posted 01-19-2002 03:04 PM ET (US)            

The pockets also look deep enough to contain the entire trim tab itelf, thus hiding them from damage, too. This should make boarding by a swim ladder much easier, as a swimmer will not have to manuever around the tabs.

posted 01-20-2002 10:20 AM ET (US)            

As far as the elliptical design on the dash, you can see similar design elements in the recent walkaround offerings from Grady-White, Scout, and others.

posted 01-20-2002 11:49 AM ET (US)            

But when he does, you can bet it ain't gonna be pretty.

Tsuriki

posted 01-21-2002 08:40 AM ET (US)            

Looks like the draft is significant, based on the boot stripe. Probably rides better then the older boats, if my experience on a friends new 21' last fall is any indicator.
I also like the addition of the trim tab pockets

posted 01-21-2002 03:37 PM ET (US)         

Anyone take one or the other out for a test run?

LHG "to late"! For what!

The BW's sales money is flowing into the Brunswick coffers.

At recent major boat shows reports from all Brunswick and Genmar boat groups are reporting record breaking sales.

You might want to step into the new century LHG.

This doesn't mean I am thrilled at all with this direction of design, I am just a realist.

posted 01-21-2002 06:45 PM ET (US)         

But Sorcerer has his/her facts wrong, whoever this person may be. There is NO boat company right now reporting record sales, including Brunswick & Boston Whaler. Sad but true. New boat sales across the industry are off between 12-20% compared to last year, and engine sales are also off, all evidenced by the many zero finance deals and discounts out there. See the last 6 months of news reports on Boatbiz.com for details. The market for good used boats, including Whalers, is better than the new boat market.

In addition, the year of a boat hull has nothing to do with it's design excellence, it's performance, or stepping into the 21st century. Most new cars, and most outboard engines, are designed better than their predecessors. Not true with some boats and buildings, at all. It should always be, but it's not.

On this Cetacea Page 49, compare the 1992 cabin Whaler with the 2002 cabin Whaler. In my opinion, the 1992 model is a much better looking design, and a higher quality boat.
This should not be, since it's 10 years old, belonging to the previous century! The true "realist" looks at design quality, vs purchase price, and then makes a decision. The year of the hull is often irrelevent. Some will prefer the 92 model, some will prefer the '02 model. Neither person is right or wrong, nor out of date.

posted 01-22-2002 12:37 PM ET (US)         

quote:

---

"This was a record New York Boat Show experience ... our best NY show in 34 years," said Mike Usina, Silverton sales and marketing director.

SURFSIDE 3, a Sea Ray and Boston Whaler dealer sold a total of 206 boats, according to the dealership's Matthew Barbara.

In addition, Bryan Seti of the Yamaha WaterCraft Group said sales were up over last year.

---

quote:

---

"Sales are up. Attendance is up," said Northwest Marine Trade Association (NMTA) President Michael Campbell. "It shows that people are looking forward to 2002 and are putting 2001 behind them, and they plan on boating in 2002." NMTA is the producer of the Seattle Boat Show.

Eticket sales on www.seattleboatshow.com are up 26 percent from last year. "We've strengthened our marketing in all areas but particularly our marketing for Etickets and our Web site," said Boat Show Director George Harris.

As of day seven, attendance is up compared to last year and dealers said their sales are also up, according to NMTA.

---

posted 01-22-2002 01:48 PM ET (US)            

Practically all photographs that you see published, here, in print, on the net, or anywhere else, with the exception of the "home-page" internet sites of the most novice users, have been retouched. Here is a rather famous photograph of a Whaler 16 from an early catalogue that is obviously retouched: http://continuouswave.com/whaler/reference/16-17/images/hull16Early512x280.jpeg

I am sure an expert eye will notice how the anchor rode ends in mid air and that the hull reflections in the waves consists of scribed lines without me mentioning that.

As for your charge that the photographs I have published here appear to be "surreal" or contain questionable effects, you will have to be more specific.

I have also gone to the trouble of explicitly pointing out minor problems in the reproduced photos (such as the pinkish tint to the gelcoat) to avoid any misrepresentation.

So if you are attempting to instill the notion that the pictures are "doctored up" to portray the boat in some unflattering way, you are venturing far off base.

posted 01-22-2002 03:26 PM ET (US)         

It's obvious you are in the industry, with probable relationships to Brunswick, which is fine. We've been hoping for some time that someone from Whaler would participate, but not as a mystery "plant". But I don't need or appreciate your personal cheap shots, and your comments about the photos, and the moderator's work, are completely out of line. It's YOUR business that seems to doctor the photos from what I have been seeing. In my opinion, I think JimH is doing a pretty fine job with this website. It is one of the best, if not THE best, out there. If you do have a relationship with Boston Whaler and it's dealers, you're not doing them any favors with your comments here.

In support of my post regarding the overall condition of the boating industry, here are a few lines from Brunswick's most recent Annual Report to Stockholders, dated Novemeber 13, 2001:

Under the CONSOLIDATED section:

"The Company reported net sales of $811.0 million in the third quarter of 2001, down 13.6% from a year ago..... Excluding acquisitions, sales declined 16.5% and 11.9% for the quarter and year to date period respectively.... but was mainly attributable to lower sales in the Boat and Marine Engine segments. (Remember Brunswick also sells Bowling and exercise equipment, etc)

MARINE ENGINE SEGMENT

"Marine engine segment sales declined 12.5% in the 3rd quarter of 2001...... Production rates were reduced across the board in the segment, but most significantly for sterndrive engines at approximately 34%.....

BOAT SEGMENT

"....quarterly and year-to-date sales declined 26.0 percent and 19.6 percent, repsectively. The continued weak demand for small boats was a leading cause for the decline in both periods, although demand for larger boats also weakened significantly in the third quarter."

I believe that Brunswick's situation is not much different from the others in this industry, including the Japanese firms.

posted 01-22-2002 08:25 PM ET (US)            

ANONYMITY: It is fine with me if users remain anonymous. For all I know we might have Hillary Clinton posting here; if she wants to remain anonymous that is perfectly all right with me... maybe that was a bad example. You get the idea, I am sure.

SLANTED COVERAGE: Since I am the Moderator, I try to remain...moderate. I do make an effort to rein in any personal views on certain subjects. A user complained the FORUM was "anti-Mercury." If that perception exists it is not because I try to slant it that way. In my own case I own a Mercury engine and have had practically nothing but good things to say about it (which would be seen by a careful review of the many postings I have made).

In the case of this new boat, I am really surprised at the reaction. My own personal reaction is far more ambivalent than that of some of the respondents.

INTEGRITY OF PHOTOGRAPHS: I take particular interest in the presentation of the photographs, which I think, on the whole, are quite well done (to award myself a complement). I have angered some folks who have sent me some images that I have not used. I try to be somewhat selective in picking photos to use, and in almost every case, the photos have been cropped, rotated, had exposure correction, had distracting background elements removed or defocused, had details enhanced, etc. But in the process of all this I don't think there was ever anything done that really altered the content or the perception of the content of the photographs as far as the boats contained in them.

I don't make boats wider or lower or longer or taller than they really are. I don't move things on the boat around in the pictures. The pictures are representative of their subjects.

I also have to work with what I get, I don't have the luxury of commissioning a photo session. Many years ago I worked in the marketing department of a manufacturer of electronic instrumentation that was often used in steel mills and other such heavy industrial locations. We hired a former heavy weight boxing World Champion and did a photo shoot with him, taking almost one thousand images. From these we selected one or two which we used in display advertising, promoting our product as "a heavy weight."

I mention this because it illustrates how much careful selection goes into the choice of images used in paid advertisements. We had a thousand pictures of this guy, yet only one or two gave us the "look" we wanted.

And to respond to the notion that retouching is somehow inappropriate, even acclaimed masters of photography like Ansel Adams used techniques of the darkroom to enhance their images. Photographs of nature were slightly modified by the hand of man to improve them. I have never heard anyone complain that a certain image of El Capitan would have been better if the publisher had just not used a little dodge and burn in the darkroom.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS: I try to respect intellectual property rights, but I do not believe that I have to ask permission to reproduce an image that was taken at a public place. For example, at a University of Michigan football game there are 108,000 people in the crowd whose images are being reproduced and transmitted in the commercial broadcast of the game (for the multi-million dollar profit of the producers). It would be ludicrous to assert that a television network would have to obtain permission from all of these people to use their images. Similarly, if you stick a boat on display in front of your marina, I don't think I have to ask permission to photograph it. And if I did, you would probably need to inform me of that.

For example, if you attend an NHL hockey game at Joe Louis Arena you will be informed that spectators may not take pictures of the game with cameras that employ a lens with a focal length greater than 50-some millimeters. (I am not kidding.) The presenters of the event, the Red Wings and the NHL have conspicuously posted such a warning at all entrances to their venue. I don't think you will see such notices at Boston Whaler dealers anytime soon.

There is a beautiful building in downtown Detroit (I know that is hard to believe) and upon entering it you are informed that photography is forbidden. Very well, I put my camera away when I enter the Guardian Building, probably to their ultimate loss.

I may have gone to extremes here with a rant about intellectual property rights, but I have recently become aware of what is more or less a "movement" on the part of the large corporations to try to suppress the rights to "fair use" of intellectual property. In the digital world, perfect copyright protection is possible ( Cf. Windows-XP), and corporations seem hell-bent on trying to extract rights they never held before from the public. A recent court case stopped the distribution of a cinema movie because an artist argued that it contained a scene in which there was a chair that looked like a chair he had sketched in a drawing. Look for that in the constitution.

OK, enough. Let us get back to what we do here so well, discuss boating and Boston Whaler boats. That is the real purpose of this website. There are not hidden agendas.

posted 01-22-2002 10:30 PM ET (US)            

I do about six trade shows a year (different market), for the last twenty years, in Europe and the USA. It's common for press to ask how business is...I don't think I've ever heard some marketing or sales guy say business is off this year at a show. They always have a positive statistic freely available to fill the air.

The guys are trying to stimulate a market and sales. The capacity to publicly discuss market woes is not in the gene pool of many saleguys. When they are fighting for free publicity inches in the post show press, they don't want the story to be about the slowness of the market, etc, etc.

But a look at the last quarter in the public financials of several boat builders and sellers....that's a taste of reality.

Citing a industry puff page (BI) doesn't add credibility. Those guys print press releases from marketers.

Thanks for the reality check, lhg.

posted 01-22-2002 10:47 PM ET (US)            

In my experience, no release or approval is required for things, for people it is more confusing. We always forced our ad subjects to sign releases. I don't know case law, but it seemed prudent.

For things, like the Conquest photo, you are collecting reflected light...it was hitting you and you passively collected it on film or on your ccd chip. There are lots of examples of this, even some seedy ones.