YM test of GT35

[Tempus]

or Bentley bringing out a panel van.

Or Bentley bringing out a track car and a Grand Tourer, or Porsche bringing out a family 4x4.....

Oh, Hang on!....

 

[Twister_Ken]

Or Bentley bringing out a track car and a Grand Tourer, or Porsche bringing out a family 4x4.....

Oh, Hang on!....

Those companies, as well as established boat builders serving different markets, started out with one specialty and established their brand on the back of their success in that market, before extending the brand into new markets.

GT's strategy of trying to build two markets from the get-go looks high risk to me. But maybe they've got a stack of development and marketing funding lined-up which will allow them to do both.

Incidentally, how many GT35's have to be sold before the model can be counted a success? 10, 20, 30?

 

[JumbleDuck]

It's your predilection for bringing the subject up over and over again at any opportunity - reviving it like final lunges of near dead killer in a teen horror movie - that led me to expand on the frankly dull subject of cushion fastenings.

You appear reluctant to understand that screws, lots of them, cost more to secure something than a bit of double sided sticky tape. And that lead costs more than iron or thick oak cost more than wafer thin teak etc etc.

All these things are true. But trying to justify an extra quarter of a million cost on the basis of a few extra light switches or some plastic clips instead of velcro seems a bit ... anticlimactic.

Lead is just a shade over $2,000 (£1200) per tonne on the London Metal Exchange today, so with scrap iron at £140 per tonne, the 2810kg of ballast in the GT35 accounts for just £3,000 extra materials cost.

But that's not really the point. Nobody doubts (well, I certainly don't doubt) that the eye-watering price of the GT35 reflects the cost of building it - a cost which in turn reflects the expense of hand-built examples of anything. I doubt that producing a single Bavaria 37 would cost very much less, whatever she was built of.

The question is whether you get a worthwhile return on that very large amount of extra money. As far as I can see - and I haven't yet read the PBO review - the general tenor of responses to the GT35 is "very nicely built, some nice interior touches, sails OK, a bit bland". That doesn't seem to me to be much justification for the extra cost. If I ever have a hundred grand to spend on a car, I'll buy a Tesla Roadster, not a handbuilt Mondeo.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Or Bentley bringing out a track car and a Grand Tourer, or Porsche bringing out a family 4x4.....

Oh, Hang on!....

A Bentley track car is pretty consistent, as Bentley were always a sporty marque until Rolls-Royce blanded them. The Porsche Cayenne is basically a blinged up VW Touareg, and lies well within Posche's current marketing strategy.

 

[JumbleDuck]

Incidentally, how many GT35's have to be sold before the model can be counted a success? 10, 20, 30?

Perhaps two will be enough. After all, the fixed costs for a handbuilt boat like that are presumably just the moulds, and at the prices they are charging those can be written off pretty quickly. Maybe we're heading back to the days when the rich bought one-offs built by craftsmen?

 

[eddystone]

While all those little extras are nice, they are very expensive to provide and few people are willing to pay for the labour to fit them. That is the difference between a mass production boat where the nice features are designed in rather than added afterwards.

It is instructive to do a bit of old fashioned clipboard type Time and Motion on traditional boat construction and work out the proportion of time skilled workers spend actually using their skill - as opposed to picking up the component, walking up the steps, moving stuff out of the way, finding they have forgotten something etc etc. The buyer is paying a lot of money for time that does not add value to his boat. A simple example is a deck where all the holes have to be drilled or cut out individually and fittings attached. A machine in the Bavaria factory does all that in hours, but for a one off it can take days.

The basic problem small scale builders face is that production boats have become so good that it is difficult to provide something significantly better at a slightly higher price, only at a massively higher price. So you get into a viscious circle of higher prices limiting the number of people prepared to pay the price, which puts the price up if a profit is to be made......and so on.

Spot on. The unfortunate thing is that the mass production (well relatively) builders could produce something with more appeal to folks who yearn after a Rustler or even a Starlight at a much lower price but they don't because the number of people who would prefer that to what they currently build is far too small. Possibly just the people on this forum

 

[flaming]

I suppose this is mitigated by the fact they are primarily a sales/marketing operation, and the building is subbed out.

That's an interesting point.

The section they're going after with the 330 is a busy one though. Off the top of my head I can think of the XP33, Sun fast 3200, J97, Elan 320, and This just announced. http://www.ancasta.com/boats-for-sale/new-boats/mcconaghy/ker/33/

You can be sure that the GT330 will cost more than the Elan and the Sun fast, so it's going to have to be a bit special to get any traction, when you consider that for quality cruiser racers X Yachts and J boats have the reputation. A new boat from a new firm is always going to be a risk for people who will view success on the race course as key. If they're serious then the first one needs a good crew for a season and it needs to bring in silverware... That's how X and J work, but it's not cheap...

 

[JumbleDuck]

You can be sure that the GT330 will cost more than the Elan and the Sun fast, so it's going to have to be a bit special to get any traction, when you consider that for quality cruiser racers X Yachts and J boats have the reputation. A new boat from a new firm is always going to be a risk for people who will view success on the race course as key. If they're serious then the first one needs a good crew for a season and it needs to bring in silverware... That's how X and J work, but it's not cheap...

A non-racer writes ...

Is fleet size important these days or is it all handicap? I'm thinking of Peter Poland's articles about, for example, the Sigma 33 or the Hunter Sonata, where it's clear that the builders worked hard to promote one-design racing and class associations right from the start.

 

[mrming]

A non-racer writes ...

Is fleet size important these days or is it all handicap? I'm thinking of Peter Poland's articles about, for example, the Sigma 33 or the Hunter Sonata, where it's clear that the builders worked hard to promote one-design racing and class associations right from the start.

I'm not sure what it's like down the Solent, but where I sail (Scotland and East Coast) there are no one designs at this size so it's all IRC. The Sigma 33s are still hanging around, but only barely. We had 7 of them at the Scottish Series this year.

 

[flaming]

A non-racer writes ...

Is fleet size important these days or is it all handicap? I'm thinking of Peter Poland's articles about, for example, the Sigma 33 or the Hunter Sonata, where it's clear that the builders worked hard to promote one-design racing and class associations right from the start.

It is important as almost everyone other than the real design geeks really wants to race OD, but getting successful people with enough spare cash to buy a race boat to agree what to buy is not exactly easy... However a decent handicap boat that sells a few suddenly becomes a one design. For example the J109... Not really built originally as an OD (as evidenced by the fairly large differences in weight...) but races as one. Or sort of, they actually don't have OD status from ISAF, so they technically race "level rating". J saw what happened there and when they launched the replacement, the 111, they already had in place the controls necessary for it to get ISAF status.

But you're right that for handicap racing as a sailor it is not all that important to me that there are no other boats the same. It makes life slightly more difficult, as we don't have a reliable benchmark to tune against. I was more thinking from the point of view of the company that has set up in business and proposes to build and sell the boats... I doubt they'd want to sell one or two...

 

[JumbleDuck]

But you're right that for handicap racing as a sailor it is not all that important to me that there are no other boats the same. It makes life slightly more difficult, as we don't have a reliable benchmark to tune against. I was more thinking from the point of view of the company that has set up in business and proposes to build and sell the boats... I doubt they'd want to sell one or two...

Thanks for that. It sounds very chicken and egg: OD racing attracts more buyers, but you can't get OD racing until you have the buyers. One followup question, if I may ... how does the cost of a competitive 33-ish footer these days compare with a Sigma 33, which was £37,475 + VAT in 1990? I'm wondering how the barriers to entry have changed over the years - whether high tech kit has pushed prices up more than modern production methods has brought them down.

 

[AndrewfromFal]

Thanks for that. It sounds very chicken and egg: OD racing attracts more buyers, but you can't get OD racing until you have the buyers. One followup question, if I may ... how does the cost of a competitive 33-ish footer these days compare with a Sigma 33, which was £37,475 + VAT in 1990? I'm wondering how the barriers to entry have changed over the years - whether high tech kit has pushed prices up more than modern production methods has brought them down.

Aside from cost arguments, there are other external 'barriers to entry' such as getting and keeping a crew together to race throughout a season; - the external pressures on people's free time are much greater than they were 25 years ago. I don't think it's a coincidence that a lot of today's production racer-cruisers (hello Sunfast) were designed to be sailed short handed.

 

[flaming]

Thanks for that. It sounds very chicken and egg: OD racing attracts more buyers, but you can't get OD racing until you have the buyers. One followup question, if I may ... how does the cost of a competitive 33-ish footer these days compare with a Sigma 33, which was £37,475 + VAT in 1990? I'm wondering how the barriers to entry have changed over the years - whether high tech kit has pushed prices up more than modern production methods has brought them down.

Google tells me that £37,475 in 1990 is £74,331 today.

This page. http://www.jeanneau.com/boats/sun-fast-3200.html. Tells me that the aforementioned sunfast 3200 is £63,248 ex vat today.

 

[Twister_Ken]

Perhaps two will be enough.

I don't see two boats being the basis of a sustainable business!

 

[JumbleDuck]

Google tells me that £37,475 in 1990 is £74,331 today.

This page. http://www.jeanneau.com/boats/sun-fast-3200.html. Tells me that the aforementioned sunfast 3200 is £63,248 ex vat today.

Thanks. So, broadly similar, then. Would you expect to spend much on the Sunfast to be competitive or does it come with all the fancy sails and other kit (posh ropes, expensive sunglasses and steely glances) required?

 

[JumbleDuck]

I don't see two boats being the basis of a sustainable business!

Depends whether they see themselves as series producers or as bespoke builders who might only do a very few, or one, of each design.

 

[sailorman]

Depends whether they see themselves as series producers or as bespoke builders who might only do a very few, or one, of each design.

The mould tools need to be paid for, so a one-off by this method is impractical

 

[flaming]

Thanks. So, broadly similar, then. Would you expect to spend much on the Sunfast to be competitive or does it come with all the fancy sails and other kit (posh ropes, expensive sunglasses and steely glances) required?

If you call 17% cheaper about the same...

Normally race boats would be priced ex sails and instruments, as most racers have their favourite makes of both.

Cordage etc would be included though.

 

[JumbleDuck]

The mould tools need to be paid for, so a one-off by this method is impractical

Maybe. But when you're punting out the boats for £250k more than equivalents from other makers, you can probably write off the moulds very quickly.

 

[Habebty]

I don't see two boats being the basis of a sustainable business!

Probably not....but there seems to be a little bit of "point missing" going on here. Whilst the GT35 is undoubtedly expensive, there is a market out there, possibly not that large, where there are people who simply want a strong, quality, modern boat that sails very well. An AWB is not good enough on the sailing front, a MAB is just not good enough on any front, a race boat is not comfortable enough, and Scandinavian is, well, a bit boring? I would bet the GT 35 will out sail a similar sized Rustler/IslandPacket/Malo/ but be just as comfortable. Look at the hull shape closely, I doubt if slamming will be an issue, and there is plenty of low down weight to keep the thing planted.

I can't remember if there was a similar discussion 11 years ago when the SJ Sadler 290 was launched. But I sure there were were doubters who said no one would pay up to £65k for a fully loaded 29-0" bilge keel boat when they could have had a 36-0" Bavaria or similar. I did, and in fact before Rampart went went tits up, about 50 others had as well, paying up to (I believe) £85k as lead and resin prices soared.

So if the the market exists for people at the £80k end of the market for quality new small boats, then it possibly exists at the £250k end of the market for slightly larger quality new boats. Possibly a little bit niche? But it is there.

Maybe in order to survive, GT have set out their stall to absorb price fluctuations in materials, which is what possibly did for Rampart who were, I think, trying to sell a quality product at an affordable but unsustainable price as material costs outstripped the 12 month waiting list and pre agreed final cost.

But hey, at least it's an attempt to rebuild a diverse British boat design and building industry.