go into some of these, you know, not so much regional, but even the opportunity to fly to Queensland, Gold Coast, Sunny Coast, if that's where Bonza was doing most of its work.

Jason · 12:18And I fly a bit, and Nick, you can probably chime in too, but I have not once seen an ad for Bonza. It doesn't pop up on Instagram. It's not on my Google, like, you know, Google Ads. Like, how could I have been expected to buy a ticket to fly somewhere, like, if I can't get to it?

Nick · 12:38Yeah, it's a really good point. I'll say this with a complete truth. The only time I've ever seen Bonza's advertising is on the side of a plane on a tarmac when I'm either getting on another plane and I've seen them before and gone, Bonza, who's that?

Nick · 12:53And I do remember seeing them on billboards when they first came out. But yeah, you're right. Like, I use Webjet a lot to, to work out what's what between Virgin and Qantas.

Jason · 13:02Same.

Nick · 13:03Yeah. Bonza are never there because at times, particularly in the last 12 months, I've actually considered Rex because Rexus, um, depending on the flight, are a lot cheaper. Um, but I've never seen Bonza ever. Um, but I'll also say, hang on, maybe this is us because they only do certain routes.

Nick · 13:22So they only do the, the country route. So maybe, maybe they are— are they on Webjet if you search the country locations?

Marty · 13:33Or I couldn't find them on any aggregated search. Like when I was— because I was looking obviously when I was flying, you know, recently and I just, I couldn't locate them anywhere. So everything's just, you know, Virgin, Jetset, Jetstar, Qantas.

Nick · 13:49Well, I guess, I guess that's how I say Jetset. You're a jet setter. I guess that's how they make money. So with Webjet, you book through Webjet and obviously there's a— then they make money out of that. So if the only option for Bonza is via the app, then they can't be on those aggregated sites.

Nick · 14:07Because you can't, you can't book them through that site.

Marty · 14:10And if traditional, you know, let's say traditional regional people, let's say they're more, they are a bit more elderly and they're connecting between communities. Um, yeah, maybe, maybe the app was a hindrance, the fact that you could only book a flight through their internal app.

Marty · 14:25That's the only way you could book a flight. So pretty limiting. Yeah, pretty limiting when you're trying to get yourself out there.

Jason · 14:32Oh, hang on. That there was one bit of news, which is probably too little too late now on the 27th of March, 2024. So just over a month, a month and a half ago, they, they just launched the flybonza.com website to be able to do bookings direct from the website to stop people having to download an app.

Jason · 14:50That's probably, that's a little bit too little too late. Again, you've got to actually, you've got to actually know to go to flybonza.com to book it rather than. On an aggregator like Google Flights or whatever.

Marty · 15:01So anyway, so you'd have to search directly, you know, rather than it coming up anywhere that you could sort of catch it by marketing play. So it's, um, so again, you need to be visible. You're starting a business, you've got to be visible in all aspects where people are looking, um, because people aren't going to guess where to find you.

Marty · 15:22So it's, um, yeah, that's business 101 right there. Uh, the other thing was, um, the marketing strategy. Like, what do you think about just, you know, looking at regional services? And I guess I sort of compare to, let's say, a Rex or, you know, Qantas.

Marty · 15:42You know, they, they have the mainstream of where the flights and where you're making money, where the mass population are actually traveling. But you then obviously have an opportunity to extend that benefit into a niche. So these guys have gone into a regional niche with no real platform of any mainstream type of service.

Marty · 16:04To me, that's a little bit anti-intuitive unless you get the absolute marketing 100% right, but bit vulnerable, I thought.

Jason · 16:13In regional, regional areas are the ones that are like, when you shut down a bank branch, they scream about it because like they like the people, people-to-people contact in regional, the community. So if you've got an airline that you can only book through an app as well, like that doesn't make sense. And then elderly Australians, which, you know, again, in a lot of regional places— again, I'm being stereotypical here, but you imagine an elderly customer base in a lot of regional towns that might want to then fly to see their family or their children.

Jason · 16:42If you shut them out altogether, that, that's just a pretty, pretty dangerous way to run a business.

Marty · 16:49Do you think they would have stayed out of like the main terminals and the main areas of travel just due to cost too? When you're looking at competition with Qantas and Virgin, how much, you know, how much it would cost to be in major terminals. It's obviously significant.

Marty · 17:05So would, would the thought process be maybe if we go from regional areas, maybe our costings are a little bit lower and we can run those transitions? I'm just trying to get the headspace as to, you know, where it could work.

Nick · 17:19Who was the guy who was ex-Virgin, wasn't he the CEO?

Marty · 17:22Yeah, he was an ex-Virgin CEO.

Nick · 17:24You've got to assume deep knowledge of the aviation industry and all the, uh, the commercial travel industry. You've got to assume budgets were done, strategies were done. So you, you know, there had to have been a viable business model, um, that, that just really— that they've obviously just got it wrong.

Nick · 17:45And I, I think— and this is coming in with absolutely no knowledge of how that all works, but But from what I do understand from reading some, some books is, is it is pretty cutthroat in getting access to, to different terminals. And then you think about all the costs that are associated with that, more staff on the ground because you've got more gates.

Nick · 18:05I think you either go— from what I can see on the outside, you either go big or you go really small. And maybe the choice was to go really small because to go really big, well, it's too hard to compete with the likes of of, you know, Virgin and Qantas.

Nick · 18:21And you say Jetstar, but at the end of the day, that's owned by Qantas. So I think surely there was a business model there that worked, but maybe they just completely got it wrong. Maybe there's been some variables that have meant the model didn't work.

Nick · 18:39Because if you look at the stuff that you've brought up, Marty, a competitive landscape, not to steal your thunder here, we'll talk about it, but frequent flyer programs, fleet size and operations, marketing strategy. Surely they knew, they knew what they're up against, um, and they, they had the model to work.

Nick · 18:58So I'd be curious to know what actually went wrong. What actually went wrong? Where were you wrong? Um, because they would have built the model around these, these other issues, I would have thought. Um, I don't know.

Marty · 19:13Yeah, there'd be definitely a demand in the niche, you would think. So, you know, and it would have been budgeted accordingly, you would think. But again, high costs, fuel, you know, expenses in general have been going up. Maybe that's, uh, but you've got to have sales at the end of the day.

Marty · 19:29You can, you can mitigate some of that cost if you've got sales. But then I read, I looked at their fleet size and operations. They were operating with just 4 aircraft.

Nick · 19:38Couldn't believe that.

Marty · 19:38So they had limited flexibility and scalability. Like, that's amazing. The choice of leasing a large Boeing 737. It's like, it's crazy.

Jason · 19:48I saw in the last couple of days 300 Bonza staff have been stood down. I don't run an airline business, so again, this unpacking of the numbers— 300 staff for 4 aircraft to fly around the country each day.

Marty · 20:03Those numbers don't stack up.

Jason · 20:05For me, it seems like the economy is a scale and the numbers, you know, and I'm sure That's what it takes. I mean, again, as I said, but the fleet size and operations there on top of that, that does blow my mind. I mean, Australia is a big country with a small amount of people when you compare to, you know, Europe and the UK, for example, where I saw planes overhead every bloody day flying into the many different airports.

Jason · 20:28I was near Bristol, I was near Heathrow, there was Exeter, there's airports everywhere. But there's so many people in Europe and the UK flying here, there, everywhere. There's 300 million people or more in the US that are flying to all the US airports. Here, they're everywhere. Australia, I can see it as a very difficult market to crack.

Jason · 20:47And if you've only got 4 planes, a limited amount of people that are getting in the skies and moving around anyway. Yeah, as you said, Nick, I'm sure they did crunch the numbers and go, this is a viable business. But at the same time, is this also, you know, private capital from another country being injected into a market in Australia and then entrusted to someone else to, to go and spend?

Nick · 21:11And maybe just, um, just, yeah, just because I thought I'd have a look at the Rex fleet. So Rex have 67 planes in their fleet. So that's, that's, uh, I know Rex has been around for quite some time, but I guess they're a competitor. They're regional and they're a competitor, um, you know, over 10 times or nearly 20 times the amount of planes that's, um, I don't know, that I actually didn't believe that stat, Matt.

Nick · 21:37Marty, when you sent that through, I was like, hang on.

Marty · 21:39Yeah, me either.

Nick · 21:40What kind of national business, airline business, has only 4 planes? Like, and I get they've got the ability to lease them, but yeah.

Marty · 21:48I thought about it relating even to our own business, Nick, and you go, okay, well look, majority of mortgage broking firms have, you know, 40+ lenders you deal with. Imagine coming out, oh, we've, yeah, we've starting a new business, there's only 4.

Marty · 22:03Right? And then you can't find us unless you go directly to our app. And, and you're overstaffed, you're carrying expenses, high expenses to cater for the volume and the operations. It just seems like, yeah, to me, even relating it back to our own business, it seems like an absolute death trap.

Marty · 22:24So just on that level, it's unbelievable.

Nick · 22:29Yeah, it's, it's, it's crazy. Like As again, as I said, reading this, it's like, how, how, how was it ever going to work? Maybe there were plans. Maybe there were plans. This obviously we're not, we were not privy to this, but maybe regional was where they were going to start and maybe they had a plan to build it out and at times attack those other routes once they got, once they got some traction.

Nick · 22:52Not sure. But for me, it just seems madness that they thought they were going to actually operate with 4 planes. There had to have been a growth growth trajectory there that they were expecting to follow.

Marty · 23:03Well, if you are small and niche, your one advantage is quality and service delivery, right? That's your one, your one advantage to the market. But then I read, you know, early flight delays, cancellations, and scheduling issues tarnish Bodza's reputation, leading to customer frustration and negative social media feedback.

Marty · 23:25This further eroded trust and confidence in the airline. So your one play, your one play of actually creating a great experience for the traveler because you're small is totally blown away as well. As you go, no leg to stand on there as well.

Nick · 23:44Crazy.

Marty · 23:45Well, wouldn't you think? If you're going to service, if you're going to service, let's say, yeah, I'll just mess around here, but let's say you're servicing 100 people instead of maybe, you know, 20,000 people, you've got a real opportunity to wow them, you know, in the expansion of the brand.

Marty · 24:01So to come up and have those issues, you're just— you're shooting yourself in the foot from day one.

Jason · 24:08So yeah, well, and now, now I'm seeing flip it the other way. I've been seeing comments online, you know, Jackie Felgate's one page that always has people going crazy with their comments and stories being shared, but some people who are trapped with their Bonza flights being cancelled, jet Jetstar, Virgin, I think they all came out and said, if you had a Bonza flight, we will match it for free or get you as close as we can to keep you moving as a goodwill gesture to you.

Jason · 24:36And so all these people with Bonza flights, Jetstar was this one particular one that came through and replaced the flight free of charge for some people who were meant to be flying on Bonza. And then that got shared on social media. Everybody's commenting on, yes, hell yeah, Jetstar, great job.

Jason · 24:52Like, this is awesome. You know, Australia. Good stuff. So, you know, you're now seeing the opposite side of reputational damage going. This is why if you do have any— if some kind of brand loyalty, you know, look, again, most of us will flick between whatever the best flight at the best time at the best price we can find, you know.

Jason · 25:10But again, if you've got, you know, frequent flyer points to use, if you've got gold, like, you know, if you're Qantas Club member, like, you know, so having lounge access and things like that, there's all these different things that make it— I think Australia's got to be the hardest airline market in the world to crack into.

Jason · 25:26Has to be.

Nick · 25:27I think the reality is too, mate, we're creatures of habit. Like, I can, I can relate to this because Qantas over the last 18 months, I feel this, this is my experience anyway, have just seemed to be far more expensive than Virgin. So, you know, I've drifted across to Virgin at times purely because of costs, and the cost was significant.

Nick · 25:47Um, but prior to that, you're always— I personally was happy to, to pay a little bit more for Qantas because I was used— I knew where to go in the terminal, like I didn't have to think. It was almost like autopilot. Like, just, just now even going into the Virgin terminal, for me it's a little bit different because you go in, you've got to go left, you've got to walk down to that— I can't remember what the terminal is, I think it is Terminal 4— where there's more people down there because there are more, um, there are more scanners.

Nick · 26:18So even though Virgin Flights are great. I'm flying— finding for me the Virgin experience getting on the plane is not as seamless as Qantas. So I think we're creatures of comfort as well. So if you are going to pull people away from their existing airlines or their existing services, you have to have a pretty compelling service or reason for them to move.

Nick · 26:41And then if you're then, to your point Marty, then getting a shitty service at the end, whether it's from a late flight or or whatnot, um, you know, they're only going to— they're only going to give you a crack once and then they'll go back to what they know.

Marty · 26:54So yeah, that's exactly right. And see, I've been flying Virgin for a fair while now, and— but I don't know what the Qantas experience is. So my perception is Qantas may be a little bit more expensive on ticket, but with Virgin, if I pay an extra $40, $50, I get Economy X, which gives me extra legroom.

Marty · 27:13But that's only because I'm a part of the brand and I've been utilizing it that I know that Qantas may well have that. And I don't have, I don't have a clue. Right. But it's, it's, yeah, you do get familiar, but if I was to have an experience elsewhere, it would have to supersede the experience that I'm having at the, you know, a similar or better price, I guess.

Marty · 27:34So it's, yeah, it's an interesting one. And I think they've failed on that. And they, they said another point, which I found fascinating was the frequent flyer programs actually played a significant part in them not getting traction. They, they didn't realize how loyal people were to Virgin and Qantas based on the frequent flyer programs.

Marty · 27:53But then I thought, but they're not flying those routes, so I'm going, why should that even have an impact? But it might just be a psychological, um, preference regardless.

Nick · 28:04So there's a few things for me that didn't stack up. Up. Um, there's a few things that didn't stack up on that stuff that came through, that, as I said before, not to harp on it, but surely they knew a lot of these things. Just did a quick Google search on the guy that was behind the cap raise though, and apparently he's in under a bit of fire for a lot of reasons.

Nick · 28:21So, um, yeah, maybe we'll unpack that another time. The mystery man behind 777 Partners, this, the strange private equity firm that owns Bonza.

Marty · 28:32So Where there's smoke, there's fire.

Jason · 28:35Might have to do a part 2 because that's interesting. And then I think he's behind one of the A-League soccer clubs here as well. He's got some investment in one of those. And then Everton, I think, in the EPL. Everton in the EPL as well. So there's, there's some interesting funds flowing around the world from, from this place.

Jason · 28:53It'll be maybe another one to unpack.

Nick · 28:56$45 million Aussie in unpaid aircraft leasing fees and damages they're being chased for. So they're $45 million in the hole just for leasing aircraft.

Jason · 29:08You can imagine then if you've got 300 staff that have pay-as-you-go withholding, superannuation, um, there's, there's going to be a trail of destruction after this, uh, all finishes up.

Marty · 29:20Surprised they even put fuel in the damn plane on that basis. But it's like, it's— but this is the thing, how wrong you can get in regards to starting your own business. You want a competitive advantage you want to have as much visibility as you can get out there, and you want to deliver a quality service that people actually want.

Marty · 29:40And like Nick was talking about earlier, you want to make sure it's mapped out strategically and executed. But again, you want to know the first thing in a business is, can I get traction? Does the market want what I have? And can I deliver in a way that they want more of it?

Marty · 29:56And it's, um,. And just running through this, I think it was just a really good, a really good demonstration of— and poor, poor methodology here— but it's never one thing that crashes a plane. It's usually a number of different things that fail that brings the plane down.

Marty · 30:14And in this situation, uh, Bonza has hit a lot of those. So I thought it was just a good, uh, good little case study and more to unpack on it.

Jason · 30:23Love it, Marty. Well, that's been another awesome episode of The Numbers Game. Thank you for joining us. Remember to like, follow, subscribe depending on what you're on. You can catch our full video eps on YouTube now and follow us on Instagram for some little snippets of gold that you may not, uh, that you may not get to see elsewhere.

Marty · 30:40But until next time, keep flying. Game over.