Built for the Future Maine boat industry, state join forces in attempt to grow

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Take a glance across any coastal harbor in Maine and there’s a good chance the boats you see were built somewhere close by.

It won’t matter if it’s a working boat or pleasure, wooden or fiberglass, motor or sail, canoe or kayak. Anything from the smallest rowboat to a 100-foot-plus luxury sailboat might have been built at a Maine boatyard.

Maine builders have been building boats here since 1607, when reportedly The Virginia became the first ship built in the Western Hemisphere, and they have continued, through good times and bad, for four centuries.

Maine is a boat-building state.

So why not just say so? That’s the strategy behind a new initiative by the state and the boat-building industry. The cooperative effort has launched a new nonprofit company called Maine Built Boats, whose goal is to build on the state’s boat-building heritage and reputation and to market Maine-built boats as a brand in an effort to attract new clients for individual boat builders around the state.

Maine Built Boats is launching its marketing effort, complete with a logo, in an effort to carve out a new niche for Maine’s industry and capture a larger piece of the U.S. and international markets.

“Our purpose is to raise the profile of the boat-building industry, as an industry, outside the state in hopes of increasing exposure and bringing in new clients,” said Paul Rich, president of Maine Built Boats.

Much of Maine Built Boats’ effort will be focused on trade shows, and the most likely area for initial success, Rich said, is the international arena.

“We haven’t penetrated that market very far and right now there is a very attractive currency exchange rate, especially in Europe,” he said.

The company’s efforts also will target East Coast markets such as Boston, Philadelphia and New York, where potential clients have easy access to Maine.

The collaborative effort will bolster what is, by all accounts, already a healthy industry that has kept boatyards throughout the state bustling.

“People are doing pretty good,” said Susan Swanton, executive director of the Maine Marine Trades Association, which represents boat builders and associated marine businesses.

“I’m not hearing any of my builders say that they don’t have work this winter. People are doing OK,” Swanton said. There are now about 450 Maine companies involved in marine trades – boat building and auxiliary industries ranging from sail making to electronics to marine engines – that employ nearly 5,000 people statewide. Although there are few new boatyards being established, existing yards are building bigger boats and more of them, Swanton said, and are employing more Maine craftsmen to do that work.

According to a 2003 Maine Department of Labor study, the number of employees at boatyards more than doubled between 1980 and 2000. Although that growth has slowed some in the last few years, the trend has continued into the 21st century.

Most boatyards are small companies employing fewer than 10 workers. The industry is mainly located along the coast with the highest concentration of boat-building employment centered in Hancock County within a geographic triangle encompassing Southwest Harbor, Brooklin and Ellsworth.

Though many Maine companies already have worldwide reputations, all Maine boat builders are competing in a global market against companies that don’t necessarily have the same types of wage and tax structures or the stringent environmental standards that Maine has.

“We’re competing against a lot of national companies who have a lot of backing from their governments,” said John Kachmar, president of Wilbur Yachts in Southwest Harbor. Kachmar was in on the early discussion that led to the creation of Maine Built Boats and serves on its board of directors.

“We need to work together to market Maine-built boats,” Kachmar said. “Maine boat builders have always played their cards tight to their chests and haven’t shared a lot of information. But we’re working in more of a global environment now and we need to do what we can to bring clients to the state of Maine.”

The idea for a collaboration between the state and the industry developed after author Nigel Calder presented the state with information about a similar effort in New Zealand.

According to Rich of Maine Built Boats, boat sales in New Zealand between 1989 and 1999 increased from about $20 million to $200 million as a result of that branding effort.

Gov. John Baldacci and Jack Cashman, commissioner for economic and community development, backed the idea and brought together a small group of boat builders from around the state who began to craft an alliance that could support the industry. Although a formal announcement came in March, Maine Built Boats was not officially incorporated and approved for nonprofit status until this summer.

No one expects the new company to generate the kinds of revenue gains seen in New Zealand, mainly because the state’s industry is starting at a much higher level than they were, Rich said.

“We’re at about $600 million in annual sales now,” he said. “We think we can increase that to $1 billion within 10 years.”

Attracting more customers to boat builders has a trickle-down effect, Rich said, and will benefit other related industries such as marine electronics, engine repairs, sail making, rigging and the service component. And more business means more jobs, many of which will be driven by new technologies such as the collaborative efforts using composite materials between Hodgdon Yachts and the University of Maine. That effort has led to a U.S. Navy contract for the boatyard to design and build a prototype for a high-speed special operations boat.

“We want to develop good solid jobs that need that kind of technological expertise; that’s where we want to see the industry go,” said Elaine Scott, Department of Economic and Community Development marketing director and a Maine Built Boats board member. “The goal is not only to create more jobs, but to create better jobs as well. We need to make sure we continue to identify areas where we can continue to compete and lead in the area of boat building.”

Initial membership in the new company included some of the better-known names in Maine boat building, including Hinckley, Morris Yachts, Lyman Morse, Sabre Yachts, Hodgdon Brothers and Brooklin Boat Yard, among others. From there, membership has increased to about 40 members and interest is growing.

Creating an awareness of Maine as a boat-building capital will benefit all boat builders in the state, whether they are building fishing boats or luxury yachts, sailboats or canoes. It will benefit the larger, well-established companies who already know how to market themselves, as well as the smaller yards, Scott said. There will be opportunities for small yards to grow their businesses, if they want to, she said.

“It’s going to help the smaller guy to become bigger and stronger and to be represented in a national and international market,” Scott said. “This is going to put a lot of new names on the map.”