Maine boat building is big business, and it can be bigger. It now brings in over $650 million a year and it can do better. Thus far, most boats built in Maine are sold in New England. Some are sold in other states and only a few are sold internationally. Each builder does his own marketing, meaning promotion at boat shows and advertising in print. Nigel Calder, who has recently visited New Zealand, found their boat builders working cooperatively with substantial government help. Tim Hodgdon of Hodgdon Yachts in East Boothbay, set up a booth at the international boat show in Dusseldorf, Germany, to find he was competing with a government-subsidized combination of Dutch boat builders with a pavilion and a beer garden. Calder wrote our Governor Baldacci suggesting an association of Maine boat builders with Maine state assistance.
Representatives of ten boat builders met with the Department of Economic and Community Development to plan Maine Boat Builders, Inc. The Board of Directors consists of Paul Rich, President; Nigel Calder, and representatives of Hodgdon Yachts, Hinckley Yachts, Wilbur Yachts, Rockport Marine, Sabre Yachts, Maine Maritime Academy and two publications, Maine Boats & Harbors and Maine Coastal News. The organization will be incorporated under Maine law as a nonprofit corporation. It will not, itself, sell boats but will promote the sale of Maine-built boats of all sizes in Maine, nationally, and internationally. It will also include a wide variety of marine-related trades like designing, sailmaking, rigging, joinery, metal fabrication, motor mechanics and others too numerous to mention. It is the quality of Maine craftsmanship, not the size of the boat or the material of which it is built that is important. A 150-foot sloop, an elegant motor yacht, a lobster boat, or a state-of-the-art canoe — each represents Maine quality construction.
The group’s first goals are: 1) marketing, 2) sharing of information across the industry, 3) education, that is, the encouragement of a skilled work force in all marine trades, and 4) legal matters such as taxes on waterfront property and affordable housing near the shore.
You will soon see evidence of their activity. They will have a booth and an active presence at the Maine Boats & Harbors Boat Show in Rockland August 12-14. They will be at other American boat shows and hope to have a first class Maine exhibit at the International Boat Show in Dusseldorf in January 2006.
Membership and support are welcome from any who have an interest in any aspect of maritime life. Fishermen were the first European inhabitants of coastal Maine. Maine shipbuilders designed, built, sailed and navigated ships that established American commerce. Maine ships have fought in all our wars. Painters, sculptors, poets and novelists, artists in every medium, have been close to the sea. Even our language has a whiff of it. If we are taken aback, we try a new tack.
Before all the trees are cut down, the granite supplanted by concrete, the fish have no place to hide and gasoline prices scuttle the tourists, let us work together to build a strong Maine marine industry.