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Atlanta’s Belgian business community reveled in its newfound nonstop flight to Brussels while also lobbying for it to be upgraded to year-round operation.
Delta Air Lines Inc. launched the thrice-weekly seasonal flight June 10, bringing back the direct connection that has been lacking since it was paused after the 2016 terror attacks, briefly restored, then abandoned for good during the COVID-19 pandemic.
For a city and state (Georgia) that prides itself on being the densest host for Belgian companies in the U.S., business leaders see the flight as vital to sustaining longstanding investment ties and to capitalizing on even greater momentum built during the last few years.
Longtime immigration attorney Anton Mertens came to the U.S. first in 1979, arriving as a high-school exchange student in Jacksonville, Fla., the year after Sabena Airlines gave the Atlanta airport its first transatlantic route from an international carrier. (See an AJC story on the new flight that recounts the sumptuous menu in business class the inaugural Sabena flight)
The predictability of that nonstop route helped showcase Georgia’s promise to a generation of Belgian manufacturing executives, said Mr. Mertens, an adoptive Southerner who moved to Birmingham, Ala., and then Macon, Ga., before settling in Atlanta after the Olympics in the late 1990s.
“Everybody said, ‘Oh gosh, we can be in Atlanta in 8-10 hours,’” Mr. Mertens told Global Atlanta.
That same argument now holds true, he added, noting plans to take the nonstop back from Brussels during a trip later this summer see family. That European trip will start with another Delta nonstop recently reintroduced — to Nice, France.
“My childhood home is about 20 minutes from the airport,” said Mr. Mertens, an advisor to the Belgian government for economic affairs who was knighted in 2017.
Belgium has been giving Atlanta an even closer look in the last few years, aided by a massive trade mission from Princess Astrid in 2023, followed by an Agoria tech mission that brought 60 companies.
“Belgians, when they think of the U.S., they think of New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami for vacation — they never really thought of Atlanta other than as the venue for the Olympic Games,” Mr. Mertens said. “Suddenly now when the princess came with the mission with 500 people and several hundred companies, they realized, ‘Wow, look Atlanta, look at Georgia.’”
Brigitte Vandeheim, chair of the Belgian Chamber of Commerce of the South, who herself was knighted during the Agoria mission, said the coming wave of Belgian investors is more likely to be in the creative and technology industries.
The flight, the founder of cybersecurity firm Syba added, is vital to putting the whole Southern U.S. on their map.
“For our members, they love it, and for prospects, it’s absolutely important,” Ms. Vandeheim said.
For Atlanta officials, executives and tourists, the new air link provides a direct connection to the European Union capital and the headquarters of NATO.
But also for expatriates, especially elderly ones, it makes the return trip much easier than transferring or flying to Amsterdam and taking a train, chamber leaders said.
“Beyond the aspect of business, for a lot of these people, that’s home,“ said Catie Stahlkuppe, the new executive director for the Belgian-American chamber.
Both Ms. Vandeheim and Ms. Stahlkuppe said the community’s enthusiasm was palpable at the Taste of Belgium gala in early May, a fundraiser the chamber also relaunched this spring.
Piet Dossche, a “Belgian-born proud American citizen” and a longtime flooring executive, “jumped on the opportunity to express my support” by purchasing two business-class tickets during the gala.
“This direct link will enable closer ties and exchanges between Belgium and Europe as whole and provide a gateway to economic growth and cultural exchange,” Mr. Dossche, founder of US Floors, told Global Atlanta. “It’s important for all of us to support this new route and investment by Delta!”
Consul General Katherine Raeymaekers, who was planning to join the flight, said the return of the flight is a long-held wish of the community.
“Since my arrival 10 months ago I found that it was the first question I always got: When do we get the direct flights back to Brussels?’” she said at the gate.
Now, Atlanta resumes a link to a city with which it shares “a spirit of innovation, diversity and intercultural community,” and through which it can reach destinations beyond in Africa and Europe, she said.
Encouraging guests to partake in Belgian waffles and other goodies during the festivities, she also reminded guests that where Biscoff cookies were served on Delta flights, her country was never far away.
“Remember, they’re a Belgian invention as well.”