A new Kansas City startup, MemberJets, wants to make it easier for you to travel via private aircraft—without having to win Powerball first.

The company has created an online marketplace where members can buy seats on the private aircraft that crisscross the country, said Ty Carter, MemberJets’ president. The service is set to launch this month.

There’s a huge potential here, he said. Many private aircraft fly home empty after they’ve delivered their passengers to their destination. With MemberJets, it could be possible to buy a seat for 80 to 90 percent off the normal cost.

“There was always the 1 percent who had access,” Carter said. But, until now, there hasn’t really been a way for the average business traveler to access this corner of the industry.

To use MemberJets’ marketplace, customers must become members, which costs $1,500 per year, and pass a background check. Then they can buy individual seats on a pay-as-you-go basis.

MemberJets operates from the Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport, Johnson County Executive Airport and New Century AirCenter, but it doesn’t own any aircraft. Instead, all the operators in its network must meet a strict safety standard. MemberJets is working with a retired NTSB air safety investigator
to vet operators.

MemberJets could be ideal for business travelers who want more flexibility and better accommodations than what’s available on the market now, Carter said.

“I think it’ll be a game-changer for aviation,” he said.