Swanky helicopter service has Hamptons visitors flying high

Written By Unknown on Jumat, 15 Agustus 2014 | 18.18

It's a summer Friday, and the propellers are spinning as fast as the rosé is flowing at the 34th Street Blade helicopter lounge.

In one corner, peering out over the East River, stands Jon Hamm of "Mad Men" (5:15 p.m. to Montauk), scruffy and gorgeous in a baseball cap. In another, across a table topped with mini lobster rolls, are a trio of 20-something pastel-clad financiers (5 p.m. to East Hampton) and one young private equity buck (flight undisclosed) in blue Bonobos, who refuses an interview: "I'm going to try to avoid being that cliché," he says. A comely woman in a long Van Cleef mother-of-pearl clover necklace (4:30 p.m. to Southampton) sits with a Blackberry and iPhone in either hand.

Nearby is Jim (4:45 p.m. to East Hampton), a 48-year-old who "runs a fund," clutching his dry cleaning and martial arts equipment.

A Blade Babe — yes, that's what the attendants are called here — comes over to offer Jim an "adult sippy cup" of rosé.

He takes it.

"I would get water," explains the six-time Blade flier as reggae music plays in the background, "but my wife likes these cups. I was under orders to get one."
Blade. It's so hot, people are hoarding the free plastic glasses.

Blade's Hamptons service offers sippy cups of wine and luxe flying for the rich and famous.Photo: Instagram

Think the $45 Hampton Ambassador jitney is high-class? Think again. New York's finest are shelling out up to $900 for this season's most buzzed-about ride out East: a seat on Blade.

The Uber-like helicopter service, which is partnered with Liberty Helicopter, lets customers book one-way 35- to 65-minute trips to and from the Hamptons on an easy-to-use app. Prices on a six-seat chopper to East Hampton and Southampton start at $575 (Montauk is $625) and go as high as $895 for a lift on Blade Ultra, which is "a little roomier, classier and faster," according to Evan Licht, Blade's general manager.

Patrons can even charter — and name — their own Blade flights, like Sunday's "Margaritaville Express," for $3,150, and put the spare seats up for sale. If weather grounds a chopper, a chauffeured Maserati is provided.

Since launching over Memorial Day weekend, Blade, the brainchild of Robert Wiesenthal, COO of Warner Music Group, has flown more than 1,000 flights, according to Licht. He says 12,000 summer Hamptons goers have downloaded the app, including Padma Lakshmi of "Top Chef," Bravo's Andy Cohen, actor Zach Braff, rapper Ja Rule, hotelier Sean MacPherson and socialite Lauren Santo Domingo, all of whom have taken the copters for a spin.

Model Anita Hodosi strikes a pose in front of her luxe chopper.Photo: Instagram

"The demand was overwhelming," says Licht, who turned down a request from the Kardashians for a free lift. Flights regularly sell out, and Blade's even had to bring in choppers from Rhode Island to accommodate fliers (according to a spokesperson, starting next summer, Blade will shuttle moneymakers to Nantucket).

While the prices may seem a bit Hollywood for some New Yorkers; for others, the convenience — and Instagram photo ops — are priceless.

"I fell in love with it," says 25-year-old Hungarian model Anita Hodosi, who's used Blade four times to and from her Sag Harbor rental.

"I mean, we can all agree that it's not cheap . . . of course you need to make a certain amount of money to afford this," she says.

Last summer, Hodosi and her beau occasionally chartered their own "heli" to the beach for $5,000 and hunted down "friends who could afford" to fill the seats, laments the Midtown West resident who, when she doesn't fly, plops down $450 for a car service out East. "That's the good thing about Blade. You just buy a ticket."

Thirty-year-old Asher Simcoe bought his first ticket after reading about Blade in The Post. (Free copies of The Post are, in fact, offered to riders in the lounge.) "It's not something to do every weekend, but I sort of looked at it as a 'What is my time worth?' sort of scenario," says Simcoe, who works at UBS and excitedly Instagrammed the trip (one comment read: #notsohumblebrag).

"Plus, you still get the fun feeling of flying over traffic and not dealing with drunk 22-year-olds on the train," says the Upper East Side/East Hampton resident.

Want to rack up likes on Instagram? Post an aerial shot leaving the city.Photo: Instagram

Fun is the backbone of the company's ethos. Hence the sippy cups — now filled exclusively with hip-hop artist Rick Ross-endorsed rosé — and Blade's preference for 35-and-under pilots.

"Oh my gosh, they are so good-looking," says Karen Coviello, 25, who flew Blade in July to Montauk.

"Liberty's pilots are the celebrities," brags Licht. "People know [our pilots] by name now, they ask for them, they engage with them . . . we encourage them to get involved with the pictures," he says, quickly adding, "But not while they're flying."

When single New Yorkers aren't using Blade to hit on its pilots, they're using it to hit on just about everyone else.

"I think it's a good pickup line," says NYC publicist R. Couri Hay, who lives right next to the Southampton helipad.

"I think the new money, especially, is very concerned with their prestige. Now they can say, 'Yes, we Bladed out.' There's a status symbol," he says, noting that the real crème de la crème travel privately.

While fancy pants and wannabes are getting whipped into a frenzy over Blade, for East Hampton Monogram Shop owner Valerie Smith, it's just a big old headache.

"I was barely aware of [helicopters] last summer," says Smith. "Now it's like living on an army base," she says of the constant noise.

Filipa FInk called shotgun on her 7 a.m. Blade flight to the Hamptons.Photo: Instagram

"I think [Blade] is adding to the very increasing number of people who have access to this part of the world. Which is a narrow, small beach . . ." A narrow, small beach with a lot of social cachet.

"Some people may think it's a little pretentious," admits Jonathan, a Blade devotee and NYC-based Kansas gentleman farmer in Y-3 sneakers and Oliver Peoples shades. "[But] my friend has a Sikorsky that takes 10 people out to Montauk," Jonathan throws out. "So there are no bragging rights."

Depends on whom you ask.

Cindy Gallop, a 54-year-old entrepreneur who lives in Chelsea, was "riveted" throughout her recent Blade flight, which she splurged on with her tax refund.

She was shocked by her fellow fliers' blasé attitudes.

"I got the impression that they were all one-percenters. The very nice lady next to me . . . she got out The Post and read it. I was thinking, 'Oh my God! How can you be in a helicopter and reading the paper when you've got all these views?!' "

Even though Gallop says she can't afford to "Blade" again, she will forever have fond flying memories.

"It's totally how the other half lives," she says.

"I felt glamorous as hell."


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