USSA Superyacht Captains Briefing St. Maarten – The Triton Reports
By Dorie Cox
February 22, 2010
U.S. Superyacht Association hosted their annual captains briefing at Isle de Sol Marina in St. Maarten in January. The kick-off cocktail reception included a speech by Billy Smith, vice-president of Trinity Yachts.
“Two-thirds of the yards in the U.S. did not receive orders in 2009,” he began.
Captains and officers quieted party chatter to hear the veteran of more than two decades in the shipbuilding industry share his insight on the state of yachting.
“Most yard are living on their back log. At some point this business must be replaced,” Smith said.< --more-->
When yards lose business they have to lay-off employees. Those employees are the skilled labor force that previously created prosperity for the business. Laid-off employees find other work, often in different fields.
At the point the yard can rehire, many employees are not available, leaving yards to hire less skilled employees. This creates a quality gap.
“It takes years to train a labor pool.. If work is slow and the work forces leaves, it is hard to get that quality back,” Smith said.
So instead, he said yards are working very hard to keep their staff in place. He said now is the time for buyers to order.
“Yards are working at absolute minimum charges. They are doing what they can to keep busy at cut-rates.”
Stemming from what Smith called the perfect storm of September of 2008: a combination of factors started the problems, including a recession that hit Monaco, the U.S. presidential election which created uncertainty, a perception of yacht owning as being politically incorrect, and cautious wealthy owners not spending Smith said.
“We had 24 yachts on order when the perfect storm hit, now we have 14 and two have been stopped,” he said.
The industry is still feeling the effects, but Smith said it is time to move forward.
“We need to educate. We need to get outsiders into yachts, only a tiny fraction of those who can own, do own,” he said.
Smith suggested that charterers, people who go on charters, need to buy yachts and then their friends will charter their boats. There is hope, he said because the phones are ringing now and they didn’t in 2009. An important thing to consider is where the industry will be in two to three years.
“The yachts being built now will have very little competition for charters and they will sell well because there will be fewer boats available,” Smith said.
Several heads nodded as Smith said that everyone in the industry needs to pull together and ride it out. He said during the good times, people were making money and weren’t really helping each other, but now all parts of the industry are trying to work together.
“You’ve heard it before, but we’re cautiously optimistic.”
The fifth edition of USSA’s captains briefings were held the next day at Sonesta Maho Resort where about twenty companies presented new technology and yachting information. Regional briefings covered the U.S. and covered the disparity of pilotage laws across the country. Cindy Segall of Pacific Northwest Yachting said pilot requirements are enforced and non-compliant vessels will be fined. She said there are several new facilities expected to open in the next few years but that foreign yachts cannot charter in the area. The San Diego Superyacht Association is growing with 30 members and they are working to clarify pilotage laws and to advocate for the industry. The northeast U.S. has varying pilotage laws in each jurisdiction while typically laws are not enforced in the southeast U.S. according to Kristy Hebert of Ward’s Marine Electric. Jeff Boyd, CEO of BWA Yachting said there are several stalled marina projects in the Turks and Caicos, Antigua and the British Virgin Island.
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February 23, 2010 8:03 pm
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