Rhonda Hamm-Niebruegge: Connecting St. Louis to the World

This week on The Rundown with Rene Knott, brought to you by Marnita Strafford of Lincoln Heritage Funeral Advantage, Rene sits down with Rhonda Hamm-Niebruegge, Executive Director of St. Louis Lambert International Airport.

They discuss leadership, public service, and the future of one of our region’s most important gateways.

From airport operations to regional growth and connection, this conversation takes a closer look at the leadership behind Lambert’s next chapter.

Tune in to this week’s episode of The Rundown with Rene Knott.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

This episode of the Run Down with Reninod is brought to you by Marnita Stafford of Lincoln Heritage's Federal Advantage. Well, for years now, she's been in charge of the comings and the goings at St. Louis Lamford International Airport. She's the one that's been trying to get the airport to upgrade so that it truly, truly represents our city in a way that more people like to come to our town and do business. But now she's about to be on the go. Retirement is called. For this episode of the Run Down 39, we sit down with Rhonda and the world.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

You know, I see an industry that is turbulent, but I see an industry that's necessary. I mean, to me, aviation is one of the greatest things that's ever happened in this country because it gives people access, access to the world. And when I look up and I see that, that's my ticket to the world.

SPEAKER_03 1:56

When you look at air flight now, I know we're going to talk more airports and air flights. Is it still accessible to everybody, or is it a certain crowd that can afford to do these things with their families or by themselves?

SPEAKER_00 2:09

I think it is still accessible, and that's a result of all these ultra-low-cost carriers coming in, Rennie. I mean, for years I don't think it was accessible. It was probably limited to those that had enough wealth to be able to fly. And then as the industry morphed and ultra-low cost carriers like Spirit, like Allegiant, like Frontier, even JetBlue at the time, or even Southwest when they started, you know, back in the 70s, they opened up a lot more opportunities for everyone to fly. The concerning pieces you see a little bit of a shift again with, you know, Spirit recently has folded, and there's a lot of concern when fuel prices spike this high. Can the ultra-low cost carriers survive? Are they able to continue operating at a price that anyone can afford or the majority of the people can afford? So I think there's always that concern about what's next, but I think right now it still is open to just about everybody.

SPEAKER_03 3:03

One of the things about air flight is that yes, it'll take you somewhere, but at the same time, it brings people to us. Looking at Lambert Airport, how important is it for that airport to be at its absolute best? Because for a lot of folks, that's going to be their first sight of St. Louis. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

It's absolutely critical. And it is how people view St. Louis as a whole. I mean, it's it's the first impression you see if you're new to St. Louis or coming in, it's the last impression you see if you're going out. And if you're a local, you want to be proud, right? And that's what I think we've tried to do with bringing so much more of what's right about St. Louis, whether it's the museums, the arts, some of the restaurants, trying to bring more of that flavor in to the airport, I think has been a critical piece because people do want to know that it represents your city and it wants it it helps identify who your city is. So it's a it's a critical asset, and I think the the opportunity for people to see it as a critical asset is something that you've lost some of the things that you're gonna do.

SPEAKER_03 4:09

And people will criticize the airport, how it looks, how it's spread out, and everything else. In your years there, what type of evolution have you seen? How have you seen the airport actually improve? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:19

Th there there's actually been a ton of things. You know, we started the renovation of early 2010 was to really take the low ceilings, bring light into them, try to get rid of a lot of the dated fixtures and stuff that was there, and that renovation was about a hundred million dollars back in 2010. Of course, in 2011 the tornado hit. We weren't finished with the renovation, so that allowed us about another 35 million to add on to reopen the C concourse, renovate it. So there was a number of things that we did, just with the lighting, with the brightness of it, to to reopen the airport to a lighter, brighter feel. Then we brought in uh an art program, a very inclusive art program. We are we are so well rated within our region in terms of artists of all backgrounds and of all mediums. So we brought in a really aggressive art program. We're now in our fifteenth year of that. Really? And we've been able to have over a hundred different local artists exhibit. So and I think people don't if you don't take time to walk through the airport and look, I don't think people have seen all the various spots, but the artists that you know that are able to exhibit out there love it because they get texts or they get phone calls or they'll get Facebooks and says, Hey, I saw your art at the airport. Um and then we've really tried to bring in local restaurants. You know, we've we've got seven or eight now that have a local flair. Our latest one was Peacemaker, which people love. So if you're familiar with Soulard, Peacemaker's down in Soulard, great restaurant. But trying to just bring in a little bit more about the region, I think has been a key piece. And you know, it's it was a long time coming, but I think some of the the recent wins with the international service back to to Frankfurt and now growing, and uh certainly the BA to London, those were long sought-after routes that we lost, and people were clamoring to get those back. So, you know, we've been able to grow back traffic and being able to grow revenues and get the airport on good footing, and so I think those were really big wins for us.

SPEAKER_03 6:17

Speaking of those two wins, how hard was it to win those fights? To bring those airlines here? Because if I'm in Jolly Old England and I'm thinking, where do you want to go to the United States? Let's go to St. Louis. Probably not going to be the first choice for people. So how much of a battle was it to get these two airlines to come to St. Louis?

SPEAKER_00 6:35

It it was a huge battle. And the and the biggest part is when we were the TWA hub and we had a lot of those international markets, peep we brought connecting traffic through St. Louis to feed them. The local market wasn't here. Today we're faced with trying to serve those airplanes with the local market. Okay. The good piece of today is this type of aircraft that's been produced, like the 787. So you've got 244 seats, or the A330, which Lufthansa flies, is 255 seats. So it's a much smaller airplane going into Europe, which works better at a market our size when you are 99% filling that airplane with the local market. That was a key piece of getting the right airplane, and that industry, you know, has morphed in the last decade to be able to offer that to more medium-sized cities. The second piece was to really get buy-in from the business community, and I worked on this for years because we saw other markets getting them. We saw markets like Pittsburgh or even Cincinnati or Austin or Nashville that were getting these international markets, and we knew that we had a better opportunity from a pure success standpoint of being able to consistently see the business traffic on those. But the business community wasn't behind it. And about five years ago, when the business community said, Well, why aren't we getting these? What's wrong? I said, We're not partnering. We have to partner. And if we don't show a partnership and the strength behind the business community to support this, the airlines don't think there's a path forward. So the Greater St. Louis Inc. and the Economic Development Partnership stepped up to the plate, put a package together with us with the airport. And that very next year we were able to ri get the Lufthansa flight. And then the economic development partnership uh through the St. Louis Port Authority came together for the BA flight and we got the second one. So that the Lufthansa flight helped prove that we're a strong market. It's not an endless market to Europe. We don't have enough of a local, you know, draw to be endless. But that flight did very well. Other airlines noticed, and I think when the business community came back to the table and said, we'll support another one, and that's a short-term incentive. It's just to get them stabilized. It's to get those first two critical years out of the way to say we can make this work long term. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_03 8:51

They look at the numbers and go, okay, all right, we'll we'll add some more flights if that's possible. So better together is what I'm thinking about with the fact that you got the buy-in from the business community. Better together is also something I'm thinking about when it comes to one terminal. Why one terminal?

SPEAKER_00 9:08

Because i i efficiency, cost effective, and just the confusion if you're not from St. Louis, and and people still call Terminal 2 the East Terminal. It hasn't been the East Terminal in 15 people still call it the East Terminal. But if you're not from St. Louis, it's confusing of an airport our size because you don't have a train that connects them. Or, you know, we have the Metrolink. I shouldn't say we don't have a train, but it's that Metrolink wasn't driven to connect the terminals, right? So I think it's it's very confusing for people. And in today's world, the four separate checkpoints is very costly because it's been driven by Homeland Security that you have to consolidate checkpoints to be able to consolidate equipment and manpower. We can't do that with two terminals. You're running two separate bag systems. And you know, we grew out of necessity. When we were at TWA and TWA purchased Ozark and we were busting at the seams, we just added on out of necessity to try and accommodate the growth that we were seeing. When all of that went away, what we were left with was kind of an inefficient footprint. And so trying to think about what the next six or seven decades look like, the consolidated terminal, without a doubt, was the best vision that the airport, the airlines, and even the business community agreed with.

SPEAKER_03 10:26

Well, now you know when you started in the airline business, by this time in history, you're supposed to have flying cars. So who knows where airplanes airports would have been, huh? Flying cars. That would have been something. I want to continue our conversations just a second because uh your background, your life is simply fascinating, and I think people would be blown away by it. Stay with us. The conversation continues in just a bit. How much does it break your heart when a family loses someone and they have to turn to a GoFundMe or crowdsourcing in order to be able to pay the expenses?

SPEAKER_01 10:58

It is so heartbreaking. Sometimes you have some individuals that really don't even care about their lives and they don't mind leaving that burden on their loved ones. You can get a policy as little as $20. People fail to realize how affordable life insurance is, final expense life insurance is. Because basically, that's what it's designed for, and it's designed for individuals that are on fixed income. So it can be very affordable. Even if you got something in place, something is better than nothing at all.

SPEAKER_03 11:48

All right, we want to continue our conversation, and I'm fascinated with the airport. I told you it's one of my favorite places to go. We talk about the evolution of Lambert. What have you seen, the evolution of passengers?

SPEAKER_02 12:01

Oh.

SPEAKER_03 12:04

You know where I'm going with this.

SPEAKER_00 12:06

You know, I I started in 1982 and I I started with Ozark Airlines, actually, at LaGuardia Airport. And Ozark had a requirement. As an employee, if you were traveling on a on an employee pass, you had to have a suit and tie, or if you were a female, you had to have a dress or a pantsuit. It was required. Okay. There was no option. And that stayed all the way through the 1986 when TWA bought us. And at that time, even the legacy carriers like TWA or America or Delta or United, they all had very strict dress codes for their employees because they wanted to set an example. If you expect your passengers to be dressed up, then as an employee, you need to be dressed up as well. And you saw in the late 80s, certainly by the mid-90s, where life was changing and as air travel became more open and more frequent and more common, then people went for the comfort. No more of the suit and the tie and uh high-held shoes and the Sunday bass. Let me see if I can put my pajamas on. And uh and today, you know, we have a lot of the Is it like anything goes?

unknown 13:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

Do you you when you go, do you go, I can't believe that person's wearing that or I yeah, I think you you do see a lot of people literally in sweats or pajamas or t-shirts and flip-flops. That just is not that's not where this industry started from. Uh you know, you still have that business traveler that uh that that may dress up more, but as a whole, i the industry has morphed. Uh what what people wear today would have never flown back in the sixties.

SPEAKER_03 13:45

Yeah. I would say I'm I'm more along the lines of comfort, but I don't wear flip-flops. I w and I don't wear shorts. I I will have a a pair of pants on. Yeah. Um one of the things that I find fascinating about you is one, the career is incredible. But where you came from? A town of twelve hundred people, twelve hundred people. In the boot hill.

SPEAKER_00 14:06

In the boot hill of Missouri. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:07

What gave you the strength to think that you could do what you do today?

SPEAKER_00 14:12

You know, I as a kid, I grew up on a farm and I had all brothers, and uh you know, they they taught me well, they taught me to compete it with them. Uh but I always I always had a dream that I wanted to travel and then I wanted to see the world, even as a little kid. And so I think I just always had that vision that I'm not gonna be able to do that if I stay here. I I love my town, I still go back, my whole family's down there. But at the end of the day, I wanted more. I wanted to see the world. I wanted to be able to see what other cultures are like and see what other places are like and what other types of food is out there, and uh so it was just always that drive as a kid to say, I want to see more.

SPEAKER_03 14:52

Were you the unusual one in the family? The one that did want to get away.

SPEAKER_00 14:55

I am definitely the unusual Most of my mother's dismay. Um But yeah, all all of my brothers uh stayed close to home. And uh you know, it's just they never had any any desire to to move away from home. Uh I I always did. And my mom always knew. I think by the time I was twelve, she knew she was gonna lose me. You know, when I was able to to get out of high school and go to college, she knew she was never gonna see me back.

SPEAKER_03 15:23

Wow. You go to college at bazoo.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

I did.

SPEAKER_03 15:25

So you go from twelve hundred people to how many you think were in Columbia at that time?

SPEAKER_00 15:29

Probably forty or fifty thousand, twenty-five thousand, which were coons, right? Okay.

SPEAKER_03 15:33

You go from that to New York City.

SPEAKER_00 15:36

Yeah. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 15:37

I mean, come on now.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Twenty million.

SPEAKER_03 15:42

There's more people in your apartment building than there probably was in your entire town you grew up in.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

That's true. There was. I lived out on Long Island and th that's true. But I again I think it was I just was fascinated by the hubbub. And you know, I was fascinated by the fact that in that 20 million people that live in New York City, no two people were alike. And the backgrounds and the personalities and the path that they all taken and how they got there just was fascinating to me. And watching them. I love I love to people watch. Another reason I like airports, I like to people watch. But you could do the same thing in New York. You could sit in the subway or stand in the subway or sit on the street at a cafe and within ten minutes see hundreds of different people.

SPEAKER_03 16:24

Yeah, watch the world go by right before your eyes. Um you leave there and come back here. What lures you back to St. Louis?

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Well, you know, family is very important to me. And uh I had met my husband now that when I was living in New York, who's also from Missouri, just kind of by a flute, you know, met when I was living in New York. So trying to find that home that we could both be satisfied with and uh TWA, after they purchased Ozark, they were moving headquarters to St. Louis. So I had an opportunity to join TWA, which was at the time the largest carrier in the United States, international carrier. So I knew I'd have that opportunity to fly around the world if I wanted to do that. Um and so it when they said we've got an opening in St. Louis, we'd like you to come to St. Louis, I I said I'll come back.

SPEAKER_03 17:12

Jumped at it. Jumped at it. So you come back to be a part of an airline. Then what drove you to be the airport?

SPEAKER_00 17:18

So after, you know, 27 years in the airlines I uh and I I rose up through the ranks, ultimately I was able to run all the North American airports for TWA. So I was their vice president of North American airports, and I g got to see how airports work, right? As an airline and all these different airports, how did each of those airports function and what were their teams like? What were those partnerships like? And after American bought TWA and I worked on the integration team for a couple of years to put the airports uh together, you know, my option was to move to Dallas to stay as an officer or uh to do something different. And I chose to go back and run the hub here at the time. It was a decision that was tough for me, but I thought it's it keeps me in St. Louis, my kids were here, and so I thought, you know, I'll figure it out. What I didn't realize was the next five years would be taking it apart and de-hubbing it. And as each of that step happened, little by little, year by year, we started taking flights away. I got more engaged in the community, Rennie, just to understand the business side of the community and where we were gonna go and what this community needed to do. So the engagement with the business community was a key piece for us as we did that downsizing. And that was kind of left to me to engage with them and work through that. So in 2009, when we had announced that we were gonna go down to ultimately 65 flights a day at the time from a where we were at 450, I just knew in my heart that it was time to leave and still didn't really want to leave St. Louis. This this had become home, and so I thought I'll figure out what I'm gonna do. And as I announced back in June of that year that I was retiring at the end of the year, it was it was that business community that I think reached out first and said, We know you love this airport, we know you know this industry. What do you think about the airport? Taking over the airport, and I'm like, Well, no. My husband was like, Absolutely. And then Mayor Slate called and said, Let's have a cup of coffee. And the more he and I talked, the more intrigued I became with why not take that chance and try to build it back. Something that you've loved and been a part of for so many years. See if you can get the chance to build it back. That wouldn't that be exciting? So after a few months of interviewing with the mayor, and he ultimately said, I'd like to I'd like to offer you to come over and take the airport. So I did. And that was uh sixteen and a half years ago.

SPEAKER_03 19:51

That's a beautiful story. You're in a position where I don't think there's a lot of women, am I right?

SPEAKER_00 19:56

There's not. There's about twelve of us in the United States that run airports.

SPEAKER_03 20:01

When you step into the boardrooms back in the beginning, did people not understand why you were there? Did people look at you as like, why is this woman in this room with with us? Or did you feel like, okay, I got command of this and I I know what I do and I know who I am?

SPEAKER_00 20:16

No, I I never felt that they didn't accept me or that I couldn't do it. And I think part of that was my nature and part of that was my brothers, you know, because anything they could do I was gonna be able to do as well. So I think I'd carried a little bit of that attitude with me. Um so I it never scared me as I as I stepped up. Uh you know, even when I when I first got the the what I would say the biggest job running the hub here, there was no other women that were running hubs for airlines, especially large airlines. So I got recognized in the industry as running one of the largest hubs in the country. Shortly thereafter, when I was promoted to the vice president for North America, same thing. It was like okay. And then more women started coming into the industry. When I morphed over to the airport side, I saw that same thing. Very few women. Now there were some women running some of the larger airports. So at the time when I first started, LA was run by a woman, Chicago was run by a woman, DC was run by a woman. Some of those have retired and changed out, but it's still a small niche group. And I think like I guess I think right now there's 12 of us running, you know, 457 public airports and 12 are run by women. But I cannot the industry always supported me, and I will say the the the bosses that I had always supported me as well.

SPEAKER_03 21:31

That's cool. What was the best piece of advice you ever received that you think was the one that drove you the most, the one that got you to to be so successful in the industry?

SPEAKER_00 21:42

So I was I was in high school and I played volleyball and my volleyball coach and I butted heads a lot. And our senior year he said to me, Stop playing for yourself and play for a team, Rhonda, and you'll be a much better person. I'm like I play for myself. Um he said, In this this semester you're gonna have to do that. Otherwise you're not gonna pass this class. And this was a PE class. I mean the best I'm the most physical person you have. I got a B in that class. And it was the only B I got in high school. And so I went in to talk to him and he said, I told you, stop playing for yourself. Start playing for a team because you have the ability to lead a team and you don't use it. And it it he really changed my thought about who I was as an individual. And you know that B hurt. I mean it for a lot of people it made You haven't forgotten it. No, I haven't thought uh it hurt because I was like, I did you know, I deserved that A and he said, No, you didn't. Wow. No, you didn't. You know, this this is a team sport you're playing, and and you just don't you don't play for the team. So it was good advice. It carried me through forty-four years.

SPEAKER_03 22:57

You know, I look at my report cards from back then and a B would have been nice. B would have been a lot of encouragement for the young man in those days. Um you've been a team player for so long, and now you're about to leave the team. Retirement again. Is it for real for real?

SPEAKER_00 23:15

You know, I I honestly don't know. I think uh the my husband and I, you know, we're gonna take off a month and go to Ireland and Scotland and really enjoy the pubs and some of the the countryside. And then I think I'll have to figure it back. I honestly have no plans. I don't know if I want to do something part-time. If I, you know, I do know that I'm not gonna go back to sixty-hour work weeks and this kind of it's it's time for me to step back and enjoy life a little bit. But uh to say I'm totally finished, I don't know. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. I think it depends. It depends how these next few months go.

SPEAKER_03 23:52

Sounds to me it's gonna be a pretty good time. Um what you could also do is get a big following on Instagram by traveling all over the place. And where is she today? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:01

Where is she? I do intend to travel a lot.

SPEAKER_03 24:03

Yeah. I I think that's a lot of who you've been on the sidelines in some ways because you're at the point where people go and come back. Now you get to be one of those people. Yep. And with no restraints as far as oh, I gotta be back for this or back for that. So Yeah. I think retirement's gonna last for like I'll give you sixty days. You thought about politics?

SPEAKER_02 24:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

You no politics? No.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

I mean you you've been able to get everybody to work together as a team.

SPEAKER_00 24:37

You know, I no.

SPEAKER_03 24:38

No, no, okay.

SPEAKER_00 24:39

No, not politics. Uh-huh. That's not in the card.

SPEAKER_03 24:44

Okay. Was that the first time someone asked you about politics?

SPEAKER_00 24:46

Pardon me?

SPEAKER_03 24:47

Was that the first time someone asked you about politics?

SPEAKER_00 24:49

Yeah, it is actually. Really? That's why I chuckled because um, but no, yeah, it's the first time someone's after. Oh, I think.

SPEAKER_03 24:56

Well, give us some thought. It's the first time you heard it. Give us some thought. Okay. Oh I tried. I tried. Rhonda thing is the conversation that was fun.

SPEAKER_02 25:06

Hey, stay new. We got a story for you.