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In a recent poll conducted by Boating Industry and RBC Capital Markets, dealers said their No. 1 concern going into the 2011 season was rising fuel prices. However, fuel prices may not play as big a role as other economic factors. In August 2008, at the start of the recession and the height of the last spike in gas prices, ...

Dealer management systems were relatively primitive beasts back in 1983, when powersports dealer Hal Ethington set out to improve the efficiency of his business. In an effort to rethink the way he managed his parts department, Ethington hooked up with a software designer to create a system soon to be called Lightspeed. It essentially ordered and tracked parts and executed ...

The Web is always changing, and I’m sure Gordy’s online presence is as well. What new things are Gordy’s doing online? We are in the process of redoing our website. We should have a new site ready to launch this summer. Some of the areas that we are focusing on with the new site include more imagery, less text, more ...

Most marine dealerships sell accessories, but few treat this area of their business as the profit center and driver of foot traffic that it could become. To see profits rise in this segment, dealers must understand retail merchandising. Webster’s dictionary defines merchandising as “the planning and promotion of sales by presenting a product to the right market at the proper ...

In the early days of the Web, boat manufacturers were like most other businesses. They didn’t understand how to leverage the new medium’s potential, so they did what they knew, putting up specs and photos — the type of information customers might have picked up at a boat show or in a dealership. Basically, they used their websites as digital ...

As the Internet’s influence over consumers’ purchasing behavior continues to grow, marine dealerships that design their websites to maximize this opportunity have a distinct competitive advantage. With this in mind, Boating Industry magazine asked three of the marine market’s leading Internet experts to share the most important steps dealers can take to improve their websites. One of the most difficult ...

In this challenging market, more dealerships are putting a stronger emphasis on in-dealership meetings and training. “We are looking at each deal and meeting and analyzing it as if it were the only deal we have,” said Gary Ingman of Florida’s Ingman Marine. “We are learning from each one.” Here are 10 guidelines to help make your in-dealership meeting and ...

Ah, the joys of boat ownership. Whether the boater is cruising around a local lake, pulling skiers behind the craft or taking a multi-day ocean voyage, how the boat steers comprises an important part of the experience. The stereo system could be primo, the drinks frosty and the companionship fine, but unless the boater feels he has control of the ...

There comes a time in most every service shop when you arrive at work to find a key and a post-it note as your only link of communication between the customer and the service that is to be performed on their boat. Hopefully, this is the very rare exception and NOT the rule in your dealership. The work order is ...