American Marine Holdings executive retires
SARASOTA, Fla. – American Marine Holdings, Inc. executive Mike Collins is retiring, the company reported in a recent statement.
Collins’ marine industry career has spanned over 40 years, including stints at Chris Craft, Formula and Wellcraft in addition to over 16 years of service within AMH’s Donzi and Pro-Line divisions where he served a variety of roles up to and including president.
“It’s not easy to part ways with a living legend. It seems everyone you meet in the boat business has a Mike Collins story,” said AMH Chairman and CEO Lee Kimmell. “From signing new dealers to landing key government contracts, Mike Collins has been an important part of our success at American Marine Holdings. We certainly join the rest of the industry in wishing him all the best.”
Collins’ marine industry career began in 1965, when he returned to his hometown of Miami with a BSC from Spring Hill College in Mobile, Ala. and began working for Donzi Marine under the direction of the company’s founder, the late Don Aronow.
Thunderbird/Formula President Dick Genth hired Collins shortly thereafter, and the two began a 25-year run, which spanned 1965-1989 and took them through Formula, Wellcraft, Chris Craft and Donzi. In each case, a company with lagging sales was resurrected, endowed with exponential sales increases, and then sold, according to AMH.
In 1989, after the sale of Donzi to Outboard Marine Corp. (OMC), Collins parted ways with Genth and joined Pro-Line Boats as vice president. Soon, Pro-Line was in the midst of a sizeable growth spurt. Many new dealers were added and the company was transformed from a regional builder to one of the most powerful names in recreational saltwater fiberglass fishing boats, AMH stated.
Mr. Collins was reunited with the Donzi brand in 1993, the year Pro-Line’s parent company AMH purchased that company from OMC. Donzi too experienced a substantial renaissance, adding new dealers, new models, and new facilities to meet demand. Soon thereafter, Mike Collins was named president of AMH.
In 2004, Collins assumed a new role as president of AMH’s Government Services division, which was created to offer customized Donzi and Pro-Line vessels for government and military applications worldwide, and recently landed a 17 million dollar Coast Guard contract.
With Collins’ retirement, AMH Government Services will operate as a part of the sales efforts of Donzi and Pro-Line under the joint direction of those companies, the company reported.
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