would like your opinion please

[PIP]

I've been in business for about 11 years, with an insurance agency, and have worked previously in fiberglass boat repair. Real quick;

1)keep overhead low. I cannot stress this enough. Do what you can yourself, until you can plan on moving x numbere of widgets every month. If you only sell two or three a month, than that is actually a nice living for a guy by himself. I see so many of my customers that have businesses fail, because they can't make payroll, and rent, and workers comp premiums, and insurance in general.

2)i would consider marketing this to the hobbyist, as a plain but finished hull. In other words, a boat that is ready for a guy to put together and mount the motor, steering, seats, the way he/she wants. I would sell it as a finished hull. I think a lot of people would be into that. To use your example, imagine a company that built a light weight hydrostream vector copy, using s-glass and vinylester, and keeping the weight down with a light layup schedule. The customer pics the color, you build it, and they take it home to complete it (carpet, seats.....) i think you could realistically sell these for $4,000 if they are done right and have a really pretty gel coat. I would much rather pay $4k for a new bare hull, than buy a waterlogged project that i put 100 hours in removing the transom and core, and repairing, plus $1,000 in materials.

3)though this may sound like i am contradicting myself on the first rule about keeping cost down; you have got to "look professional." this doesn't mean you go buy a $60,000 pick up to impress the guys at the boat show, but simply look presentable. Pay to be seen at boat shows, have professional ads done, professional brochures, professional answering machine service, always wear a nice polo type shirt with your company name on it, have vinyl graphics done on the side of your vehicle, professional web site, and so on. This stuff makes all of the difference in attracting the right crowd, the people that will spend money. One of the biggest turn-offs to me is when i go to a company web site, and see spelling errors. It just looks like an amateur threw it together and nobody proofread anything. A friend of mine went to law school recently, and when i checked out the schools website, i found two spelling errors on the home page. It really looks bad.

4)consider also building a very simple but practical little skiff or fishing type boat. These will sell when fun boats will not. Include features that they should all have, but don't, such as;

1)ski steps
2)stainless rubrail (simply cuz they are tough)
3)a floor angle that drains really well so your feet are not wet all day
4)nice built in rod holders
5)nice built in drink holders
6)marine grade carpet that snaps in for easy cleaning
7)a simple manual 2 1/2 inch jackplate so that motor height is easily adjustable, and silly people don't leave motor holes unsealed into the hull.
7)bilge pump installed

these are my thoughts, i am no expert, but have considered doing the same thing you are contemplating.

Ronny jetmore

[david harrell]

hey guys,
haven't been here in awile. wanted to hear your latest thoughts. i love all this input. thanks again. well my buss planner seems to have fallen off the face of the earth. hope i don't have to start over with a new one. i swear this would be so much easer if they would just let me rob a bank. sometimes i think that the office dweller's real job is to take something simple and make it as complicated as possible. i just want to build awsome boats. i want to build boats that are to tomarrow what the classic chris craft is to today. btw pip. you spoke of selling a hull for $4ooo. that won't even cover materials. however they will be complete from trailer to cover minus motor. as far as offering a kit goes. sorry i'm far to picky and anel to put my name in someone elses hands.

[PIP]

i can build one at the weight and size you originally defined at $2,200. again, i stated, bare hull, me doing the work (no workers comp, no shop rent, in my facility). talk to people that are small builders, and they will tell you a small shop that is a one man operation is highly doable with the perameters i defined.

the problem with being anal (i am not calling you this, but only using your words) is that idealism rarely is profitable. sacrifices and short cuts are made because PEOPLE CANNOT PAY FOR A BOAT BUILT BY SOMEONE THAT IS ANAL OVER THE DETAILS. This is why Walmart sells far more mens ties, than Brooks Brothers. I don't know of enough snooty type people, or Brooks Brothers types looking for the Ferrari of little boats. They don't buy little boats. The smallest luxury craft I know of is about 26 feet, built by Albemarle. Again, not many buyers, their.

Loot at the boat market, in this economy. Why spend $10,000 or more for a 16 foot new boat when you can buy a very nice used boat, much larger for less than $10,000. Take a listen to economist Milton Friedman or Mike Milken. They bring the common sense of Wallstreet to main street and show you what works and why.

Thanks man.

[stupidbaker57]

rowboat 001.jpgPlease let me jump in. I'm retired and I build a small 8 foot runabout for my grandson. After I finished it, I thought that maybe I could sell these little boats in an unfinshed way with just the inside painted and let the customer choose the colors and finish the boat to their style. Well,,,,,,,,after 6 months, I still have the runabout and I'm only asking 275. The good side is that I am building 8 foot dingies the same way with just the insides painted. I just finished my 7th one today. They sell for 225 plus 30 more if they want oar locks (I make those also). They sell fast because of PRICE!!!!!!!!

[capnzee]

Your skiff is a measure of quality and beauty! Nice job. I'll bet you could build a small racing run-a-bout to APBA standards for not a lot more than you are asking for your skiffs. I can see your work is a labor of love and it shows. Rod

[david harrell]

ok. first off who says wall street has any sence let alone common. their job is to run up price and squeese us for all they can get. btw. much of the cost of these boats comes from the cost of wall street based typ co. bitch at them about the cost. can you remeber when the world clamerd for american made goods because they where the good stuff? if we don't put the quality back in our goods then we are no better than china. all we have to do is care about what we are doing. btw. i will be the first to call me anal so don't sweat calling me that. to me that's a compliment. i also from a construction background of 25+ years [been building boats longer] so i know all to well about cost effectiveness.
here's the u don't get it part. i can build build a basic shell for about $1500 mat cost sealed and out the door by my self in a week and for us crazy speed freaks that's great but how many people go into say a checkmate dearlership and want just a shell? i'm talking about a ski boat to take the fam and freinds for a day of fun in the sun. the twists are the beauty factor and the mostly natural material. i will make the classic chris craft look like plane jane. no offence to the chris craft guys. i love them too. i want to do something better. don't call me crazy. call me american!!!
ok i'll shut up now. your turn.

[PIP]

if the market will support it, make it and sell it. at the end of the day, that is what we all do. this is what wallstreet does, this is what everyone does, unless receiving tax money for just showing up to work.

the whole thing about buying american, though, it sounds nice, and is charming, and is great in idea, but people generally do not mean it. case it point, if the chinese product is "adequate" but substantially cheaper, everybody buys it. no american can buy all of the goods they want and have them be american. they would go broke. china does it cheaply, and the federal govt in the us strangles the factory. we are forced to pay a minimum wage for a worker not worth half of this amount. we fear adding employees because the govt constantly wants a bigger piece of OUR pie. they want to increase taxes on business, making it very difficult for business owners to take growth risks. people talk about buying american, but take a look in your sock drawar and see how many american socks you have, or better yet, your coat rack. you can get more for your money buying oversees, and the u.s. can't compete easily because our own government regulates the domestic companies so closely, they have to manufacture oversees to be profitable.

[Original Looper 1]

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The richest man in the world is now supposedly Carlos Slim of Mexico, who is worth more than $60 billion according to reports. I say hell yes, when Mexico dumps all of it's impoverished and peasant class on the American private sector taxpayer working class for socializing aka welfare, food stamps, subsidized housing, schooling, etc. Sounds like a hell of a deal for the global elite. Thank you very much, political scumbags and who**s in Washington, DC. Most everyone is on to the fact that BOTH parties are nothing more than crime syndicates running political protection and economic rackets for the wealthy, corporations and special interests. What a deal coming from a bunch of phoney, political opportunists that are mainly made up of slick lawyers.

By the way, Carlos Slim thinks private sector seniors should not retire, they should work till they drop. It's good for them. I'm told he doesn't say the same for government workers who can retire much earlier and receive bigger pension benefits, including health care packages. You know, the ones that give your money away.

Remember, the best kept secret is that over 99% of the people that don't have health insurance in America work in the private sector. You know, the ones that the government depends on to pay their salaries and benefits -- the real "slaves" in America.


Regards,

Paul


ps: You don't see cheap, Chinese corporate health care being offered in this country. You don't see cheap, Chinese education being offered in this country. You don't see cheap, Chinese corporate legal firms offered in this country. Why? Because those three professions are protected from global competition by the carpet bagger, bought and paid for, both parties of Congress in the United States of (make believe) America. Free market ... yeah, right.

Open borders, free trade and endless wars have destroyed the middle class of this country that is now run of, by and for the global elite. As long as people insist in playing the Democrat vs Republican games, the elite will continue to win.

[racingfan1]

Could not agree more Paul. I will probably draw the ire of plenty of people for this comment but here goes anyway. While there are others in running , Bill Clinton , in my mind , will go down as the worst President in the history of this country. Nobody did more to screw the middle and working class than he.

Not just economically but morally as well.

[smittythewelder]

David, I'll spare you my political views. My notion about your boat-building biz is to identify a niche clientele and build what they'll buy rather than trying to compete with a whole industry for a whole range of buyer types, and just putting out a boat hoping someone will show up. I would think you'd want a clientele that doesn't have to think about the purchase price, just whether they want your boat as opposed to another, . . . which probably means yours should have some feature that stands out.

What PIP said about being very hard-nosed about overhead and up-front expenses before you've even got a product is right on. How many models do you figure to produce in the first couple of years? Surely for just a few boats the old methods of layout and lofting would save you thousands on computer programs (on which you likely will spend many happy hours playing with designs when you should be working in the shop or testing a prototype on the water or dealing with paperwork.

Get the prototype tested, tuned, de-bugged, polished out, then see what you can do to get some free "ink" (magazine tests, etc.). Get some buzz going within that target clientele.

This can be easy to do depending on the clientele. For instance, a landscaping contractor I do work for did a job for a local businessman from India, and now gets lots of Indian professionals in town asking for him. This can cut both ways, of course; Chinese-American housewives are notorious for saying, "You do this job for me real cheap, with lots of extras, and I'll refer all my friends to you!", but then each of her referrals will want the same deal. Home-grown American housewives are known for coming in after their husbands have made the arrangement for a job, and wanting half of it done over, . . . so, applying this to boat sales, it might be worth checking to see that BOTH spouses like your pretty boat. If the wife feels she was consulted and was part of the decision process, even though she knows nothing about boats (or welding), she is very likely to talk enthusiastically about it with her pals.