E352: From Oshkosh to Lakeland: Gene Conrad on Running Sun 'n Fun's $7M Aviation Spectacular

Pilot to Pilot

Justin Siems

Aviation, Leisure, Flying, Pilot

4.8 • 997 Ratings

🗓️ 3 February 2026

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What does it take to run one of the world's largest aviation events? Gene Conrad, President and CEO of the Aerospace Center for Excellence and Sun 'n Fun Aerospace Expo, pulls back the curtain on Florida's premier aviation gathering. Growing up in Oshkosh as the son of an airport director, Gene counted aircraft at EAA AirVenture as a teenager to see who had more planes. Now, he's running Sun 'n Fun—a six-day event that costs $7 million to produce, attracts over 60,000 attendees, and requires coordination with everyone from the U.S. Navy Blue Angels to Amazon Air operations. In this episode, you'll discover: - The real costs of running a major aviation event ($700K just for tents!) - How Sun 'n Fun coordinates with Amazon's massive Lakeland hub - Why they're making major schedule changes for 2025 - The difference between running an airport vs. running an air show - Future expansion plans including new 40,000 sq ft air-conditioned exhibit buildings - What makes Gene happiest: closing the airport because there's no more parking space - Behind-the-scenes secrets like the Island, the Swamp, and Chick-fil-A coming to the event Gene also shares candid insights about working with 3,000+ volunteers, learning from his biggest mistakes (like the WiFi disaster), and why his ultimate measure of success isn't attendance or revenue—it's making sure everyone goes home safe. Whether you're planning to attend Sun 'n Fun, curious about aviation event management, or just love air shows, this episode delivers insider knowledge you won't find anywhere else.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Episode 352 of the Piot the Pilot Podcast takes off now.
0:09.7	The Pilot to pilot podcast is brought to you by Ground School from the Finer Points,
0:13.9	the indispensable training app for new and experienced pilots.
0:17.4	Visit Learn theFinerpoints.com, backslashash Justin to save 10% off your first year.
0:22.5	Fly with Garmin avionics, then grab your mobile device and make the Garmin pilot app your
0:26.9	cockpit companion. Get advanced functions you'll use before, during, and after every flight,
0:32.7	including updating your aircraft's databases and logging engine data plan file fly log with garmin pilot
0:40.7	all pilots need the big weather picture and i use serious xm aviation to check the fronts
0:45.6	air meds segments turbulence pyreps and more while i'm pre-flighting and in route all to give my
0:51.1	passengers and me the most comfortable flight possible and now with the latest offeriusXM, there's never been a better time to upgrade your
0:58.0	next flight with a Garmin GDL-52 portable receiver to bring SiriusXM and ADSB weather, plus
1:04.3	traffic, into your cockpit.
1:06.4	So my name is Gene Conrad.
1:08.0	I am the president and CEO for the Aerospace Center for Excellence in the Sun Fun Aerospace Expo.
1:13.6	Aviation, what is going on? And welcome back to the pilot to pilot podcast. My name is Justin Seams and I am your host.
1:20.7	Today we are talking with Gene Conrad. Now, Gene is in charge of Sun and Fun. It was a lot of fun to talk with Gene as he has a lot of great information and a lot of great stories. And he actually grew up in the Oshkosh area. So to be so involved with Air Venture and to now be running Sun and Fun, it's just kind of fun to put the two against each other and to talk about both of them, what you learned from this, how you made this better, what your future plans your future plans are and he tells a lot talks about how much they make in an actual event how much
1:49.3	how expensive it is to put these shows on in the future planning just two years in advance you know
1:55.6	i also asked him are you able to enjoy the show so i was very intrigued and interested by his
2:00.3	answer because it's got to be hard in those six days of putting on this amazing event. You might be focusing on something that you think is going massively wrong while someone else could just be looking at the plane, but like, this is awesome, dad, thanks for taking me. So it was really fun to talk with Gene, super impressed with Sun and Fun. I really want to go this year, and I'm hoping I can find time to go. Aviation, I hope you're having a great day. The pilot to pilot magazine is in full effect. Volume 1 is out. We hopefully by the time you're listening to this, let's see, there's a massive ice storm coming here in North Carolina. It's close to the end of January. We're
2:34.4	finishing up all the content. We're trying to get all the content done, trying to push this out
2:38.2	so we can get this episode out on time, this magazine out on time. So very excited about volume
2:42.9	two. It is pretty sick. I cannot wait for to come out. Thank you so much for subscribing,
	...

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