Icon is Screwing Their Customers http://eaaforums.org/images/icons/angry.gif

[Floatsflyer]

Icon Aircraft, makers of the popular and advanced SLSA A5 amphibian, is putting the boots to and stepping on the throats of their loyal customers. Icon has, in the past month, sent their deposit holders a brand new 41 page(!)Purchase Contract and Associated Ownership Agreement which gives Icon complete control over the use and future sale of every aircraft for the life of the aircraft(defined as 30 years or 6000 hours maximum). Icon is shifting liability responsibility and other critical matters directly to their customers.

The new terms and conditions of this new Agreement are Machiavellian and more odious than a slaughterhouse. You have to read this summary:

http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/A...WT.mc_sect=tts

The control freaks who drafted this are CEO Kirk Hawkins and CFO Chris King. Clearly, this is something Icon didn't want outsiders to know. It has been leaked to on-line forums, media outlets and AOPA by very disgruntled deposit holders.

Despite what Hawkins is saying publicly, very few are signing. You'd have to be insane or brain dead to sign this crap. Once a deposit holder reads, understands and fully comprehends the Agreement, I believe the greatest majority of deposit holders will choose to cancel their current deposit agreements and get their $5000 or $2000 deposits back. The poor schmucks who put down non-refundable $100,000 deposits to be the first 100 in the delivery line may be the only ones to sign the new Agreement unless they can easily afford to lose the deposit.

Icon has shot themselves right between the eyes in that there will no longer be a market for their aircraft. No more sales, no airplanes out the door, no more revenue. If Icon's Hawkins and King sticks to demanding the buyers sign the Agreement, this may go down as the biggest fail in general aviation history since the Eclipse which currently holds that dubious distinction. You will become a case study for elite business schools and not in the way you have heretofore imagined.

For the buyers I say Caveat Emptor. For Icon I say study the launch of New Coke and begin to seriously care about your customers instead of thinking about them with utter contempt.

[rwanttaja]

I guess we now know where the original authors of the EAA Youth Protection Policy ended up... :-)

Ron Wanttaja

[TedK]

lets see, this sure looks like a 30 years lease for $250K up front...

[George Sychrovsky]

Its was in their name right from the start- "I con"

[rwanttaja]

AVweb had a good article on this, too.

One of the leading theories right now is that Icon is doing this to weed out the early customers who were promised a much lower purchase price. They can give these folks their deposits back (in one case, with many thousands extra) and turn and sell the production positions for $50K or more higher than the price they were going to have to accept from the original purchasers. Icon gets another influx of money, without having to actually deliver anything.

Ron Wanttaja

[Gunslinger37]

Delivery position #23 is for sale on eBay.

[Floatsflyer]

The writer of this short article is a recognized trial lawyer, pilot and aircraft owner. He calls Hawkins out on a number of his assertions that are inconsistent with the actual wording of the agreement. He's basically saying he's full of s**t and asks, "who would sign this thing?".

http://www.aviationlawmonitor.com/20...gn-this-thing/

[MEdwards]

I think it's interesting AOPA would publish, even online, an article so unfavorable toward a GA company. Icon must not advertise enough in AOPA Pilot.

[Kyle Boatright]

I think this contract will greatly limit the number of airplanes they sell. I don't understand why they are choosing this path.

[Floatsflyer]

I think it's interesting AOPA would publish, even online, an article so unfavorable toward a GA company. Icon must not advertise enough in AOPA Pilot.

Well, the O is for owners and the P is for pilots so their editorial policy would be to protect those entities and inform and educate that member base. Really good on them for doing so. You don't expect EAA to do it, they don't/won't protect their own members as evidenced by the youth protection policy fiasco. And besides, EAA is in a constant state of conflict of interest because of AV. EAA has never and will never criticize a company that pays them big exhibit fees and sponsorships. EAA's mandate is to promote all types of general aviation interests AS LONG as it does not hurt their balance sheet!

To the best of my knowledge and awareness, Icon has never spent a nickel on advertising. They don't have to, their marketing strategy from the get-go was to receive multi-millions of dollars in free marketing and promotion from numerous media by way of written articles, TV shows, awards and aviation media flight tests, etc. The next award for them will be "The Hubris and Audacity Award "for worst business decision ever. I'm beginning to believe that Hawkins may well be the reincarnation of the designer of the Titanic.