Just a quick Trip Report, I'll try to focus on the flight experience itself rather than on the destination. I apologize for the lack of pictures of many aspects and the quality of the ones I did take. I was trying to just enjoy the experience, and reviewing it was only secondary.
My buddy
Shmueli2007 and I got the 3 month JetSmarter Simple membership trial, and we were itching to try it out. In case you aren't familiar, a Simple Membership costs $5,000 and gives you one free seat on any scheduled "shuttle", and two free seats on any empty leg "deal" flights. There are many regularly scheduled shuttles, and there are also member initiated ones where you basically hop on a plane with someone else who chartered it. You can only book one shuttle flight at a time, as you have a shuttle token that gets returned after you take off. We wen't back and forth on different destinations, before deciding to go back and forth to Washington. There were some other deals that came up, but I'd heard reports that many of them get canceled, and the shuttle was much easier to plan our way home. The Teterboro to Washington Shuttle takes off at 7:45 am on Wednesdays, and returns at 5:45 pm that afternoon. We booked the outbound flight on Sunday night after checking that there were multiple Avios and TrueBlue options that could get us home if we weren't able to get back on the shuttle.
I was coming from Long Beach and Shmueli was coming from Brooklyn, so we had to plan the best way to get to Teterboro, especially considering we didn't know if we'd be returning there, or to JFK or Laguardia. The first plan was for me to sleep in Brooklyn and we'd wake up early to take a train to Grand Central and then a bus to Teterboro, but in the end we decided that we'd take a risk. We ended up finding a place to stay in Passaic (15 minutes away) for the night, so we drove there and then left the car at Teterboro in the morning.
When you book a flight, JetSmarter sends you an itinerary in the app that includes the address of the FBO (Fixed Base Operator, basically the company that provides the ground services) where you will be departing from. They tell you to arrive 30 minutes before your flight, but we got there earlier since we were pretty excited. When you get there, you provide the tail number of your flight (also available in the itinerary they send), and they give you a paper to put in your car to allow you to leave it in the lot. I was later told that you can leave your car there for up to 5 days for free. There was a JetSmarter representative waiting outside the Terminal who checked our names against a list he had, and showed us in to the Terminal. I didn't take any pictures inside as I was trying to look like I'd done this a million times before, so here is one that I found on Google:
Private jet FBOs don't seem to be as fancy as what we expect from first and even business class lounges. I would assume the reason is most people aren't spending more than 20 minutes in there, as they arrive exactly when they want to fly. There was a coffee machine and a few snacks, and comfortable seating. I didn't think to ask if there was a shower. The views are incredible as there was 10 - 15 private jets of different types and sizes parked right outside. I gave up hope of looking like a hot shot and took a ton of pictures. Most weren't that great but here are a few:
Very soon our pilot came and introduced himself and checked our licenses. He said they were just waiting for the other passengers to show up, and then we'd get going. Once everyone was there, we simply walked onto the tarmac and got on the plane. The plane itself wasn't overly fancy, but the seats were very comfortable for a 45 minute hop. There were three other passengers on board with us, all of whom did not seem interested in conversation, so Shmueli and I made all the noise. There were some sodas and some alcohol, but no snacks.
The pilots then closed the door, gave a 30 second safety speech, and then we started taxiing. Since it is such a small plane, you really feel every movement when you take off, and it feels a lot steeper. The flight was uneventful, and there was no service as the only crew on-board were the pilots. They flew with the cockpit door open, which was cool as we got to see what the pilots see (hint: it's nothing). We landed and pulled right up to the FBO. It was interesting as we took off from Atlantic in Teterboro and landed at Singature in Washington. The pilots were more than happy to let us stay on the plane a bit longer to snap some pictures while it was empty.
I felt bad when I realized that there was an agent waiting to escort us to the terminal while we were messing around and chatting with the pilots. Once inside, there was a JetSmarter representative waiting for us, who asked if our driver was there or if we needed an Uber. We ended up just hanging out a bit to try and figure out what we wanted to do that day. Eventually we went outside and hopped on a shuttle that took us to the main arrivals terminal, and we were going to take a bus/train into the city but decided to take an Uber to a bagel shop. We took Uber Pool and it came out to $31 before my $15 Amex Platinum credit. We got to the bagel store that we'd found online (Baked by Yael), but realized it had a conservative hecsher. It turned out alright as the Zoo was right across the street so we just hung out there for a bit. The admission was free. From the Zoo we took another Uber Pool ($4.20) to Char Bar for lunch. I had the brisket sandwich with rosemary potato chips ($20) and Shmueli had the Caeser Salad with lamb bacon ($11 + $5 for the lamb).
The brisket was good but unremarkable, especially compared to Judd's Memphis Kitchen and Izzy's. The chips didn't have any sign of rosemary but they were fine.
The lamb bacon was amazing and they gave a decent amount of it. Unfortunately they also included quite a long hair, which earned Shmueli another salad.
Overall it was a good restaurant and we left satisfied. From there we decided to walk to the White House, which was about a 20 minute walk. Along the way there were tons of food trucks, including one Kosher truck run by Chabad. It was a shame because the prices were much lower ($12 for a brisket sandwich). We hung around the White House for a while, and walked around the area for a bit before ending up in the Trump International Hotel. The lobby was incredible, and the couches were super comfortable after such a long day of walking. Kayak showed rooms for that night for $360, which seems pretty reasonable for a hotel that fancy, at least based on the lobby.
The hotel was glad to give us some Trump water bottles, and then we left to make our way back to the airport. It was around 3:30 and our flight was at 5:45, so we needed to be there at 5:15. We decided to take public transportation, as Uber Pool was $50. We walked to the train ($2 but the card we had to buy ended up costing $4.25), and took it a few stops to the bus ($7.50), which arrived right on time. We left at 4:15 and arrived at Dulles at 5:00, and walked about 8 minutes to the FBO. Once there we asked about a shower, and they let us use a shower in the Pilot Rest area. This time around the other passengers were very friendly, and were extremely interesting. One woman was from Indonesia, and travels back there once a month. Lately she has been flying Garuda F, as she booked as many trips as she could with the 90% discount a few months back. She's flown just about every F cabin you can think of.
They didn't bother checking ID for this leg. Once everyone was ready (there were 6 of us), they took us to the plane for another uneventful, but very entertaining ride home. Everyone was sharing stories about where they've traveled, and they were all in love with JetSmarter. They all had the simple membership and were seemingly taking full advantage of it.
We arrived back in Teterboro, and that was it.
Overall it was a great experience and I'm very glad I had an opportunity to give it a try. I guess if you live in one of the cities where they have a shuttle and often need to go to one of their destinations, then it could be a good value for you, but it seems to me that not many people would fit into that category. It seems more useful for more of a leisure traveler who has plenty of extra cash, and lots of free time to go wherever they happen to be flying that day, which is what most of the people on the flight were doing. The main attraction of a private jet to me would be the ability to leave whenever you want and fly wherever you want, both of which JetSmarter doesn't provide, unless you charter a flight yourself. In that case, you'd be spending a few thousand for the flight in addition to the money you paid for the membership. Once you are being confined to their (very limited) flight schedule and route network, the only thing you are gaining over commercial is skipping the airport experience. I don't think the seat is that much better than most domestic F products, and with a full plane things can get pretty cramped.
I guess as they grow and add more shuttle routes and frequencies that the value proposition for many people will improve, but at that point you are running an airline with small planes and private terminals.
