Market Leader Spotlight: Bobby Jensen
A Career Built Around Citation
For Bobby Jensen, understanding an aircraft has never been limited to what appears on a specification sheet. After more than two decades in business aviation, much of it spent flying, selling, and working alongside the people who build Citation aircraft, he understands ownership from nearly every angle.
Bobby’s connection to Citation began in the cockpit. His first professional flying job was aboard a brand-new Citation CJ2, where he participated in the delivery process and worked closely with the Citation Service Center in Wichita while flying and managing the aircraft. That introduction gave him an early appreciation for the people, product support, and customer relationships behind the Citation name, all of which would remain central to his career. His path eventually led to nearly two decades in OEM sales leadership, giving Bobby a front-row seat to both the evolution of business aircraft and the many reasons people choose to own them.
Early in his career, Bobby expected there might be a simple answer to why someone decides to buy a business jet. Over time, he realized the motivations are far more personal. Some owners fly primarily for business, others for personal travel, but many are ultimately looking for the same thing: more control over their time. “I think most who look at business jets do so for the ‘time machine’ factor,” Bobby says. “They want more time with family, less time on business trips, and they want their aircraft to work, every time.”
As an ATP and Citation 525 type-rated pilot, Bobby also brings firsthand operational knowledge to conversations that might otherwise focus solely on specifications. When discussing avionics, performance, or cockpit technology, he considers how those systems perform in real-world flying conditions and how they affect workload, safety, and day-to-day ownership. Having watched the Citation family evolve alongside its customers, Bobby has seen advancements increasingly address passenger comfort, connectivity, safety, and reducing pilot workload alongside performance. He credits much of that progress to Textron Aviation’s willingness to listen to its customers and incorporate operator feedback into future aircraft.
Today, Bobby draws on that product knowledge in the Citation M2 and CJ3 markets, where aircraft that appear similar on paper can be very different in practice. Understanding those differences, he says, requires looking beyond inventory counts, asking prices, recent transactions, and average days on market. “Market data shows the inventory. Experience provides the context.” Knowing how to interpret those numbers can reveal what the market is rewarding, what it is penalizing, and where imbalances between buyers and sellers may exist. Even familiar statistics can tell an incomplete story when a small number of aircraft distort the broader picture.
The same principle applies when comparing individual airplanes. Within the M2 Gen2 market, equipment differences can meaningfully affect future capability. In the CJ3 market, engine program enrollment, program type, and upgrades introduced throughout the aircraft’s production life can distinguish airplanes that initially appear comparable. Buyers today have access to more aircraft information than ever before, but listings, specifications, transaction history, and market data still require careful interpretation to determine which aircraft is worth pursuing. A buyer may see 20 CJ3s available online. Bobby helps identify which of those truly fit the mission and deserve further consideration.
That is why he believes an aircraft search should begin with the mission rather than the inventory. “What do I actually need this airplane to do?” is the question he wishes more buyers would ask at the beginning of the process. That means considering where the aircraft will fly, how often it will be used, how many passengers will typically be aboard, what runway environments it needs to serve, and even how difficult it may be to find qualified pilots for a particular model. “Let’s not start with what’s for sale,” Bobby says. “Let’s start with what makes sense for you.”
Moving from new aircraft sales into the pre-owned market has broadened the way Bobby evaluates those decisions. Instead of building the ideal aircraft for one specific buyer, he now also considers its appeal to future owners and its long-term life cycle, including which upgrades may provide meaningful value three, five, or even ten years down the road. His approach has also been shaped by a career spent in Wichita, a community that has influenced the way he works just as much as the aircraft themselves.
For Bobby, Wichita, known as the Air Capital of the World, represents generations of aviation expertise and a culture built around pride, a strong work ethic, Midwestern hospitality, and a willingness to help. He describes it simply as a culture of “How can I help?” That same philosophy carries into his relationships with clients. After more than 20 years in the industry, Bobby has built connections across manufacturers, service organizations, operators, and the broader aviation community. Those relationships can be valuable during a transaction, but often become even more important once aircraft ownership begins.
“I hope clients come away knowing they have a trusted advocate,” Bobby says. “If they feel more informed, more confident in their decision, and know that I am invested in their success, then that means I did my job.” From his first CJ2 delivery to decades spent within the Citation community, Bobby’s career has always extended beyond the transaction itself. Today, he combines his background as a pilot, deep product knowledge, and longstanding industry relationships to help clients choose confidently and navigate the years of ownership that follow.
