Used Cat Market Going Forward

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by rabbi

Afterall this was no unexpected freak storm in the Med, this was a strong hurricane in a hurricane prone area during hurricane

Spot on.

If you have an existing production cat slot in the next year or two you may get an offer to delay delivery in exchange for an incentive payment (sell your slot).

[SV Coronado]

Originally Posted by tmccaffery

As far as ordering more new boats, it took almost nine months from signing a purchase agreement until our boat was actually delivered to the base it operates from. So, I just don't see how ordering more boats from R&C is going to get them delivered any faster without them expanding their plant & etc., which takes time and money. The bottom line is that the only way Moorings / Sunsail can re-stock their fleet in Tortola beyond what is already scheduled to go there from current production is to convince people that have purchased boats that have not been delivered yet to shift them from the base they wanted to have their boat at to Tortola. This may be a hard sale, although the contract gives Moorings / Sunsail the right to shift boats around. However, the delivery / re-delivery ports are defined in the contract. So, theoretically, a boat under contract could be re-allocated to Tortola, but would have to be re-delivered at the contract port.

I would not be surprised if Moorings/Sunsail starts buying all the salvagable boats in the area, fixing them up and putting them into charter. They have the resources to hire full-time fiberglass and diesel experts to do the work. After all, these are charter boats, they don't have to be perfect or cross an ocean. They made end up with more monohulls then they had previously, but at least they won't have to turn away customers that want to cruise the BVIs. Fixing every salvage they can get their hands on will at least give them boats to charter until the new orders arrive.

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by JDavison

I would not be surprised if Moorings/Sunsail starts buying all the salvagable boats in the area, fixing them up and putting them into charter. They have the resources to hire full-time fiberglass and diesel experts to do the work. After all, these are charter boats, they don't have to be perfect or cross an ocean. They made end up with more monohulls then they had previously, but at least they won't have to turn away customers that want to cruise the BVIs. Fixing every salvage they can get their hands on will at least give them boats to charter until the new orders arrive.

Yup. Better than letting go of the revenue-weeks.

If you're right anyone who can run a grinder or roll out resin might get themselves at least to STT if they don't already have a BVI work permit in hand.

Hopefully Sir Branson will get the work permit concept suspended for 6-12 months under his plan in order to maximize the rebuilding labor force. IMO this is not the time to limit the output to Belongers. The more helping hands the better.

[rabbi]

Originally Posted by JDavison

I would not be surprised if Moorings/Sunsail starts buying all the salvagable boats in the area, fixing them up and putting them into charter. They have the resources to hire full-time fiberglass and diesel experts to do the work. After all, these are charter boats, they don't have to be perfect or cross an ocean. They made end up with more monohulls then they had previously, but at least they won't have to turn away customers that want to cruise the BVIs. Fixing every salvage they can get their hands on will at least give them boats to charter until the new orders arrive.

That approach may be viable for the smaller charter companies. They may be flexible enough to do this but most likely unable to raise the funds required for this.

Sunsail/Moorings on the other side are big professional business. They have a defined business model that they follow, and your approach doesn't seem to fit.
First they don't own any of the boats in the fleet and second they are in the premium market, with relatively new boats.
They can't just buy cheap boats and rent out fixed up trash.

[Red Herring]

Originally Posted by tmccaffery

As far as ordering more new boats, it took almost nine months from signing a purchase agreement until our boat was actually delivered to the base it operates from. So, I just don't see how ordering more boats from R&C is going to get them delivered any faster without them expanding their plant & etc., which takes time and money.

From what I've heard, they have already started to expand their operations to address the pending back log. I don't have details, but that's what I hear so far.

[nwdiver]

I don't think many companies will increase thier plants by much for a bubble, what do you do with the space and talent when things normalize in 2-3 years?

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by SecondBase

Hopefully Sir Branson will get the work permit concept suspended for 6-12 months under his plan in order to maximize the rebuilding labor force. IMO this is not the time to limit the output to Belongers. The more helping hands the better.

US waived the Jones Act this morning for Puerto Rico which means foreign vessels with foreign crews can work directly on the relief effort. Similar, prompt flexibility can also help Great Britain's territories recover.

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, tmccaffery.

Interesting contribution.

[PhiSig1071]

Originally Posted by nwdiver

I don't think many companies will increase thier plants by much for a bubble, what do you do with the space and talent when things normalize in 2-3 years?

If you rent the space, you stop. If you hired the workers, you lay them off. Happens all the time. An argument could be made to watch out for the quality of work coming out of the big three for the next few years.

[rabbi]

Originally Posted by PhiSig1071

If you rent the space, you stop. If you hired the workers, you lay them off. Happens all the time. An argument could be made to watch out for the quality of work coming out of the big three for the next few years.

I have to disagree.

Scaling a professional operation like the big three cat builders is not that easy. At least FP and Lagoon (but I guess Leopard as well) have very controlled environments to produce their boats:
Big workshops with cranes, moulds, infusion systems, airconditioning and humidity control, air exhaust systems with filters, watertanks and spray areas for leak tests, etc. Nothing you can hire for a year or two.

Maybe they can hire more workers temporarily and do another shift per day. But you still have cure times, so this does not result in a linear increase in output.
If they do speed things up quality will certainly suffer.

If it was that easy they would have done so before for their favorite models. They already had up to 2 year lead times for some models before Irma arrived on the scene.


Interesting to see that Irma had no significant impact on FP stock price. Maybe because the larger charter fleets are only Leopards these days (Mooring / Sunsail)?

[SV Coronado]

DYC looks like they have plans in place to be up and fully running soon. I wonder if they have ordered other new boat models besides Lagoon 52s, Bali 4.5 catamarans, Dufour 520 and Sun Odyssey 519 monohulls.

Update from Dream Yacht Charter | Cruising World

[MountainKing]

Dream Yacht posted an update on the current situation and their plans to address it.
Update from Dream Yacht Charter | Cruising World

[nwdiver]

Originally Posted by PhiSig1071

If you rent the space, you stop. If you hired the workers, you lay them off. Happens all the time. An argument could be made to watch out for the quality of work coming out of the big three for the next few years.

Ahh.......you don't know much about French labour law......you are hired and trained for life, sort of more or less.......the USA it's not.....

[SV Coronado]

Wiley lives and is a yacht broker in the USVIs, so I'm sure he has better information then folks trying to assess the situation from afar.

https://youtu.be/Ih93XSTX1k0

[Red Herring]

A somewhat different take on the situation...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih93XSTX1k0