Entrepreneurial Appetite

Creating Approved Experiences Abroad: The Journey of Kelvin Mensah and Aaron Wilson

• Aaron Wilson and Kelvin Mensah • Season 5 • Episode 46

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What if you could transform your side hustles into a thriving luxury travel business? Join us as we sit down with Kelvin Mensah and Aaron Wilson, the visionary co-founders of Approved Jets and Approved Experiences. From their early days hustling as barbers and sneaker flippers to leading one of the fastest-growing private jet charter companies, Kelvin and Aaron share their incredible journey. Learn how their strategic thinking and industry know-how helped them navigate the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and drive innovation in the luxury travel market.

This episode delves into the entrepreneurial spirit of young Black founders from Africa and the South, who have mastered the art of calculated risk-taking. Listen as Kelvin and Aaron recount their various ventures—each one teaching them valuable lessons that contributed to their ultimate success. Discover the importance of mentorship, a solid legal structure, and strategic planning in overcoming obstacles and achieving sustainable business growth. This conversation aims to inspire and equip aspiring entrepreneurs with the tools needed to make a mark in unique industries.

Finally, explore the luxurious world of Approved Experiences and the immense benefits of becoming an Approved Lux member. Kelvin and Aaron reveal how their innovative mobile app streamlines bookings for private jets, yachts, villas, and more, offering a seamless experience for their clients. Learn about the exclusive perks of the Approved Lux membership, including access to a luxury marketplace, 24/7 concierge services, and curated travel experiences. With personal stories and firsthand accounts, this episode underscores why investing in premium travel memberships ensures a higher quality, stress-free vacation.

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Langston Clark :

Hey everyone, thank you again for your support of Entrepreneurial Appetite. Beginning this season, we are inviting our listeners to support the show through our Patreon website. The founding 55 patrons will get live access to our monthly discussions for only $5 a month. Your support will help us hire an intern or freelancer to help with the production of the show. Of course, you can also support us by giving us five stars, leaving a positive comment or sharing the show with a few friends. Thank you for your continued support. What's up everybody? Continued support. What's up everybody.

Langston Clark :

Once again, thank you for joining Entrepreneurial Appetite, a series of events dedicated to building community, promoting intellectualism and supporting Black businesses. And today we have the co-founders of Approved Jets and Approved Experiences Calvin Mensah and Aaron Wilson. And so Approved Jets is a global private jet charter company specializing in sales, leasing, management and charter sales. And so Approved Jets is a global private jet charter company specializing in sales, leasing, management and charter sales. And so, as we begin, I'm just wondering if you brothers could just give us an introduction of who you are and tell us your walls tale. Like what's your bonded hero's journey into being the founders of Approved Jets and Approved Experiences?

Aaron Wilson:

Thanks, langston. So it's pretty interesting Kelvin and I we were actually working at a different company. Kelvin was the head of sales, I was actually the strategic advisor to the CEO and actually is, in fact, somewhat of a competitor because we're operating in the same space. But after seeing some success there, one day and I'll give Kelvin the credit he came to me and said hey, no, I think there's an opportunity for us in the industry to do things significantly differently and do things potentially better than the way that they're being done right now at our current organization. So he said, hey, let's consider going out on our own.

Aaron Wilson:

So, after careful consideration and taking a look at the industry and things of that nature, I agreed and you know, back in the end of 2019, we brought Approved Jeffs to fruition. So we were fortunate to be able to have really good relationships and also have pre-existing experience in the space. So that gave us, you know, just a little bit of an advantage as opposed to being a fish out of water, because it's never smart to start a business when you have no connections in that industry and you know nothing of that industry. And you know we were blessed to have the business take off While we did start in the end of 2019, of course, if you think back historically speaking, as of March 2020, things started to look a little bit scary and tense, because that's when the world shut down in lieu of COVID running rampant.

Aaron Wilson:

But we're fortunate to be able to leverage the relationships that we had and the hard work and putting the customer first, to be able to make it through that hard time and in 2020, we actually were fortunate to generate seven figures. But, kelvin, I know there's a ton of context that I probably missed out on, so I would love for you to be able to contribute and shed some light on some of the other things that transpired.

Kelvin Mensah:

No, I think you actually hit the nail right on the head. But basically, what I wanted to add is that we formed a great relationship at a formal company and I think what I seen in Aaron is like well, he's the perfect business partner that I want to do business with. So when we started you know when I decided to start you know PJ, kevin, prove and Approve Jets it was more of an idea that I wanted to grow and I think that at a point where you're working for someone, you're working for a company, it's hard to grow in your own terms, right, without having your own terms and your own abilities to grow exponentially, especially when you have your own clients. So for me, I know it was always easy to get, glean, you know, clients and build relationships and build the business that I really wanted to build in my head. I just haven't done it yet and Aaron was a perfect partner.

Kelvin Mensah:

So a little bit backstory about me is I've been an entrepreneur my whole life. You know, going back to school. I was, you know, going to school at Syracuse University and I always had an entrepreneurial spirit. I did have multiple jobs I worked for Starbucks, worked for Kodak, worked for Dunkin' Donuts and different businesses and I kind of, you know, was basically understanding how business was running and how to start a business. But I never had a business of my own right and for me, my idea was that I wanted to do something in the travel industry which was unique, which I can add my own twist and flavor to it. And basically I met someone that had a pilot license and he wanted me to work for him in Farmingdale. He was starting a jet company and I was like you know what? I think this is a good idea. To you know, jump into a space where I'm uncomfortable.

Kelvin Mensah:

I learned the industry inside and out, about the private aviation, the size of the jets and then from there I started working for our former company technology company, where I met Aaron and we hit the ground running right. We basically didn't spend any money on marketing. And we hit the ground running right. We basically didn't spend any money on marketing. We took basically our idea of business and really channel our energy on new ideas, new innovations of how to add to the private aviation industry, and I think that's what separates us from the competition. And then from there we started to see some success once we started implementing those ideas, innovations to the private aviation industry. So that's a little background story of how we started and I'll let you continue and feel free to ask any questions from there.

Langston Clark :

So I think the direction I want to go in is this as a podcaster who interviews entrepreneurs, I have become more and more interested in the world of entrepreneurship, startup culture, things like that. My work is the furthest thing, like my I don't want to say my real job, but yes, my real job is the furthest thing from the type of entrepreneurship that I see you guys doing and what I see other folks doing who have been guests on the podcast. Okay, and one of the things I noticed if you like, look on LinkedIn or you hear people talk. They'll say I'm X this company, I'm X that company, and it's almost like people are being very strategic about where they're going at certain points in their careers because they know what it's going to do for them when they exit.

Langston Clark :

So people are treating like working at Google, like another four years of college that I get paid to do, and just like some folks go to Stanford MBA to find their co-founder, they're going to Google to find their co-founder. They're going to Meta to find their co-founder, or whatever company to find their co-founder. So what was it like for you all? Like, how did you find each other? Did you have in mind going into the previous company. You were at that like, at some point I'm going to leave here and start my own thing. Or was it just a serendipitous thing that happened, where you all just met each other, you connected and things just happened from there?

Aaron Wilson:

I'll actually answer that because it's actually interesting. I'd left out a key component to well. I didn't really give any context to my background, but I started out my career at JP Morgan in finance. After leaving JP, after a few years I had gotten into human capital consulting and recruitment. Eventually I started my own recruiting firm. I was named one of the top 20 recruiters in the world, et cetera the whole nine yards.

Aaron Wilson:

So what I do is I find talent, and talent could range anywhere from someone who's entry-level to semi-experienced to managerial, to being a middle manager straight through to the C-suite, and I've built teams at large Fortune 100, fortune 500 companies and even the AMLA top 20 law firms in the world. So with that, I have a knack for talent and when I first met Kelvin, I knew right away this is someone who's electric right, the energy, the charisma, the ability to organically be a business development function and funnel all in one person right. And that was unparalleled. Think about it when I'm coming from the human capital recruitment space, I'm interacting with individuals like this on a regular basis right, interacting with individuals like this on a regular basis Right. So I knew right away OK, this is someone who is very talented. But I didn't go into the entire company or the business thinking, hey, we're going to branch out and do our own thing. I actually didn't know. Kelvin was completely serious when he said it. I thought he was just saying it casually like, hey, man, you know, we could potentially do our own thing. But then he said no, I'm serious, and things took off from there.

Aaron Wilson:

But I'd say that's one of the most important things in the world, what you just mentioned, right, what is the driving force behind why people are going to these fang companies? Right? The Facebooks, the Alphabets, the Apples, googles of the world, these extremely powerful companies, so a lot of people. They're going or experience. Some people are going for the networking opportunities and some people are going for the credibility they gain by saying that they were a product manager or software engineer there, et cetera. But, being a contrarian, I'd like to challenge that as well. And I'd like to challenge that because I've come across an array of individuals who have worked at these companies who are great in their specific siloed functional area, but they're not necessarily operators or entrepreneurs or C or founder material and they don't necessarily know how to run a company, but they're excellent at that specific core functional area that they were hired for in that larger, more established company.

Langston Clark :

So, kelvin, from your perspective, how did the two of you find each other? What was the conversation like from your end? Was it obvious that Aaron wasn't taking you serious? Or how did you woo Aaron from your previous employer?

Kelvin Mensah:

Well, I never got the feeling that he wasn't taking me serious. I just got the feeling that he just thought that I wasn't ready to move forward from a previous employer. But I always had an entrepreneur spirit right. I was basically explaining something that, hey, you know, the clientele that I had are reaching out to me and with your expertise on the management side of things and my expertise on sales and building network and then relationships, we can take this industry by storm. Exactly what we did. So it wasn't so much a non-belief. I just think that he just think that, well, from now understanding, I just think that we didn't have the tools and he's afraid of moving forward without the proper tools to grow and build out this company.

Aaron Wilson:

Yeah, yeah, I'll even echo the sentiment because I remember the first thing I asked Kelvin was are you sure? He's like, yeah, why wouldn't I be sure? I just said it Right, so it was a given at that point. So a little bit more context too, right?

Aaron Wilson:

When I was a youngster, I was also an entrepreneur as well. I used to be a barber, right. I was flipping sneakers crazy. When I was in high school. I was on the SB dunk wave like crazy back in 2006, 2007, 2008. I was going crazy.

Aaron Wilson:

I was a photographer while I was in college. I was a DJ as well, and I also did catering, so you name it, and I did every kind of hustle in terms of like food and entertainment and people getting their haircuts right. That was what I did. So I definitely am a risk averse person, because anyone who has a certain level of financial acumen is naturally going to be that way, because it's in your DNA. But my aversion to risk would never actually prevent me from moving forward when there's a great opportunity, and that's why it's calculated risk right, and that's where the whole idea of hedging comes into play. When you identify someone who was talented like Kelvin, it doesn't really feel like you're hedging as much. It feels more like a sure thing. It's just more so, making sure that we execute. And that's what we did. We planned and we executed and prayed. Can't forget about God. We were blessed to be able to bring things to fruition and to continue to grow year over year.

Langston Clark :

Before we get into, like, what Approved Jets is and what Approved Experiences are. I'm thinking back to a conversation I had with a mentor on this podcast who wrote this book called Strategic Planning for Black Folk, and what I'm about to say isn't in his book, but he always used to talk about it in conversation and he would say I'm joining the board of this nonprofit philanthropic organization because I'm infiltrating. So what I'm doing is I'm going in there to learn the structure, the systems, the policies, the processes and things like that. Did you all go into your previous employment experiences, whether it was the one right before you all found it or some of the other ones that you all had, with the mindset of infiltration and learning so that one day you can take those processes and those skills, those things that you learn and insights that you learn and apply them to what you're doing now? In other words, what is the anatomy of infiltration from you all's perspective?

Kelvin Mensah:

I think the anatomy of infiltration is being fearless. The reason why I say that is you have to start right. If you don't start, then you don't understand what failure is because you haven't started. For me, I think you know when you're fearless, you don't care what no one says, you don't care what your mother says, you don't care what your friends say. You actually go out there and do it right, no matter what obstacles you may face, because you're fearless right. So you have a heart of a lion and I think it starts there mindset and understanding that it's not going to be easy. You're going to face obstacles, but having that positivity that you'll get through these obstacles is another part of that now to me, because you have to have both in order to succeed. Right.

Kelvin Mensah:

When we started Approved Jets, I think we was going into the industry fearless because it was unique to have young black entrepreneurs from Africa and the South, from Jamaica and the South, to penetrate this industry.

Kelvin Mensah:

And once we penetrate the industry, we face obstacles, we face different things that we had to overcome. We have seen the growth year after year and I think that's why we keep growing year after year, because we're not scared to face our obstacles and we're not afraid to change Right, and we're not, like, stubborn against each other. You know, aaron say something or I say something, we both take an effect. Ok, like, all right, there's a cause and effect, all right. What would this reaction lead to? This reaction so like, we both understand each other and I think that's why it works. That's why the dynamic works in this business and as we continue to grow in this industry, we want to show other entrepreneurs that it is possible to grow in this industry, right? So we don't want to be selfish to other entrepreneurs that's coming up in the industry. We want to show them that it is possible to have a footprint in this space.

Langston Clark :

Yeah, I appreciate you all sharing your journey, how you met, and I want to get into the meat and potatoes of what Approved Jets is and what Approved Experiences are. So could you tell us a little bit about what the company is, or what the companies are, and how you all have been able to be so successful in what you do as founders?

Aaron Wilson:

Yeah, what I think and the thing is like these platforms, right, individuals like yourself are being able to put together this kind of content and afford listeners the opportunity to take in information. It's critical, right, and it's critical that we acknowledge certain things so that you know the next generation and the next entrepreneurs. They walk away with these nuggets of information and these gems, as they would say. So one of the key things that we did when we started out is we formed a holding company first. That's the first thing that we did, because we knew that Approved Jets was our entry point and the goal was to scale into other areas was our entry point and the goal was to scale into other areas. So we started a holding company first so that our legal structure would be very tight. After the holding company, we then started putting these subsidiary entities under that holding company. So Approved Jets is a subsidiary entity of the holding company and Approved Experiences is also another subsidiary entity under that holding company, making Approved Jets and Approved Experiences is also another subsidiary entity under that holding company, making Approved Jets and Approved Experiences sister companies to one another. Approved Jets is a full-service private aviation brokerage, so we provide private aviation charter services to an array of individuals. It could be professional athletes, nba and NFL, physicians, attorneys, venture capitalists, private equity folks, entrepreneurs, tech entrepreneurs you name it a host of individuals. In addition to that, approved experiences is everything that's private aviation adjacent, so not the jet, but the car, the villa, the yacht, et cetera. Everything that is fully encompassing of the luxury travel experience, or even just the luxury experience, luxury lifestyle experience in general, fine dining, concierge, et cetera. It's funny because, kev, I'm going to spill the tea a little bit. Back in 2022, we went live with approved experiences right, and I'll take full responsibility for this. Kelvin. He said, aaron, are we ready? I said, yeah, man, we're ready. We're going to make this happen.

Aaron Wilson:

So we posted on Instagram about approved experiences. This was Labor Day weekend. It got crazy. Hit left and right, left and right, instagram's blowing up. People are sending me DMs. Kelvin's DMs are blowing up His phone. They're calling oh, I need a jet, I need a yacht, I need this, I need that. So we're like, oh, snap. And at that point we had to just pump the brakes on promoting approved experiences. Wow, because it went crazy.

Kelvin Mensah:

Hey, kelvin, I don't know if you want to chime in and speak on that I remember like yesterday we did a launch commercial, so it was a simultaneously launch between my page and the new Approved Experience page. Yeah iFollowers will get to see the reel and then Approved Experience's new followers will get to see as well. So it's a joint collaboration post and I knew what it'd be. But I told Aaron I'm like, listen, he kind of underestimated my audience, right? Oh, he said my audience.

Aaron Wilson:

No, no, he has a pretty robust audience.

Kelvin Mensah:

Well, I would say our audience right. But really from my page I was I understand, yeah, yeah. And once we launched it was like nonstop calls, nonstop texts, nonstop DMs. It was just like nonstop. And then I asked Aaron, I'm like are you sure you're ready? And I think at that point we realized that's where we need to innovate into technology.

Aaron Wilson:

So what we ended up doing right. When you start to take inventory of all the things that are happening and you start to think about how your growth is being determined, we were quickly able to see that our growth was going to be very heavily predicated upon having more people in the seats and more brokers, et cetera. That's not as scalable as we'd want. You shouldn't have to go out there and hire 10 people in multiple places around the world in order to service our clients at scale. So that's when we started thinking a lot more heavily about leveraging technology in order to solve for this problem. We were fortunate to be able to do so and as a result of that, we started building the Approved Experiences mobile application. So the Approved Experiences mobile app it streamlines that luxury travel booking experience.

Aaron Wilson:

When you look at some of our peers in the space right, you take a look at Wheels Up, they're operating in a single vertical jets. You take a look at Airbnb, they're operating in a single vertical logic. You take a look at Boat Setter or Yachtico single vertical boats and yachts. At Boat Setter or Yachtico single vertical boats and yachts, we're operating across all verticals simultaneously to streamline that experience. Say, for instance, the individual who's throwing a bachelor party and that person is tasked with throwing the bachelor party, getting the villa, getting the yacht, setting up dinner and just having access to a general concierge. That person is operating across four different platforms or four different vendors, whereas the approved experiences you have one point person, one platform and you know these are vetted vendors through our KYV, know your vendor mechanism. So that's one of the huge value propositions that we'll bring into our client base through the approved experiences platform and just a little bit more about what that entails too.

Aaron Wilson:

So Approved Experiences on the platform once you become an approved Lux member and you're an official member of our community, because you can download the platform and you can check things out. But once you become a Lux member, you'll get access to an array of different things. Number one you get access to our proprietary social club, the Approved Luck Social Club for the elite. Number two, you get access to a 24-7 concierge and personal assistant. Number three, you get access to our luxury marketplace where you could explore the yachts, the jets, the cars, the villas and ground transportation right. In addition to that, you get access to weekly empty legs on a regular basis, which are heavily reduced charters. Sometimes they can even be reduced down to 50 percent of what a charter prices. And, last but not least, you get access to approved news, which is our proprietary news content feed that covers worldly things from travel to sports, entertainment to politics, and all this Ninety nine dollars per month that covers worldly things from travel to sports, to entertainment, to politics, and all this $99 per month.

Langston Clark :

Yeah, okay, so I'm glad y'all went to the scaling right. And this is what I was thinking as you were explaining that you all have approved jets and you have everything from a venture capitalist to a doctor, to an entrepreneur, entertainer, athlete, whatever using the jets. Okay, right, and so in my mind I was like man, I'm going to ask this question about scaling, because when you hear all these tech people talking about like I'm trying to scale my business, like Google is really search, but now when we say search, we say Google, so it's scaled in our consciousness is scaled like when we use it. And so at first I was like, well, what's the dichotomy that you all are operating in? Because it seems like you all have structured your business to serve the rich and are you scaling intentionally within that tax bracket? But now I see you broken down how you all have scaled but are still maintaining this sense of quality and the experience as these approved experiences, so that other people can get a sense of like what it means to have that lifestyle. I think that's interesting.

Langston Clark :

One of the things that I'm also noticing about entrepreneurs is that maybe our parents, maybe our grandparents, like people, didn't really care about meeting the CEO or the CEOs or the founders, but now it seems like founders whether they be like in the blockchain space or some other tech space or whatever they're building community around what it is that they're doing, and you all mentioned that. So, kelvin Aaron, can you all kind of talk about what's the logic or the strategy for building the community to support or rally around or be interested in the product and services that you all are providing?

Kelvin Mensah:

With approved jets. It's kind's going to be an in-app experience among travelers where you can speak to other friends or unique people that share the same experience that you will also like to experience and you guys can either meet up on an app or you can meet actually doing the experience. What do I mean by that? If me and Aaron is actually on the app and we are friends on the app and let's say, we're planning a trip to go to the Bahamas and we're planning on getting a yacht together, since we are friends and we're planning on the same trip, we can actually experience that same yacht together in the Bahamas by just sharing.

Kelvin Mensah:

Hey, aaron, I'm actually going to the Bahamas on this date. I'm booking this yacht from Approved Experiences oh, I was just checking out this yacht as well and now they share that same experience. It's their first ever chance to share a travel experience within app. Now we are also building a community, because there's a lot of travelers that want to experience these high ticket items that they can't really afford. So what we're trying to do and this is something that's coming on later down the line which figure out how to make it as affordable as possible by building loyalty reward points that you can build up by in-app purchases that can grant you access to a jet, a luxury yacht, a villa, a exotic car, what you want to experience inside the app. And, aaron, I'll let you take it off from there. I think I probably said too much, but I'll let you go.

Aaron Wilson:

No, no, no, it's all good. No worries, no worries, I mean. What I think would be cool too is to tell Langston a little bit about Approved Lux Traveler, right? So once someone becomes an Approved Lux member and you're a gold member and you have access to all those things that we just discussed, right the 24-7 concierge. You have access to the luxury marketplace. You have access to the proprietary news content feed. You have access to the social club feature. You have access to all of those things. You also now are eligible for Approved Lux Traveler.

Aaron Wilson:

For us, you have to have Approved Lux first before you have Traveler, because we want to make sure that, when people are investing in luxury and investing in lifestyle, that they actually see the value in it first and foremost. That they actually see the value in it first and foremost. We're not trying to drive a ton of individuals into the platform just for the sake of doing so. It's not our goal. We want a quality platform, right? So it's not a come hither, come all, because we just want as many people as possible and say, hey, if this is something that truly benefits you, then, yes, you should become a member. So, first and foremost, you have to be an approved Lux Gold member first. Right, once you're an approved Lux member, then you can become an approved Lux Traveler member.

Aaron Wilson:

That's a specific ecosystem within the approved experiences community Approved Lux Traveler individuals. They have a specific membership where they get crazy discounts on everything travel oriented. They have crazy discounts on cruises, crazy discounts on yachts, on hotels I'm talking about anywhere from 10% to even 40 to 50% off and we're coming in lower than some of the most well-known third-party travel companies out there. I'm not going to name any names. No free advertising for this. That's right. We're coming in lower than all of them. And what's pretty interesting as well is we do actually have a built-in rewards and loyalty mechanism so you can leverage the points that you've accrued to book more trips and more travel options and experiences and excursions, or you could leverage the points that you've accrued and convert those points into gift cards.

Aaron Wilson:

Yeah, so we're really trying to make sure that we take things to the next level, because you have to think about it right? Yeah, there are people who go on vacation and go into debt to go on vacation, people who take loans to go on vacation, people who are going into massive credit card debt to go on vacations with the approved Lux Traveler, you're spending $1,000 for the year to have access to crazy discounts. By the time you take your first trip, you probably already saved the $1,000 that you put up for the year, as opposed to getting these crazy, exorbitant amounts of debt that you have to pay down that people are just taking more and more and more and more, because one of the key things for us is luxury. Is luxury right? And, as Kelvin mentioned, we can't build a robust ecosystem around individuals who fly private, because it's a very small percentage of people in the world who fly private. However, what we can do is semi-democratize the space so that individuals who typically would not have had access to certain kinds of luxuries can now experience that and have the opportunity to meet with other like-minded individuals who want to experience that as well, and it could make a lot more sense from a fiscal responsibility perspective.

Aaron Wilson:

Furthermore, with our social club, we already know what's going to happen here, because one thing that Kelvin never mentions, one thing that I never mentioned we're connecting people on a regular basis for business, for camaraderie, for everything Our social club is going to.

Aaron Wilson:

We need to actually make sure that we're gathering insights from the people once we go live with the social club, because they're gonna be new business relationships forged, new partnerships. People are gonna potentially find their significant others in this. When you take a look at LinkedIn and I'm a big fan of LinkedIn, so by no means am I saying anything ill or negative toward them but when you take a look at linkedin, linkedin has gotten so polluted with just a bunch of things that aren't assisting with building genuine connections. Right, and once your inbox is inundated with auto messages from someone who put you in some kind of drip campaign and you're seeing all these messages and friend requests coming in, you want to leave the platform. It's not what it used to be and I've been actively on LinkedIn for about 13 years now. Right, what we're going to be doing is creating a safe space, a trusted space, where real connections by real people who are like-minded have common interests, whether it's travel, whether it's watches, whether it's art you name it.

Langston Clark :

You know it's interesting. It's almost like you're describing the gathering spot, but for a million with that. That's really interesting and you know? The other thing that stood out that you said was you know you are democratizing travel luxury. And what's interesting to me is the time frame that this happened. So you all get founded in like 2019 and then the pandemic hits and it's really surprising that, like, travel takes a hit.

Langston Clark :

People are talking about how aviation's like on a downtick, but I know that the black folks that I know, even though COVID hit and people don't like black folks start traveling more than they did before. Like the year return was happening all around the same time than they did before. Like the year of return was happening all around the same time. There's expat communities developing in the era post-Trump or the era during Trump and all of that stuff. Like I had another podcast interview with a brother who moved his family to Portugal, right, and so one of the things that I see manifesting in Black community and I don't want to limit you all's business to Black folks but like I think travel is becoming a budding part of black culture globally and I would love it if you all spoke to how you all see that how you all see you all's business as part of that growing manifestation of our culture.

Kelvin Mensah:

So, basically, you know, when a pandemic hit, our business actually blew because airports and things with airports was closed and people still needed to either go to their family or still handle business and the only way to do that is through private jets. So I know you're saying when COVID, everything was slow, but our business actually rose when COVID hit. So it was the opposite. Right, but now that everything is back open and everything is getting back to normal, right, our community and our experience and, like you, know what we have to travel because we don't want to go through what we had, what happened during COVID. Right, we want to be able to see the world grow, explore new things, do new experiences, experience new cultures and especially with Africa, right, africa has been the leading destination when it comes to God. It's been the leading destination in the past four years. Growing every single year by year has been nonstop, growing, whether it becomes festivals. So I've seen that and I understood that because I've been gone for the last seven to eight years. Right, so I've seen the growth.

Kelvin Mensah:

I've been talking about Ghana for a while now. I've seen the growth and I've seen it before and I'm seeing it after. Right, to be honest with you, it's amazing to see our culture and black people travel more because they get to experience more. So in the future, right, we're going to see even way more people travel. This is just the starting point. This is just the iceberg to the start of what we get. I mean way more people traveling to new destinations in the upcoming years.

Kelvin Mensah:

So that's why a crew of jets and cool experience time-wise is perfect, right, because we're going to see exponential growth in travelers as the years grow, and what we're seeing now is that it's more group traveling. Yeah, right, we're seeing a lot of group trips and we're seeing a lot of people come together collectively to put together a group trip. Yeah, and you know, I was talking to one of my homegirls and she was like you know, I'd like to go to ghana one day and I was like, why do you want to go to ghana? She was like it just seems so cool and peaceful out there, and once people start to like hear, you know, other people go and it's like relaxed and it's cool and it's peaceful and it's enjoyable there'll be way more people to go. So I think it's really, really exciting what's happening in the travel industry and it's just nothing but growth from here.

Aaron Wilson:

And shared experiences. Just to echo Kelvin's sentiment, shared experiences are the cornerstone of that growth. Right the minute that people start sharing experiences, now someone's inspired to go. The minute you hit IG and you share your location and you take a fly pic yo, I got to go there right, if someone's over in Tresaco at a fly crib in Ghana and they're like, oh man, because one thing you have to know Langston I'm not sure if you've ever been to Ghana I haven't been yet, but I've seen all the pictures, all the videos, everything I lived through Kev.

Aaron Wilson:

When it comes to Ghana, the architecture is crazy, yeah, doing from an interior perspective, the decor insane, like when I'm talking about the modern style of interior decor that's being used in the new developments and all that stuff. It's incredible. It's topping a lot of the decor that you're seeing in the top cities out here in the new developments and all that stuff. It's incredible. It's topping a lot of the decor that you're seeing in the top cities out here in the States, from Miami to work to San Fran, la, alaska. So it's like the shared experience is driving travel and we're right now at a point where we're creating again a safe space for those shared experiences by way of approved experiences and the approved luck social club even more so because if you take a look at the conversation, right, you do some social listening and you take a look at the conversation that's happening across these different platforms, and a lot of thought leaders are saying this as well.

Aaron Wilson:

In the space and digital, people are not satisfied with the direction that things are heading in. As it pertains to social media, nobody wants to just have a public profile, have a bunch of random people following them and post what they're doing. That feels a little bit too intrusive, right? They're giving too much of themselves to the world, unless you're an influencer and being paid for it. People don't want to do that anymore.

Aaron Wilson:

That's why a lot more people have private profiles than before. That's why a lot of people are joining ecosystems and communities with like-minded people, as opposed to being a part of this broad worldly whale of the Instagrams of the world, where it's just a bunch of people where, if you have access to the internet, you could have an Instagram profile. It's just a bunch of people where, if you have access to the internet, you could have an Instagram profile Approved Experiences and Approved Lux. That's a closed community If you're not a paying member, you can't be a part of this ecosystem. So just things to think about in terms of the direction that we're heading, in terms of community social interaction and, specifically, community and social interaction in the digital sphere.

Kelvin Mensah:

That was amazing and he was well-spoken and great compliment about Ghana. Thank you, I appreciate that, aaron.

Langston Clark :

That's going to make me want to go. So me and my wife have been discussing our trip to the continent for a long time. My wife is much more well-traveled than I am, and so like I've never been home, and so maybe that will be the first place that we go, based upon this conversation, because I want to see some of this interior design that Aaron is talking about.

Aaron Wilson:

Well, my bad, kelvin. I just have one more thing to say. One of our mutual friends just came back and she sent me tons of videos and pictures last night. So, kev, she told me every single restaurant that you recommended was insane. She said it was insane, like just insane. They're eating beachside, beachside, langston right, super tranquil, calming the ocean's right here. There's a pool right in front of you. You're having some of the finest cuisine, even the sushi. She said it was the best sushi she'd had in her life. I kid you not, this is real life. I had this conversation last night. She was filling me in and she said so. Basically, if you're going to Ghana, you need to holler at Kev first to get all the recommendations. He has all the hot spots.

Kelvin Mensah:

Whenever you're ready to go, just let me know For sure.

Langston Clark :

For sure. I have to point something out that I think is really important for the audience to understand. I think sometimes we want stuff for free, and you know why? Would I pay a thousand dollars a year, $99 a month, whatever to be part of this travel, membership, social club, whatever? Why would I do that? Why would I go on Instagram for free and I could just join that group over there and I don't have to pay for it?

Langston Clark :

I could start a Facebook group or whatever group and do that, and so I think sometimes we may think what you all are doing is greedy, but I want to counter maybe that thought that some people may be having and say that it's probably a bit more greedy when the social media company is giving it to you for free because you're selling something when you're on these platforms, they're still taking something from you, right?

Langston Clark :

They may be taking your data and using it for their purposes. They may be taking your time in ways that aren't efficient, with advertisements and things like that, and so you actually are probably getting more value out of paying for what you're getting, with approved experiences, than something that you get on some other social media platform, and so I think it's important for consumers and listeners to recognize that, because what you put on the internet out there for free, once it's out there, it's not yours, right? And so you don't own that part of you anymore, and so it's important for you all to recognize that when you get something that's tailored and specific to you and what you want and your needs, that is worth paying for.

Kelvin Mensah:

I think what I need to say toward that is that luxury is not free and you get what you pay for. You want to go the free route. Misinform information, not know what vendor to use, is very, very important when it comes to traveling. Not being able to have access to special deals, discounted Right. And I think that once you invest in yourself and you invest in traveling, you start to understand the difference between having a great experience when you travel to having not so much of a great experience, right, and it's because you didn't take the time out to join a specific club that can give you real life information and tell you what not to do or what to do that interests you.

Kelvin Mensah:

Another thing I'll say too and when it comes to subscription right is that it's not for everybody, so we're not targeting the masses. The non-paying individual may not be our target person, our target niche, right. We don't want someone that just don't want to pay. That's not the idea of having a pool experience, right. We want the experience to be approved by a paying individual, and that's just a fact, right, and we also understand that the average person, if they are going to spend on travel right, they have $100 to spend on the experience right, because they want to get access to the best right, and we kind of. When we was pricing out our membership package, you know we could have went $1,000, we could have went $2,000 a month because the value that you, that we're given, but we feel like the price point that we value, what we're given, is really really a great price for the value that you get yeah be honest with you, yeah, and because this is actually, you know, tested by other competitors and we know what's out there.

Kelvin Mensah:

Nobody's giving you the value that we're gonna give you for 99. No, no one's. No one's doing it and even you know, with that said're going to give you for $99 a month.

Aaron Wilson:

No, no one's. No one's doing it. And even you know, with that said Kelvin, and I think that was well put. You know, it goes back to the phrase my father used to tell me when I was younger don't be penny wise and pound foolish. Right, if someone doesn't want to put up a thousand dollars to get access to an array of discounts, right, let's think about it. Right, let's just be real. If you're booking a hotel, right, and that hotel per night, you're going away for five nights right, six days, five nights, which is pretty standard and you book that hotel and that hotel costs you roughly $300 per night, right, for those six nights. Okay, cool, you could easily find that hotel or comparable hotel via the approved lux traveler program, right, and that membership for 50, maybe even a hundred dollars less, right, per night, immediately, 600 saved, anywhere from 300 to 600 just on the hotel, not any other part of your trip. Right, and that's why it's called approved lux traveler.

Aaron Wilson:

It's not meant for people who travel once per year, it's meant for an Approved Lux Traveler, so doing this often. If you're traveling four times per year, this is the program for you, because your savings will exceed what you spent on the membership period, and it's also incentivized by way of the rewards program. Furthermore and this is, you know, just to be completely transparent, because a lot of times we try to, you know, be very nice about things and politically correct, I'll speak straight up. If someone gives you a cheeseburger and they tell you, hey, this cheeseburger costs $7, you understand. If someone offers you Wagyu steak and they tell you this Wagyu steak is going to cost you $19, but you're really upset about it. You truly do get what you pay for. And, again, this is about a different kind of lifestyle. So, if you want to live a certain way, if you want to put certain things in your body, if you want to also have access to certain people, you'll find that a lot of people who are of a certain ilk and a certain caliber will tell you they eat at certain restaurants, they go for drinks at certain bars and they hang out in certain circles because it affords them access to new opportunity. If that's not important to you, then this isn't for you. Again, not to beat a dead horse, but it's just so important when you start thinking about even education, or you know what.

Aaron Wilson:

Let's go back to what you mentioned about pedigree. From a corporate perspective, there's a startup that could offer someone $200,000 as a software engineer with two and a half percent equity right, and you know that the CEO of this startup is going to be able to scale that company and get it to a competitive valuation of more than a hundred million, where your equity stake, if it's not diluted, is going to be worth 2.5 million once you're fully vested right, Plus your 200K salary. Versus going to Google right. You have to ask yourself how much is that brand value worth? Because, let's say, google offered this person 150 and some shares, but not a two and a half percent stake in the company. You have to ask yourself at that point, what is the play here?

Aaron Wilson:

Is this a networking play? Is this a gain more experience play? Is this a monetary play? So it all comes down to what's important to the individual. I don't want to speak irresponsibly for Kelvin, but I know that he will attest to this. Networking is very important and building relationships is very important. I 1000% wholeheartedly believe the same thing, and these are different tools that afford you the opportunity to be able to connect with other people who will assist you with accomplishing your goals. So it's just one of those kinds of plays.

Langston Clark :

I thank you both for joining us.

Langston Clark :

Kelvin, I don't know if it was only yet, but I talked about that we have Origins as a book club and so, speaking of community, just real quick the story of the podcast me and my own boy, jason Bailey, saw this guy had a burger joint speaking of burgers, right, and it was going out of business.

Langston Clark :

A black dude here in San Antonio, and this is what Facebook Live was like the thing. So we got a group of young black entrepreneurs not entrepreneurs, but professionals and entrepreneurs together to go support his business and had a local state representative join us, and so we started having these monthly gatherings and then, eventually, we evolved into having books being integrated, covid hit transformed into a podcast. We can get authors and entrepreneurs in conversation with authors and entrepreneurs when we do our live discussions and have pre-recorded conversations with brothers like you, and so I always ask the question at the end what book or books have inspired your journey? Or maybe are some things that keep you grounded, or maybe that you read for entertainment right now, but are part of what you're doing either in your personal or your professional or entrepreneurial lives.

Kelvin Mensah:

One book that really helped me and shaped me on a mindset was how to Win Friends and Influence People.

Kelvin Mensah:

Yeah me on a mindset was how to win friends and influence people. Yeah, another one was the alchemist and another one was I had to give it up to. Robert is basically rich dad, poor dad. Yeah, you know a lot of people read these books, chase success. I read these books that just shape my mindset and really understand what is it going to take to be successful and I took little bullet points from each book that helped me, shape me to who I am today. So when you read these books, I always tell people like, take what's necessary out, the book that you can relate to your life, use it, apply it and if it works, great. And if it doesn't work, I'll say read it again and take some things out that actually works for your life. These books right here really helped me and shaped my mindset to be successful and made me the man I am today.

Langston Clark :

Yeah, aaron, what's on your book?

Aaron Wilson:

list, oh man.

Aaron Wilson:

So there's one author in particular who had the biggest impact on me as a professional John C Maxwell.

Aaron Wilson:

So I've read like a ton of his work how Successful People Think, how Successful People Lead Relationships, and also Team Building.

Aaron Wilson:

These are very concise reads where, again, like Kelvin mentioned, you can get so much out of it in terms of how to approach things and shaping your mindset. But it's all about execution and applying this knowledge right. It changes the way you think about things, changes the way that you think about people and how to interact with people. Because, again, right when we were discussing earlier in the conversation the whole concept of certain people who are very, very bright, very sharp, very smart, but very specific in terms of where their intelligence may be and that's for a specific functional area as opposed to having, like broader experience as entrepreneurs, ceos, founders and operators and these books shape your thought process as a founder, ceo, executive and operator, as opposed to being someone who's focusing on a micro issue and then passing the baton to someone else, someone who understands the broader scope of their role in the supply chain or in the ecosystem that they're a part of, which could be their company. That's good.

Langston Clark :

The final question I want to ask for the audience is where can we go to support you all's business and learn more about Approved Jets and Approved Experiences?

Kelvin Mensah:

So you can find me on social media. Approved Jets is our business handle. Approved Experiences is our business handle on Instagram. My personal page is at E-J-K-E-B. Aaron. I'll let you say the website, yep. My personal page is at EJKEB, aaron. I'll let you say the website, yep.

Aaron Wilson:

My personal page on Instagram is AaronWilsonVC, so Aaron Wilson Vegetable Carrot Our website's wwwapprovedexperiencescom. And for Approved Jets, that's approved-jetscom. Again, that's approved-jetscom. And download the Approved Experiences mobile app, available in the Apple App Store now, and we'll see you in the Approved Lux Social Club.

Langston Clark :

All right, fellas. Thank you for joining us. I appreciate you taking the time to be here on Entrepreneurial Appetite. Thank you for joining this edition of Entrepreneurial Appetite. If you like the episode, you can support the show by becoming one of our founding 55 patrons, which gives you access to our live discussions and bonus materials, or you can subscribe to the show. Give us five stars and leave a comment.