Miami boat show strictly sail died February 14, 2018

[JC Reefer]

Apparently they sold over 30 leopards at the show.

[DotDun]

Was at Annapolis in October and Miami a week ago. Miami was very crowded, probably due to both power/sail at the same venue. Annapolis was crowded due to the small(er) venue. Logistics were bad at both shows. Annapolis - waited at least 45 minutes for a way-too-small bus back to parking at the stadium, Miami the water taxi line was probably 20 minutes, but loading/unloading the big boat took another 20 minutes.

Kind of like the airlines, not which one is better, it's which one sucks less!

[fatherchronica]

Right you are sir, but they did show off many nice boats. I may never get there again, but truly enjoyed our visit to Port Townsend, where coincidentally our Cape George was born. As a little aside, a couple of years after we bought our Cape George we met Cecil Lange in Mexico where he taught us the rudiments of celestial navigation, which whetted our love of math to spur us to get our friend Isabel to complete our education.

[billknny]

Originally Posted by JC Reefer

After years of attending the South Florida boats shows my most favorite one seems to have come to an end. The boat show">Miami boat show strictly sail had maybe 30 sailboats from less that 10 companies. IP and Hunter each only brought 1 model. The majority of that where of the Benetau, jeanneau, lagoon, Catalina, leopard and maybe 2 other sailing brands. Compared to literally hundreds of motor boats ranging from pwc to luxury

Have any others seen this as well?

From a sailor's perspective, the show is dead. I guess if you wanted to buy a condomaran, it might be worth going. But for real sailboats? A big zero.

A good show for fishing tackle, and dinghies, and those things that overlap the motorboat and sailing markets. But for sailing stuff and boats? Save your pennies and go to Annapolis in October.

[DotDun]

Originally Posted by billknny

From a sailor's perspective, the show is dead. I guess if you wanted to buy a condomaran, it might be worth going. But for real sailboats? A big zero.

A good show for fishing tackle, and dinghies, and those things that overlap the motorboat and sailing markets. But for sailing stuff and boats? Save your pennies and go to Annapolis in October.

What is your definition of a 'real sailboat'?

[billknny]

Originally Posted by DotDun

What is your definition of a 'real sailboat'?

I KNEW I shouldn't have said that...

When I was teaching sailing for a living (not a good living, but that is another story) when people asked me about catamarans my response was pretty much always the same: "If you will be happy with a motor-sailor, you'll be happy with a catamaran, and should consider one seriously. If you want a boat that can make way ONLY with sails under all conditions you'll not be happy with MOST catamarans."

I always caveated that with the fact that there are a lot of catamarans that I would classify as REAL sailboats, (some even GREAT sailboats) but they they tend to be VERY weight sensitive, and that's a problem for MOST cruising sailors.

Before anybody jumps down my throat, please read carefully. There are NO absolutes in that text. Everything is relative.

[sailjumanji]

Ok, here is a different perspective. Buy your parking in advance, reserved, underground, American Airlines Arena, online for $25. We got there around 9-9:30 am, and that parking lot was empty, and we parked right night to the stairs going up to the shuttle bus. Use the shuttle bus instead of water taxi. It's a nice Greyhound-type bus and gets you to show in something like 20 minutes. At that time, there is no line at all to go right into the show. That said, we attended on Sunday and Monday (federal holiday), so Miami traffic going in wasn't an issue.

Stayed at a Hampton our near the airport, in a nice room that was $170-something per night. Eat the free breakfast before you get away in the morning. You won't want to eat any more meals than you have to at the show, but it is typical of all sports venues - not that great, and expensive. That said, nothing about boat ownership is cheap, and attending the boat show to payout with equipment "deals" is never going to work. Stay at home and wait for the Defender annual sale, and order online.

As for billkny's comment, we cruised for four months in our Seawind 1000, with watermaker, kayak, dinghy, and way too much food and alcohol stores. We sailed right past many of your "real" sailboats - all with waterline length longer than ours - on the way to the Bahamas. And many times watched those "real" sailboats roll in anchorages - to the point that the owners couldn't sit in the cockpit - while we were tucked in shallow water, avoiding the swell. Oh, and maybe our dual outboards don't motor as well as your diesel, but OTOH, unless its glassy conditions, we are sailing. I wouldn't own a boat that doesn't sail - which excludes all of those condo-cats - so we probably agree on that. But your generalization still overlooks the fact that some of your "real" sailboats - i.e., with one hull - don't sail well either.

We signed on to buy a Seawind 1160 Lite at the show, which I suspect with more waterline length will be an even better cruising boat than our shorter Seawind 1000. And we test sailed with nine people onboard, and gear for a full crew that was about to take the boat back across to the Abacos, and it sailed very well. Actually, I was shocked at how high it sailed to weather, and tacking angles.

For us, the Miami Boat Show provided the opportunity to see all of the boats we were considering buying, all in one place. (Actually, all around Dock 800 - so we were able to not waste time sifting thru 100's of boats on Docks 100-700). I did notice there were some really big monohulls at the show, but didn't count their numbers to see that there apparently weren't many. I know there were some monster cats there, but didn't board those either.

The vendor spaces in the tents could have used more-visible space numbers, as most were covered by displays. But I thought the grouping in the tents was well-thought out, and a couple of the tents we didn't go into, because we had no vendors of interest to us in them. B&G had a large tent on the docks with lots of new equipment, and I got the low-down on new Zeus 3 features (did everyone know that autorouting is about to be released, in the US-version Zeus 3 units?), and some Airmar transducers that have non-mechanical speed sensors.

Tent C had C-Map (next +Wide chip release should have Active Captain back on it), Dometic (got the low-down on air con choices), Fusion, Rocna & Mantus (both anchors), Ocean Air (those neat hatch sliders that have both screen and blackout materials), Vesper (killer AIS system, this will be my second one to install), and Garmin. All in one tent.

Tent F had Spectra (including JT Holden "Tellie" working the booth, so that alone was worth a visit!) Also Doyle - who is now the Seawind stock sail maker, and answered questions about sail cloth options, and square top head, etc. - and North (getting a quote on 3Di sails, but afraid they might be too expensive). Checked out Isotherm in Tent E as I had questions about their ASU and Smart Energy Controllers to reduce current draw on refrigeration.

ALL of the reps (above) that I talked to were extremely knowledgeable regarding their equipment. Some had boat show deals or rebates. Seawind had a rep from their factory in Vietnam who knew all aspects of their build process from start to finish, and therefore able to answer all of my detailed questions.

I'm not sure what Tents A, B, D, or others had in them, as I figured out pretty quick with the show guide what I wanted to see. And there were seminars going on, but we packed in two days seeing boats and vendors instead. Oh, and we stayed until the show closed at 6 pm each day. Most people seemed to be leaving around 3:30 pm, as the crowd dropped off around then.

I'm not a fan of big city Miami, and specifically attended the boat show on Sunday and Monday (holiday) to avoid the traffic. On Saturday, we spent the day at nearby Coconut Grove at a very big outdoors art show, walking the waterfront around Dinner Key marina, and having drinks on a bar at the water. That was especially nice day for my wife (although at the boat show, she visited a lot of vendor booths she had interest in, and gathered a pile of business cards for insurers that I need to get quotes).

I'd love to go to the Annapolis boat show, but schedule conflicts with a long-distance offshore boat race here each year. There are a lot of other big sailboat shows in the US, but in my experience many of them are brokered yacht shows, and don't offer new, big sailboats from multiple manufacturers. And/or have far fewer equipment vendors. For my wife and I, the Miami Boat Show ticked all of the boxes this year.

[sailjumanji]

Originally Posted by JC Reefer

Apparently they sold over 30 leopards at the show.

We only looked at cats with around 40 ft LOA. I think all of those display boats were sold on day one (Thursday?). Most of the ordered boat deliveries were into early 2019, or later. For someone trying to decide between a Leopard, Lagoon, FP, Seawind - you could step off one, and board another manufacturers model all on the same dock. Comparison shopping was pretty easy.

[billknny]

Originally Posted by sailjumanji

But your generalization still overlooks the fact that some of your "real" sailboats - i.e., with one hull - don't sail well either.

Geez... What do you have to do to get people to read what you actually write instead of having them start an argument with what they want to read? I did not say that condomarans are bad boats, as long as you know what you are getting and it meets your needs. There are an awful lot of monohull motor-sailors that people love and sail.

I did NOT say all monohulls are better than all catamarans. In fact I tried very hard NOT to even imply that that because it is NOT true. Try being less sensitive, not all monohull sailors hate catamarans (or catamaran sailors). And not all catamaran sailors have an inferiority complex where they take offense at anything someone says about their boat.

Really, your boat is perfect for you and what you do with it. That makes it a great boat. It is not perfect for everybody, and it is not perfect for everything. NO boat is perfect for everybody, doing anything--even mine.

The fact remains if you are seriously boat shopping and what to see a wide variety of sailboats, you will be seriously disappointed at the Miami show. I was disappointed at the boat selection, and I just wanted to look for entertainment, but I had a very productive time looking at the general boating accessories.

If you had already decided on a brand of boat and wanted to talk to that boatbuilder, and they were there... it would have been worth the trip. But, seriously, if you want to see a variety of boats, and see things you might not have seen before, and learn about what's really new in the sailing world, you need to go to Annapolis in October. I have been to both shows this year. This is apples and oranges.

If you were shopping for accessories that cross over between motor and sail, you'd find most all the manufacturers there, the Miami show would have been worth it.

If you want offshore fishing gear, it was a great place.

If you want a new dinghy, you'd have had the ability to see a lot of them and get a good deal.

If you want to buy new sails (for example) there were only one or two sailmakers there. The major manufactures of sailboat hardware were totally absent. I did not see a single rigger. If you were looking to outfit or refit a sailboat you would not have been happy.

It is simply no longer a sailboat show. That's a fact. Just like catamarans or monohulls, that is not a bad thing as long as you understand what you are getting and it meets your needs.

I don't know what happened in two years that caused the collapse of the sailboat market in Miami. Or maybe it was just mismanagement of the show?

[Polux]

Originally Posted by JC Reefer

After years of attending the South Florida boats shows my most favorite one seems to have come to an end. The Miami boat show strictly sail had maybe 30 sailboats from less that 10 companies. IP and Hunter each only brought 1 model. The majority of that where of the Benetau, jeanneau, lagoon, Catalina, leopard and maybe 2 other sailing brands. Compared to literally hundreds of motor boats ranging from pwc to luxury

Have any others seen this as well?

Once I found information, some years ago, about all major boat shows and the proportion of sailboats and motorboats and you could see that tendency very clearly,

The one that had more percentage of sailboats, almost 50% was Dusseldorf, Paris appeared next.

The American shows that were listed and Genoa, had already a very small percentage of sailboats. That corresponds probably to the public interest in them.

[DotDun]

Originally Posted by billknny

Geez... What do you have to do to get people to read what you actually write instead of having them start an argument with what they want to read? I did not say that condomarans are bad boats, as long as you know what you are getting and it meets your needs. There are an awful lot of monohull motor-sailors that people love and sail.

I did NOT say all monohulls are better than all catamarans. In fact I tried very hard NOT to even imply that that because it is NOT true. Try being less sensitive, not all monohull sailors hate catamarans (or catamaran sailors). And not all catamaran sailors have an inferiority complex where they take offense at anything someone says about their boat.

Really, your boat is perfect for you and what you do with it. That makes it a great boat. It is not perfect for everybody, and it is not perfect for everything. NO boat is perfect for everybody, doing anything--even mine.

The fact remains if you are seriously boat shopping and what to see a wide variety of sailboats, you will be seriously disappointed at the Miami show. I was disappointed at the boat selection, and I just wanted to look for entertainment, but I had a very productive time looking at the general boating accessories.

.......

Maybe you should read what you wrote!

[JC Reefer]

Originally Posted by sailjumanji

For my wife and I, the Miami Boat Show ticked all of the boxes this year.

Im happy that the show provided for you and your wife. I did not get onto any of the seawind cats. They are just out of the budget at the moment.

For those who were lucky enough for their preferred brand to actually be at the show then of course the show was wonderful. But I actually had the hopes of seeing more variety. I had planned on taking time off for a test sail. If we include all the brands under the beneteau flag then there was 3 other companies showing more than 1 boat.

This is not a cat vs mono thing. The same thing is happening with cats. Just seems like there are only a few brands that have consolidated the market. I get the economics but I don’t like the idea of only having one or two brands to choose from. I don’t know, even with the high price tag, it feels cheap to me. Cookie cutter and unimaginative.

Like buying Kobe steak from the frozen goods section of a super Walmart.

[TheThunderbird]

No BUNKS, no strict sail.

It was OVER in the mid-'90s.