North Star Air Opens Brand New Terminal Building!
by Scott A. Sumner
The Thunder Bay Airport has a brand new building adjacent to its runways occupied by North Star Air. This state of the art, 37,000 square foot facility, has been custom built to meet the needs of the growing airline.
“ North Star began about 26 years ago in Pickle Lake as mainly a float operation dealing with tourism and canoes. Frontier Canoes was involved in the original company. Frank Kelner got involved with the owner in 2013 with Cargo North which featured the Basler aircraft. From there in 2017 North Star Air was purchased by the Northwest Company, which is a publicly traded company. We operate independently but are owned by them. The Northwest Company also operates stores in the remote communities.” said Tom Meilleur, Vice President North Star Air. “ Frank is a visionary and turned North Star from scratch to where it is today, so deserves a lot of the credit. He is the Accountable Executive of North Star with Transport Canada. Eventually he merged North Star and Cargo North and now we have 3 Baslers, 5 ATR 72 500 freighters, 8 Pilatus PC 12 and 4 Dash 8's- 100 and 300's.”
“ I am from Chicago and went to school in Boston. In 2012 Frank had just bought out my dad in the business and asked me to go to Pickle Lake for the summer and I liked it there. One day in Boston and then Pickle Lake! I've been working in the aviation business for 11 years now.” said Jeff Stout, President / Chief Operating Officer of North Star Air. “ My father, John, was involved in 1997 when it was a fly in fishing operation and grew over the years bit by bit. In 2012 my father's business partner was bought out by Frank Kelner and that is when the growth trajectory started. They brought on Baslers, started Cargo North, added Pilatus aircraft and culminated by being bought by the Northwest Company in 2017. My father is completely out of the business now. Northwest purchased North Star Air in 2017 from my father and Frank Kelner. Frank Kelner is well known in aviation.”
North Star now has a staff of 330 here in Thunder Bay, in other NW Ontario communities, in Northern Manitoba and Nunavit.
“ The new building is an amalgamation of 7 locations used previously including the warehouse leased from the airport for our cargo location. Our schedule service was in the main terminal building. We had Walsh street as offices and administration with two buildings and two rental units on Beaverhall Hall Place. We have been growing over time and now we are in one location.” said Tom Meilleur.
“ We firmly believe the goal of being consolidated in one location was to improve customer service. Previously you had to go all over the place. Having everyone in one place and getting a team approach with one stop shopping for our customers is huge. We have maintenance right here. The synergies are going to be amazing.
” The new building is around 37,000 square feet in size, just a little bigger than the previous 7 locations combined. It was 3 to 4 years in the making, including a 1 1/2 year design and construction to get it completed. It is really energizing for Tom and myself to be involved more closely with the staff. In the past we had many people working from home because we didn't have the space. It has been a long process and we are thrilled to have everyone in one location.” said Jeff Stout.
“ The aviation business is complex, particularly in the North. If we were running from say here to Toronto only it would be simpler. In the North you have a lack of infrastructure. The airports may not meet today's codes. We are working with the government trying to find solutions to improve these airports. The weather, the harsh environments that are ever changing and lack of weather reporting is challenging. Our aim is to get a better service to the North.” said Jeff.
“ You have to be adaptable in this environment. We have done a pretty good job to adapt to our customers and have had a good relationship with our First Nations communities including 11 partners- they are not owners but we have a strategic partnership. Since 2014 we have given back to the communities over $13 million dollars. It is a beautiful relationship, built on trust, friendship and service. Our customers can call Jeff or me and say we need this. They get that extra service level and we get friendships. The communities we service are exclusively fly in only. They relie on us for passenger movements, fuel, cargo, food- we take that extremely seriously. We are an essential service.” said Tom. “ This new building is also about food security for example, so our clients can bring their food back safely in good condition, with our new freezers.”
“ We are a larger regional carrier- don't have as many aircraft as some others, but what we have we use well. For instance our ATR's normally might fly 1200 hours with other carriers and they are happy, but we have over 1800 hours due to efficient usage.” said Tom.
“ We operate independently but report to the Northwest Company. They are also our biggest customer as well as we serve all of their communities and are held accountable. They get well serviced. We are a Thunder Bay company and that is not changing.What is neat is we are working in Northern Manitoba and operating elsewhere bringing jobs here.” said Jeff.
“ It will take time to settle into this new building, but it is focusing in on our core business which is servicing the north.We don't pretend to be Air Canada, we're not Porter, we are a northern airline focused on safe, reliable service to the north. We can now double down with this new building and focus on what we can do better. It reaffirms our commitment to the north for the long run.” said Jeff.
Is there anything else on the horizon for North Star Air?
“ We always look at new opportunity and have just got a new to us Pilatus PC 12 and want to add another freighter aircraft. Our growth will be incremental and concentrate on good service in the north. We will get better with this new building. In the business, aircraft can need maintenance so it is good to have flexibility with staff and aircraft to think outside of the box. If you have a scheduled flight and need a new aircraft for the route we will find a way to service the customer. We never want to hear from a community that there are no seats available, as they need to attend medical appointments for example- we will add flights. We take out role very seriously.” said Jeff.
