Information on the business of sailing

Branding

In a most improbable pairing, sailing and alcohol, US Sailing has signed a two-year sponsorship agreement with Dry Creek Vineyard. The agreement provides Dry Creek Vineyard with marketing rights as well as the rights to sponsor select Adult Championship events. What, no Youth Champs brought to you by Dry Creek?

Apparently Dry Creek Vineyard will also promote it's new REGATTA label, a wine brand specifically created by Dry Creek Vineyard for sailors (Higher alcohol content? Cheap price?), and also donate a portion of the proceeds from the label's sales to US Sailing's education programs. Info courtesy IBI News.

12/12/2003

Disney Quits Board

Roy Disney, owner of the new R/P 86 Pyewacket, quit the board of directors of the company founded by his uncle, and lashed out at much loathed Disney Chairman Michael Eisner in a letter he sent to Eisner. Disney would have been forced to leave anyway due to rules requiring board members to retire when they reach 72. Well, now at least he'll have more time to count his Disney stock holdings (worth approximately $600 million) and sail the new boat. The full text of the letter and further details can be found here.

New DK46

One of SA's fav designers, Mark Mills, sent us this picture of his new 46, built by DK Yachts. Not only is it very good looking, it looks to be pretty quick too.(Say, are those Genesis sails??) It won it's first outing, beating it's likely competition both on the course and at the dock, the Swan 45's rather handily. Good, we say.www.mills-design.com

B&G Bought

Brookes and Gatehouse, currently owned by the Yeoman Group, has been purchased from marine electronics manufacturer Simrad (part of the Norwegian-based Kongsberg Group). The purchase price for B&G was $4.5 Million USD.

Little short term change is anticipated, but Simrad apparently plans to give B&G a bigger presence in the superyacht segment. You know, where all the real money is.

Here is the full story from IBI.

Mast Man

We hear that Dave Hulse of recently formed Novis Composites (out of the rubble of Hi-Tech Composites) has not only gotten the order for the carbon rig for the new Jim Donovan designed TP 52, they are also going to be building the carbon spars for the new Columbia 30. Dave certainly knows his way around spars, and throw in that they are building their first Farr 40 rig, all the carbon spars for C&C and Tartan, and this may be the spar company to watch.

10/14/03

New TP 52

Speaking of MORC, one of the talented, if not well known designers who had an impact in that class was Jim Donovan. He designed a wicked fast 30' maxi MORC boat named Wolfpack, and also a fairly successful 27', the Donovan 27. Jim worked for Gary Mull, Doug Peterson and Bruce Farr, before doing design work for the last couple of America's Cups.

We now hear that Jim has gotten the commission for a new TP 52 design. We don't know who else is involved with the project, but we're glad to see him get a chance at the plate. This of course is great news for all the little guys out there (and I'm sure very irritating to the Big Names, some of which btw, we hear might be on the ropes in terms of very little or no new design work.)

We've always admired Jim's talent, friendliness, and throw in to the mix being a superb sailor as well. We look forward to hearing more about the project.

10/6/03

Hey Boys

I know a lot of you have girlfriends and/or wives who actually go sailing, and sometimes even with you!. Our friends at the Chapin Company would like to offer you a chance to score some bonus points, by getting that special gal (or gals) a pair of the Dawn Riley Signature Line All Weather Salopette. It's got some nice features (Water resistant, breathable, windproof) and for SA readers only, you will get a 15% discount off the retail price.

Believe me when I tell you that Christmas is right around the corner. Can you imagine actually having a present, ready to go, by October? Unheard of! So for once, get ahead of the curve. Click on the picture to see how easy it is to do.

09/29/2003

Emma's "New" Pindar

Image © James Boyd

Here is a look at the Owen Clarke designed 60 originally built for Graham Dalton and campaigned in the last Around Alone as Hexagon. There are some interesting features to the boat, and we'll try to get a few words from the designer about the project. Anyone doubt that Emma will get just a bit more out of it than Dalton did? For more info go to www.owenclarkedesign.com

09/25/2003

Deja Vu All Over Again

What you are looking at is the forbearer to the new line of Quantum sails. Granted these are older shots of a prototype sail, but you can see the essential design theory. In this exclusive report, we have learned that Quantum is in the process of acquiring the production facility in Malaysia, and has huge plans to introduce this as their "new" technology. Looking frighteningly similar to the abysmal Genesis product built by Sobstad, sources say it is significantly better. It fucking better be. And you have to think that is the case. Larry Leonard and the boys have been burned by Genesis before - in fact it is safe to say that the woefully inconsistent product that Peter Conrad was shoving down his reps throats, is exactly why Quantum was started in the first place. So one would like to believe that this time, the end result will be significantly better. Advances in film, fiber and adhesives have been, well quantum, and it would be very surprising (and hugely disappointing) if this product isn't quite nice right from the get-go. Technology is one thing, what will be really interesting is to see where they establish their price points. Could Quantum, for the first time ever, become one of the least expensive choices? More as we get it it.

According to an article in Trade Only Today. Loses to recreational boats from the damage of Hurricane Isabel — not including marinas, or other infrastructure — will exceed $150 million, according to an estimate from the Boat Owners Association of the United States.

Most of that damage, says Boat U.S., occurred in the upper regions of the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River watersheds, a considerable distance from the storm’s actual North Carolina landfall. $150 mil? In boats alone? Really? Seems high. Pictures courtesy of good friend Boyd Tomkies

Word is that Jim Betts (America True, Sierra 26 among many others) will be building the Farr 36 now that Carroll Marine has bitten the dust. Jim builds a nice boat, but there's just one slight problem: It doesn't appear that there is a waiting list of buyers. The boat looks very sweet, but this class must be a very hard sell. We hope to be proven wrong.

Sails-online.com is one of our newer advertisers, and they couldn't be happier with the response many of you have given them. In fact, our audience is so active,you have accounted for 80% of the hits to their site. By comparison another site that sails-online advertises with, claiming to have the same sort of traffic that we have (which we call bs on, btw), was responsible for a measly 2% of their hits. I've said from Day One that you buy stuff, and when I hear this sort of feedback from advertisers, it only verifies what we know.

Sails-online is offering a special on cruising sails. Cruising sails? Yes I know that we all fancy ourselves racing sailors, but some of you do go cruising, even with race boats and especially with racer/cruisers. If you've ever thought about getting say, a furling headsail for example, click on their new banner ad on the upper left. They have a special discount for SA readers only, so if you'd like to see how inexpensively and quickly they can build something for you, click away. And thanks!

Well at least partially. Roy Disney, owner of the new MaxZ86 Pyewacket, is selling 40% of his Disney stock holdings. The sale will net a cool $163 million. Hey, gotta pay for all that high-priced sailing talent somehow. Read the full story here.

The Wyliecat 65 Derek M. Baylis looking very sleek. Word is it just hauls ass, especially for what it is. We'll get the Tom Wylie InnerView together asap. Photo courtesy www.wyliecat.com

In this case, their name says it all, Sails-Online.Com, and they are our newest advertiser here at SA. Quite simply these guys are experienced sailmakers who have started a new company based in New Zealand that is offering NZ designed and built racing, performance, and cruising sails at a very reasonable price and an exceptional delivery schedule. Yes they are mail order, yes you provide the dimensions and yes you save money in the process. Interested in finding out more? Simply click on the banner on the upper left column, or go to www.sails-online.com.

Amazingly enough, the new/old Hobie 33 is here! These are pics of the first boat, with at least a few more on order. It does look cool in a "back in the day" kind of way, and they certainly cleaned up the interior nicely, but unless there is already a class in your area, you have to wonder why you would buy one. As cool as I have always thought 33's are, a lot has changed in boat design, and surely a new 33 from scratch would be markedly improved in almost every aspect from the original Hobie.

But what the hell do we know? We've been wrong about just about everything else, and I hope we are wrong here too! If you'd like more info on the new/old 33, contact the builder, Robbie Roberson, and for more pix, go to www.hobie33.com.

This is a nice shot of the new 65' Wyliecat, the Derek M. Baylis. Wylie calls it an "expedition cruiser" and that seems an apt description. West Marine founder Randy Repass' version of this design, called a Wylie 66, will be launched in September. For more info on these pretty amazing craft, go to their site, http://www.wyliecat.com. Photo courtesy Wyliecat.

This hardly rates as a major stampede of orders, but it is noteworthy. The first Tom Wylie designed and Schooner Creek built Wildcat 43 has been sold. We previewed this thing way back in '01 (Wild On), and thought it was cool as we do now. With the trend towards simplicity and lightness, why doesn't this boat make sense? It will be fun to see how the boat performs, and surely we'll do a review. Also, look for a Tom Wylie InnerView in the comming weeks. Click for more info on the Wildcat.

Many years ago, my dopey brother bought a Columbia 26 Mk II, the Tripp designed model with the little bubble cabin. I believe when they first came out they were referred to in advertisements as the "Mini 50", which is kind of funny. We also used to smoke a lot of weed back then, much of it from Columbia, or so we thought anyway. Being the hip stoners that we were, we used to call the weed lumbo - I don't know why, we just did. Wait, I do know why, we were stoned. Well, guess what we also started calling my brother's boat? Yep, The Lumbo. Now I'm not suggested that we start referring to the new Columbia 30 as the Lumbo 30, but I wanted to at least share that Columbia story with y'all from back in the day. - The formerly very high Ed.

Now, here's the latest on the new Columbia 30. I spoke with Vince Valdes from Columbia Yachts and he reports that the tooling is being built, and they plan to begin making the first deliveries in November. Here's the cool part - they already have five orders! For a boat not even built yet, that to me is great news. They have something like 800 inquires, so things are looking good for them. I have long held that a 30' dual purpose sportboat, priced right, will have great success in the market, and I hope these guys hit the home run.

Hey Vince, sorry about all the weed talk, but maybe there will be a whole new market segment of stoners that will now buy the new 30!

A while back we reported that Palmer Johnson had "filed to secure protection from its creditors under Chapter XI of the Bankruptcy Act." Turns out that there is much more to the story, and none of it very good. Rather than have me re-tell the story, and no doubt butcher it along the way, read it from the source. Good times.

We know that businesses get sold all the time, but in this business, in this economy, this one is of some note. The parent company of B & G, the Yeoman Group, has announced that it is planning to sell B&G, the marine instrument company, to concentrate on Yeoman's strategy in rolling out mobile phone based car navigation and traffic products.

A recent restructuring at B&G has resulted in a number of new products, including the wireless RaceVision2 deck tactical computer, and increased profitability, the manufacturer claims. Really? Increased profitability? Then why sell? Perhaps sales projections and forecasting paint a future picture that is not quite so cheery?

KPMG has been appointed to conduct the sale which is already attracting interest, says Yeoman. B&G says it will be business as usual until a buyer is found..