Thank God you put that thing in the water...I was getting worried.

Its been in the water more than a couple of times Jake. I just never talk about it, nothing more nothing less.

Matt how do these two statements square up, what type of boats are selling well?

Hobie seem to be selling two distinct models, the racing boats (Tiger FX1 etc) and the leisure boats (Wave, Getaway etc).

I will hazard a guess that it is the leisure models that are selling well, This squares with your other statement that Kayak sales are up, you only sell leisure orientated (plastic) Kayaks.

Work somewhere between 40 and 55 Hrs a week, cover 24/7 one week in 7 - Travel 3 hrs a day. Work some weekends and evenings from home when needed. Pay could be better, job could be better, but I work in Investment banking and it is expected to put the time and effort in.

Does pay for boats and cars mind....

40 Hrs/wk - 120 hours of PTO per year.

I get enough vacation I think, however I can't possible devote all of it to sailing. Take a day off here and there and its amazing how quickly it accumulates.

It always seems like the wind dies out on the weekends around here too.

First of all, I'm impressed by the general knowledge of our group; we've got some pretty impressive readers of information here.

Second, to Matt's point on the sales: I'm the administrator for our Hobie Fleet and this year I've already got at least five requests from perspective members to find them a boat. I try to match them with good used boats whenever I can.

From my perspective, I agree with those members that think there is not enough free time. Double income earners are the norm, and this is a very time consuming sport. Plus, it is harder to find a beach to sail now; Our litigous environment has certainly started putting up roadblocks on anyone trying to have fun.

I see so many positives, though. Besides the interest in cat sailing in my area increasing, our recently formed (last year) J22 Fleet in Buffalo has just balooned to over 33 boats!

I see the glass half full, so I'll just top if off by adding ice.

America, what a wonderful country.

P.S. Timbo. I won't have my job replaced by someone for 10 cents an hour. I worked hard and committed to retiring at the age of 55; I'll never own a million dollar mansion on the waterfront, but I'm very happy doing the things I do; sailing, teaching skiing, working for my sailing fleet, and helping manage our little ski village.

Wyatt

Terrible irony ,-typical EU reads an article and refers to the author as a {wishfull thinker} ,--"HE IS not dealing with REALITY" -he declares --per post below ---the terrible irony is a rejected Euro mainland continent in decline ,the realities that involves ,and grave danger they are facing in the near future .
EU responce ,--is the typical anti-Americanisms and to promote the EU model 30 hour work week and themselves as {{noble fencers }} in a supposed utopian socialistic sailing heaven .


Some realities-- EU declining population--unasimilaed minority populations, largely muslim , failing socialistic systems ,--large unemployment rates ,-overburdened elitist burocracies and bloated impotent beaurocrates ,-its total inability to defend itself militarily ,-there is no real EURO Force OF ANY MILITARY CONSEQUENCE-,all this and much more in an age of rapid global change of historic proportion the EU can only respond with socialistic Pavlovian type reaction that could only emit from a protected people unaware of the TRADGIC realities that will soon become apparent if not already apparent to most .

For those concerned about the US -It is often said that the US system of democracy and basic human freedom based on individual rights is the worst possible ,--that is until it is realistically compared to any other . .-

here is todays article by VDH

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June 10, 2005, 7:47 a.m.
The Global Shift

Radical global power shifts have been common throughout history. For almost a millennium (800-100 BC) the Greek East, with its proximity to wealthy Asia and African markets and a dynamic Hellenism, was the nexus of Western civilization — before giving way to Rome and the western Mediterranean.


Yet by A.D. 300 the Greek-speaking half of the empire, more distant from northern European tribal attacks, proved the more resolute. It would endure for over 1,000 years while the fragmented West fell into chaos.

And then yet again the pendulum shifted back. The Renaissance was the product of Florence, Venice, and Rome as the Byzantine East was worn out by its elemental struggles with Islam and straitjacketed by an increasingly rigid Orthodoxy and top-heavy imperial regime.

But by 1600 the galley states of the Western Mediterranean were to lose their restored primacy for good, as to the north the ocean-going galleons of the Atlantic port nations — England, France, Holland, Portugal, and Spain — usurped commerce and monopolized the new trans-oceanic trade routes to Asia and the New World.

By the time of the industrial revolution, another radical shift had occurred in influence and power. The northern European states of England, France, and Germany, products of the Enlightenment, with sizable Protestant populations, outpaced both the old classical powers of the Mediterranean and the Spanish empire. And in early 20th century, the United States, benefiting from the Anglo tradition of transparency and the rule of law — combined with a unique constitution, exploding population, and vast resources — displaced the old European colonial empires and stood down the supposed new future of Soviet totalitarianism.

Globalization and technology, of course, can speed up these shifts and accomplish in a few years what used to transpire over centuries. We are told that a third of the planet, the two billion in China and India, is now moving at a breakneck pace with market reforms to remake the world. The old idea of a “population bomb” of too many people and too few resources has been turned upside down: The key is not how many people reside in a country but rather what those people do. A billion under a Marxist regime leads to terrible human waste and starvation; a billion in a market economy is actually advantageous — as seemingly endlessly active minds and arms flood the world with cheap consumer goods and rebuild a decaying infrastructure from the ground up.

Europe — high unemployment, layers of bureaucracy slow growth, unsustainable entitlements, ethnic and religious tensions, shrinking populations, unresponsive central governments — is often juxtaposed with Asia, as if its sun is setting just as the East’s is once again rising.

So far the European Union’s decision not to spend on defense; its inherited infrastructure and protocols; and its commitment to the rule of law keep the continent seemingly prosperous. It has some breathing space to decide whether it will reemerge as a rising power or be relegated to a curious museum for cash-laden tourists from Asia and America.

Somewhere between these poles is the United States. Pessimists point out that we increasingly don’t create the cars we drive, the phones we used, or mirabile dictu, soon the food we eat. High budget deficits, trade imbalances, enormous national debt, and growing military expenditures will supposedly take their toll at last, as pampered Americans consume what by the new global rules they don’t quite earn.

Optimists counter with their own set of statistics and point out that immigration and religion have ensured a steady if not rising population. Unemployment, interest rates, and inflation are low, and alone in the world America has an amazing resiliency and flexibility to fashion citizens and a single culture out of diverse races and religions. It also, of course, enjoys a unique constitution and laws that provide freedom without license.

We seem to enjoy the best of both worlds, symbolized by our two coasts that look on both east and west. Our European traditions ensure the rule of law and the vibrancy of Western civilization. Yet decades ago, unlike the EU, we understood the Asian challenge and kept our markets open and our economy free, often requiring great dislocation and painful adjustment. The result is that for all our bickering, we continue to remain competitive and flexible in a way Europe does not.

If we have avoided the state socialism of Europe that stymies growth, we have also already passed through all the contradictions of a breakneck capitalist transition — the dislocation of rural people, industrial pollution, unionization, suburban blues, ubiquitous graft, and petty bribery — that will increasingly plague both India and China as they leave the 18th century and enter the 21st.

But the real question is how both China and India, nuclear and arming, will translate their newfound economic clout and cash into a geopolitical role. If internal politics and protocols are any barometer of foreign policy, it should be an interesting show. We mostly welcome the new India — nuclear, law-abiding, and English-speaking — onto the world stage. It deserves a permanent seat on the Security Council and a close alliance with the United States.

China, however, is a very different story — a soon-to-be grasping Soviet Union-like superpower without any pretense of Marxist egalitarianism. Despite massive cash reserves and ongoing trade surpluses, it violates almost every international commercial protocol from copyright law to patents. It won’t discuss Tibet, and it uses staged domestic unrest to send warnings to Taiwan and Japan that their regional options will increasingly be limited by Beijing.

China could rein in Kim Jong Il tomorrow. But it derives psychological satisfaction from watching Pyongyang’s nuclear roguery stymie Japan and the United States. China’s foreign policy in the Middle East, Central and South America, and Southeast Asia is governed by realpolitik of the 19th-century American stripe, without much concern for the type of government or the very means necessary to supply its insatiable hunger for resources. The government that killed 50 million of its own has not really been repudiated and its present successor follows the same old practice of jailing dissidents and stamping out freedom. When and how its hyper-capitalist economy will mandate the end of a Communist directorate is not known.

The world has been recently flooded with media accounts that U.S. soldiers may have dropped or at least gotten wet a few Korans. Abu Ghraib, we are told, is like the Soviet gulag — the death camp of millions. Americans are routinely pilloried abroad because they liberated Iraq, poured billions into the reconstruction, and jumpstarted democracy there — but were unable to do so without force and the loss of civilian life.

This hysteria that the world’s hyper-power must be perfect or is it is no good is in dire contrast to the treatment given to China. Yet Pavlovian anti-Americanism may soon begin to die down as the Chinese increasingly flex their muscles on the global stage and the world learns better their methods of operation.

So far they have been given a pass on three grounds: the old Third World romance accorded to Mao’s Marxist legacy; the Chinese role as a counterweight to the envied power of the United States; and the silent admission that the Chinese, unlike the Americans, are a little crazy and thus unpredictable in their response to moral lecturing. Americans apologize and scurry about when an EU or U.N. official remonstrates; in contrast, a Chinese functionary is apt to talk about sending off a missile or two if they don’t shut up.

The Patriot Act to a European is proof of American illiberality in a way that China’s swallowing Tibet or jailing and executing dissidents is not. America’s support for Saudi Arabia is proof of our hypocrisy in not severing ties with an undemocratic government, while few care that a country with leaders who traverse the globe in Mao suits cuts any deal possible with fascists and autocrats for oil, iron ore, and food.

Yes, we are witnessing one of the great transfers of power and influence that have traditionally changed civilization itself, as money, influence, and military power are gradually inching away from Europe. And this time the shake-up is not regional but global. While scholars and economists concentrate on its economic and political dimensions, few have noticed how a new China and an increasingly vulnerable Europe will markedly change the image of the United States.

As nations come to know the Chinese, and as a ripe Europe increasingly cannot or will not defend itself, the old maligned United States will begin to look pretty good again. More important, America will not be the world’s easily caricatured sole power, but more likely the sole democratic superpower that factors in morality in addition to national interest in its treatment of others.

China is strong without morality; Europe is impotent in its ethical smugness. The buffer United States, in contrast, believes morality is not mere good intentions but the willingness and ability to translate easy idealism into hard and messy practice.

Most critics will find such sentiments laughable or naïve; but just watch China in the years to come. Those who now malign the imperfections of the United States may well in shock whimper back, asking for our friendship. Then the boutique practice of anti-Americanism among the global elite will come to an end.

— Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.

Have not got the time at the moment for a long reply, but I agree that mainland EU is in trouble as is the Euro.

However, it looks like the UK is doing OK. Yes we have some serious problems with out current Govt (I for one cannot believe that Blair actually pulled off a 3rd term) and their "Tax and waste" plans. The UK appears to be doing ok dispite the Blair administration !

Wyatt - if you find a place on the water for only a million, you'd better pass - it's a "fixer-upper." Real estate is insane right now. Realtors around here say prices have been going up 4-5% per month since the hurricane. No wonder people are working harder for less.

Good news about your fleet - keep it up!

I'll add a few more comments on the issue to address some other points.

When I was a kid, my brother and I played sports (Lacrosse, wrestling), but those were not the all time consuming efforts that kids sport have become these days. Even with games and practices there was plenty of Sunday afternoons with the whole family and a packed dinner on the family boat. Nowadays involvement in sports seems to take up more than that - if you're involved in the sports there are skills camps and tournaments and a whole lot more devoted to the idea that each kid is going to be a soccer star. I know of families that spend the whole weekend traveling from one game to another, and then even to games their kids aren't playing in so they watch other teams play and learn from observing. As a new parent I have to admit to worrying about how to balance all that - I think sports involvement is a great thing for kids to learn a lot of life skills through, but there seems to be a loss of balance these days. I want to have Sunday afternoons with the family on the boat and a packed dinner again...

Matt - I was thinking about your comment regarding the kayaks, and that sparked another thought. At the last couple of Annapolis Sailboat Shows, Hobie seems to be more of a kayak company than a sailboat company, even at the sailboat show. The kayaks are out front, the cats are few, and the sales staff seem to have a dismal understanding of the local catamaran scene. It's been very disappointing. However, I must admit I have no idea how many boats they sell from that show. I do know that nobody I know of has shown up to the local clubs saying they just bought a new Hobie and are looking for like minded individuals. But the real reason for me to bring this up for this discussion on boat sales is the realization that, for all the boats I have or have had, the ONLY ones I've bought new were kayaks.

Other folks comments about work hours - I can say that work hours affect my ability to get on the water. Weekends aren't off limits, and the week is rarely only 40 hours. I get 3 weeks of vacation a year, but frequently I lose one of those because I don't get to use it due to delivery deadlines and I can only carry one week over to the new year. I'm not the only one, and this isn't in pursuit of the ultimate corporate prestige job. It's simply doing what's required to get the regular job done, and seems to be becoming the work culture these days.

And water access again - water access is tight, but there are launch areas. But again for the power boat versus sailboat, trailering is much easier with a power boat. Once you get to a size with sailboats that ballast and keels become an issue, you're stuck with putting the boat in a slip. Slips that can handle keelboats with their depth or multis with their width are not cheap. I think this is another reason sailboat sales on the whole are losing to powerboats.

I can tell you that we are selling recreational sailing and ALWAYS HAVE. Even when racing was BIG in the 80's, racing accounted for less than 10% of our sales. Entry level and recreational is where it is at. We knew, in the early 90s, that we needed to re-build the market place. That is where the Wave came in. Now the Getaway and Bravo AND Kayak sail rigs. We sell TONS of sail kits for our kayaks and that is bringing new blood into sailing too. Our sales are up... I think we made good choices as to what to concentrate on. Kayak sales are driving the company these days. That is where the big sales are. The MirageDrive has once again placed Hobie Cat on top of a market, or at least put us on the path.

By the way... we re-introduced the 17 due to pressure by Hobie 17 racers. So, who buys them now? Recreational sailors something like 4 to 1... they are mostly selling as Sports. (Ooops... not this year... SEs outselling Sports again!)

Yeah, I'll have to admit the MirageDrive is pretty facking cool, I love it. And the fishing kayak you have... brilliant!

When the Euro was valued at 80 % of the US$ it was said that it was in trouble

When the Euro was valued at 134 % of the US$ it was said that it was in trouble

Now that the Euro is valued at 122 % of the US$ it is again said that it is in trouble


At least you guys are consistant.

What ever is linked to the identifier "Euro" must be in trouble for that fact alone.

Well if that makes you guys happy then I think it is harmless enough.

Now Blair thinks that the mainland is now ready for some far stretching free market thinking and an economic model like the UK. If that makes him happy then I think it is harmless enough as well. In 7 months time he will know better.

There are alot of rumour around about the No votes, sadly none touch on the real reasons.

For the Dutch it was the trouble with the stability pact, the powerplay by the big nations (we don't want to loose our veto power) and the fact that we're paying millions of Euro's to EU (and UK in particular) and get nothing in return. (in UK case we get a thankless 5th colomnist). That and the fact that many are tired that our politicians are selling us down stream to lobby groups and big corporations. The people have different idea's about Europe than the policy makers have and this was one of the times when such a view could be expressed. In general, people care less about free markets and open borders than about the benefits of a social-democratic society. In france a few other points were involved as well; most having to do with market liberalisation and the cutting of state social programs.

Wouter

Wouter: the resons you listed for the no vote to the EU constitution is about the same why Norway have stayed out of the EU (even if we also pay some billions as danegeld to the EU). Ditto on the politicians and the free market theories.
I dont understand why Carl saw a reason to rant on about the EU, in a thread about decline in boat sales in the U.S? Hurt feelings?

Also have to agree on the fact that europeans and people from the U.S can communicate, but that we do have a different set of opinions and values.

Kayaking has become really big up here as well, but I have yet to see a kayak with a sailrig.

Rolf,
Check out the link, pretty nice boat kits from these guys.

http://www.clcboats.com/boats/sailrig.php/cart_id=b2aece4e0ba65309d08d10c5e2d9bef7/

Wouter,

Please get your facts right.

The highest contributors to the EU coffers are Germany,

Then the UK (the figure below is including the rebate, we pay 5.something before the rebate). I think you will find that none of the NL Euro is going to the UK.

Then the Netherlands



(image from the BBC)

A post on sailing... Now who's the smart butt that put this in here.

Take a look at the Hobie Sail rig on a Hobie Mirage Kayak.

Hobie Kayak Sail

Thanks guys, nice pictures and the CLC trimaran kit is a cool thing in my opinion (I know CLC very well, I have buildt a Chesapeake 18 from their plans, and was pondering a Pax 20 for a time as well but could not find the 3mm plywood).

What I meant tough, is that I have never seen anybody _use_ a sailrig on a kayak, and I live in a kayaking hotspot. Perhaps it's becouse it's a bit hard to do an eskimo roll with a sailrig attached. And we all know about the need to seal the mast, right?

Nice one dingram, next thing you know, people will be talking about why US sail boat sales might be down!