FOOD FOR
THOUGHT K E A LY DON A LDSON
A PIECE
OF THE PIE
O N TH E F LY CA F É AT YQQ
It’s no secret… small and medium sized businesses
to us, as a destination for pick up. It was late spring and
have been hit quite hard through this time of Covid
I thought that everyone loves an incredible pie. So that
Pandemic. Some have closed to either re-open later or
was it, the Café started marketing fruit pies and a new
possibly never at all, and some through perseverance,
clientele appeared. It is truly heart warming to see the
tears and bit of magic have been able to pull through.
incredible progress made in only a few months, and the
With a flair for more than just on the go foods, On The
support from the locals is overwhelmingly generous.”
Fly Café, in YQQ Comox Airport, has been able to do a full turnaround from their business model of just a few months ago. “Adapt
and
Erin Neely, Market Development Manager at YQQ, filled us in on the changes at the airport and how quickly On The Fly Café adapted to their new Pie model. “YQQ had
change,” laughs Andrea Wagemaker,
restricted access as soon as the pandemic hit. The airport's
Co-owner of On The Fly. “We were able to recreate the
policy was strict, no mask=no entry, and if you were not
café’s product lines and services through supporting
a passenger, no entry. It was devastating to both the café
other incredible local Food and Beverage vendors.” So
and gift shop on site. We lost flights and foot traffic, and
much so that this directional change has On The Fly
our amazing team of volunteer ambassadors were no lon-
nominated for Comox Valley Chamber’s COVID Busi-
ger accessing services on site," she says. "So when On The
ness Resiliency Award, sponsored by the BDC. Now
Fly presented their re-launch using Andrea’s Pie Model,
you ask, how’d they do it? On The Fly went from hav-
we were on board with helping them get back on track.
ing multiple flights of foot traffic built into their daily
We had already been working towards Island Good which
routine to a minimal amount of flights and needed to
focused on locally grown or produced products. The air-
find the next level and layer of business to keep their
port was happy to arrange the take out window to better
business alive.
facilitate physical distancing, and to provide access to
As Spring 2020 coasted by with most of us tucked away
those currently restricted from entering."
at home, Summer time emerged and that’s when Wage-
On The Fly started with fruit pies and literally got off
maker developed a brilliant idea. “We were already
the ground during the summer season and the pies
working with the YQQ Management Team on incorpo-
started to fly! “We can’t thank our customers enough
rating more local vendors into our product lines under
for believing in our products and services. You are the
the ‘Island Good’ program,” she says “so it made sense
reason we are still open. Once we saw that the Pie Mod-
to find a product that everyone loves and would come
el was working and revenues were climbing, I knew we
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