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$35-40,000 slalom tug. Possible?


jcamp
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@OSUwaterskier Again...the Outback was tournament approved.

 

 

I think many people here will generally not be interested in a boat unless it says Mastercraft, Nautique, or Malibu on the side....which is OK. But if that is the case there shouldn't be any complaining about price. Everyone wants a MasterBuTique new for 40-50k. That ain't happening. If people would rather buy a used MasterBuTique rather than a new "other option we wish was cheaper" because a perception that the MasterBuTique is better, than there really is no incentive to drive the market for a new cheaper option.

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I remember the days of Brendella, MB, Magnum, Contender and American Skier. Boat companies that just started up to build boats and succeeded for a while. Malibu was another one (their first effort was more sketchy than any of the above boats). Perservere (like Malibu) and another choice can certainly be developed.

 

Stan had a Moomba. OK boat (good enough to qualify him into MM tricks). Never saw one at a tournament. I had a Magnum. Mediocre boat that I got for a few tournaments. Didn't do magic for my skiing but I banked a lot of money - enough to buy a Nautique of that era.

 

There just isn't as much passion in the young entrepreneur skiers today. All the above mentioned boats were projects of skiers or builders who loved the sport. Huge profits weren't the prime driver.

 

Maybe Nautique's stratospheric price will encourage a new competitor?

 

Eric

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As a small niche boat manufacturer I will tell you that a company can no longer afford to make a new line of boats or even a model hoping to sell them. The old joke is "Want to make a small fortune in the boat business? Get in the business with a large fortune and get out quickly". When I was approached about building a "barefoot" outboard with the wake characteristics of a Flightcraft I bought a nice used outboard model. We studied it. When it came for time for the bare footers to put up money or place orders the project stalled and died. It takes money to make things happen. The bare footers have since then approached several other small boat companies. Each of the companies made a boat. No sales have come from this that I am aware of.
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I agree with most of what @fu_man said above, if we (as consumers) keep believing that (even a used) MasterBuTique is better, then

there really is no incentive to drive the market for a new cheaper option

However, there may be some hope that the big 3 won't keep acting like a single monolith. Anecdotally (at least at the clubs I've been to), it seems like Nautique has been increasing its lead, and like Sony or Apple, it strikes me with the new MRSP that they're testing their pricing power to see how much of a premium their reputation can buy them. It makes sense in that environment for either Mastercraft or, more likely, Malibu to go the other direction and try to make at least a somewhat cheaper (and perhaps more broadly appealing, family-oriented?) boat and try to exploit a pricing opportunity? Perhaps wishful thinking, but if I was competing against the new Nautique, I'd see the MRSP as the thing to take aim at.

 

If you're Nautique, Mastercraft or Malibu, one of your biggest competitors/barriers to growth is your own used market. The price between new vs used grew so fast (between, let's say, 2000-2010), it's driven lots of potential new buyers to used. The question is whether any manufacturer can reverse that trend.

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What is the incentive to sell boats cheaper? There really is none. All companies care about are profit margins. I could easily build a Closed Bow 20' model with a single outboard engine. The engines are very powerful and props make it easy to reduce speed variations. Mercury's new light weight V-6 four stroke has Smart Tow and includes digital throttle and shifting. So this covers speed and even launch control. Making the boat heavier will help in the slalom course and the barefoot wake behind the boat is decent customers seem to feel. All it takes are an order or two or seed money. Making a wrap around type of boarding platform can be done or just bigger boarding platforms. Again it just takes some money.
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@DynaSkiPete You've kinda hinted at the answer to your own question:

What is the incentive to sell boats cheaper?

Volume, hopefully. Essentially, (margin/unit) * units-sold = profit

 

We can dream about a significant volume at a significantly lower price, but in the current market, it's perhaps more realistic to hope someone could tweak a little more volume with a little lower price.

 

I know a lot of consultants who seem very proud that they charge $500-600/hr, but I always wonder how many hours they sell.

 

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Many boat companies have gone out of business trying to build more boats and selling them for less. Building fewer boats with a higher selling price and margin is a very sound business practice. Don't you think the big 3 have pondered building more and selling them cheaper? The ship builders build fewer and make way more profit per ship. A manufacturer wants to be building enough products to keep the plant busy and not incur overtime. Remember when a buyer had to wait for a long time to buy a Harley Davidson Motorcycle? Now that is no longer the case and Harley is struggling.
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I don’t know about the final price tag but it seems like there’s more momentum now than there was just a few years back. I see it being driven by BOS, TWBC, The Pro Tour, ski and equipment companies, tournament sponsors and lake owners. Who knows we may just see someone with lots of cash jump into the ski purposed boat building game. Maybe a splash of one of the favorite hulls with just the basic needs or maybe something new.
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I look at a company like Gekko, who made a really great boat with some innovative stuff at the time. It has to be priced SO low that people will take a gamble the company won't be there to support the warranty, but high enough that dealers are going to take risk and us slalom snobs will want tournament certification.

 

The ONLY way I see any of this happening is if there is a name like Tesla that has enough cache to do a direct to consumer product.

 

Right now, I think we should probably count our lucky stars there is a big 3 and not just a big 1.

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There is literally zero momentum to make a cheap strippy ski boat by anyone who is in a position to make it happen. A Prostar (the supposedly more reasonable option price wise over Nautique) with the base engine and base trailer and a few options is reportedly going out the door for six figures for 2022 models.
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question? what makes a boat slalom tournament certified? is it pay to play? it certainly isnt speed control or surepath as you can put that on almost anything.

 

weight? performance? seat heaters? tower speakers? what is it?

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If I recall correctly Supreme Boats was getting close to building a low dollar tug…then Correct Craft bought them and Centurion and scrapped it and the Carbon Pro. They figured they already had a proven ‘second line’ boat in the 200.
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My observation:

 

Slalom tugs/3-event boats are a low-volume, niche market. This niche market will reliably purchase a certain number of these boats each year and this specific market is fairly price insensitive. Buyers looking for a much cheaper boat likely won't buy a new one anyway and will look to the used market to fill their needs. And manufactures have limited space based on capital constraints and can make other boats, like surf boats, in the same facilities. Based on my observation, I see two options for manufacturers.

 

Manufacturer Option One: Make these niche boats expensive with good margins knowing a specific number will sell each year and pretty much no more regardless of price. They can make a profit on these boats and will continue to make them even through surf boats have even better margins.

 

Manufacturer Option Two: Make these boats as cheap as possible with low margins knowing a specific number will sell each year regardless of price virtually ensuring they don't make much profit, even though surf boats have great margins and their manufacturing capacity is limited by fixed capital constraints like molds and factory space.

 

Based on my general observations, I can see which option all three manufacturers are gravitating towards. And any manufacturer gravitating towards option two won't be in the slalom tug market at all for very long.

 

 

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I'd be curious to see how many prior new boat buyers now consider themselves priced out of the market? Myself and my family used to religiously buy new boats, but we're out now. I don't expect a $40k tug, but no way I can personally justify 6 digits. Like the famous Seinfeld episode, "I'm out Jerry!" :D
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I could be way off but....What if.....what if.. say, one of the big 3 came out with a limited edition bare bones boat, say like the year after a new hull design comes out using up all of their surplus parts. ( Malibu lxr ish) it could be way to attract people to their product and the sport. Just a thought. Like I say could be waay off
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My response is that it can be done…but my gut and head says that it won’t.

 

Does anyone have the actual statistics of the quantities of DD ski boats sold? I’m not sure, but my guess is that it’s something less than 500 annually in the US. This is out of the total boat market of 13,000 (from NMMA). If my estimate is close, then it’s ~5% of the total US registrations.

 

I doubt it’s a good business model to build a low cost niche boat that most consumers would consider a luxury purchase. Previous attempts also seem to support that it won’t happen.

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That number is fairly accurate. It comes down to revenue. Why would a mfr take up a production slot for a boat with a small amount of profit? When that same slot could be used for a boat with a large amount of profit? You need volume to make that work. But that’s not possible when your production capacity overall is so low. Can they make a low cost boat? Sure. But it makes absolutely no fiscal sense to them.
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I heard similar numbers on the Malibu side, approximately 11:1 ratio of wake/surf to slalom boats. Spartan tugs are not what the market is looking for today, if you look across many consumer products buyers lean towards fully loaded options (boats, cars, etc) and shun the spartan versions hence manufacturers would not see value / volume / profit in that segment.

If you are looking for a $35-45K tug, there are numerous options, brands, models available. Ski-it-again is your go to source. There are approximately 50 that go for under $50K

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There is a current shortage of everything marine as far as replacement parts.

Or there is a 12-14 weeks lead time on casting items- manifolds, mounts as well as engine harness .

Nobody in their right mind would start up a boat company dedicated to tournament style inboards, electric or internal combustion.

Complete engine orders up to 4 months out for delivery. ...

 

Sorry kids but it ain't going to happen 45k 0r 60k or even 80k

Might be time to rethink your approach to the sport. Current direction for the competitive aspect of the sport is about to derail period.

No customers no products.

 

 

 

 

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I guess I should change the title of this thread to $75,000 ...

 

Anyone think the huge increase in boat prices might finally create room for a new player to enter the market at a lower price point?

 

Seems like that is the natural ebb and flow of markets. Prices go up, competition comes in. Prices go down, competitors get weeded out. Repeat.

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No.

I'm convinced if you want to build a ski boat then don't bother trying to get it certified just make sure it skis really well and make it attractive to the family boater for other purposes. I'm by my local marina all the time, I'd say 50-60% of the boats are 19-21 foot runabouts. It is easily the best selling segment. Don't need a huge truck to tow them, fit in garages, seat 8-9 people, comfortable on rougher days relatively dry to be in. That's just what sells.

So take that boat and make it skiable sort of a modern take on the Tristar 190. And I think you could do that for 40-50K because clearly you can get a Tahoe or whichever in that segment.... And then you've got a product that people will buy. If that happens to ski well enough that you can convince people to buy one instead of a ski boat (knowing they're not going to use their own boat in a tournament) and then you can get the price to that level because you're selling volume.

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Hard to justify a $150k boat when a $30k used boat does the same thing. (Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Not the same as what you see in tournaments...)

I'd enjoy a new boat and I'd enjoy supporting those that support the sport, but it is well out of my price range. Not to mention that I likely never will be willing to spend that kind of money on a depreciating asset.

Anything with ZO is fine by me...

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