Re: Now comes General Boats

[stanleyl]

    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.

    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.

1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.

2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
 h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.

3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime.  

    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.

4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.

    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.

    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.    

    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)

5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
 media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.   No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.

    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
 e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.

    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.

    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
 yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.

    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.   A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.                      
                                                                       IN CONCLUSION

        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
 ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."

        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)

    ss
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[WYSailor09]

Stan,

Does this mean on a private sale you expect 5% from the seller and another 5% from the buyer for 10% of the selling price? If the seller doesn't do their part but the buyer did 10% would the GB support be offered?

I am new to the Rhodes want to be owners list and would like clarification. Your points are well taken.

Scott Badley
WYO Sailer

-----Original Message-----
From: rhodes22-list-bounces@... [mailto:rhodes22-list-bounces@...] On Behalf Of stan
Sent: Wednesday, August 05, 2009 8:17 AM
To: The Rhodes 22 mail list
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] Now comes General Boats

    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.

    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.

1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.

2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
 h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.

3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime.  

    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.

4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.

    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.

    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.    

    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)

5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
 media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.   No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.

    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
 e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.

    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.

    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
 yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.

    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.   A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.                      
                                                                       IN CONCLUSION

        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
 ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."

        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)

    ss
__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________

__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________

[David Bradley]

Stan,

Thanks for taking the time to share your thinking.  I think it makes
good sense as an owner and definitely see the rationale from your
point of view.  If I were to sell my boat I would want you and GB to
stand behind it, and I do agree that this is part of a strong value
proposition to a prospective buyer.

I have not been able to keep up with the list over the last few weeks
but did see a number of well-intended suggestions on how you can
better market your boat.  It seems to me your marketing approach is
brilliant - a great boat, a great web site that sucks you in, a great
community of advocates, a feature article each year, the occassional
boat show.  The last thing you probably need is to manage an inventory
of pens and logowear.

The area where I'm guessing the List member could help most is to
follow up on the suggestions of MJM and John to build and maintain a
"best of" wiki.

As for the royalties issue, I want to say for the record that when a
few of us instigated the "boom room project" a few years ago it was my
understanding we were helping you solve a design problem and the
project had your support.  I'm dismayed to hear that you may not have
been compensated for that and will take it personally to rectify that
on my end.

Best wishes for the next decade of GBI,

Dave







On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 7:16 AM, stan<stan@...> wrote:

>    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.
>
>    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.
>
> 1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.
>
> 2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
>  h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.
>
> 3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime.
>
>    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.
>
> 4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.
>
>    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.
>
>    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.
>
>    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)
>
> 5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
>  media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.   No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.
>
>    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
>  e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.
>
>    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.
>
>    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
>  yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.
>
>    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.   A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.
>                                                                       IN CONCLUSION
>
>        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
>  ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."
>
>        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)
>
>    ss
> __________________________________________________
> To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
> For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
> __________________________________________________
>

__________________________________________________
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__________________________________________________

[Bob and Kathy Quinn]

Stan:  As a couple with a two Rhodes 22 history, we can only support your Loyalty/Royalty endeavor.  The time that you, Elton, Rose, and the Rhodes workforce have spent with us over the past 18 years has been totally unselfish and I would be hard pressed to put a price tag on it as it would be priceless.   The sailboat we owned prior to our first R22, had gone out of production.  Needless to say, there was no support!  Keeping it sailing became a nightmare. Our first recycled R22 was a joy only because of the outstanding support by the GB crew.

Let's face it, when we take our cars in for problems, we don't walk out the door without paying a bill.

Bob and Kathy on the R22 "NoKaOi III"




________________________________
From: stan <stan@...>
To: The Rhodes 22 mail list <rhodes22-list@...>
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 10:16:52 AM
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] Now comes General Boats

    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.  It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.  The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:  Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).  For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.

    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".  There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.

1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.  This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.

2,    General Boats builds a single boat.  In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.  The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".    Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so
 they should not risk the wrat!
h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.  If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.

3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.  Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime. 

    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.

4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.

    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.  When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.  We had to do something - and we did:  Selling used Rhodes.

    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.  But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.   

    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?  You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.  When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)

5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".  The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.  The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by
 asking royalties from other !
media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.  No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.

    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.  This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.  It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.  "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."  Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and
 sellers did get our messag!
e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.  But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.

    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.  We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.  My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.  But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.  When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.

    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.  No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:  "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.  If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives
 you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.

    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.  A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.                     
                                                                      IN CONCLUSION

        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.  Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)  Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good
 price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."

        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.  After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)

    ss
__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________
__________________________________________________
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__________________________________________________

[cowie]

Stan:

You have done a great job establishing and maintaining the general boats company.  The recycle program has been a significant part of your success.  As a buisness owner I can appreciate the challanges and opportuniites trying to provide a product to be proud of and stay afloat at the same time.  I am in favor of a Loyalty/Royalty program along with any other specific suggestions from GB.  It would be helpful to have a clear statement on the GB business plan and how we as a community of owners can support GB to contribute to and benefit from the win/win/win conditions you aim to support.  Maybe this is already included on the GB web site however clear communication of your message to current and future community members would be helpful.

stanleyl wrote:

    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.

    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.

1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.

2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
 h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.

3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime.  

    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.

4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.

    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.

    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.    

    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)

5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
 media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.   No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.

    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
 e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.

    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.

    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
 yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.

    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.   A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.                      
                                                                       IN CONCLUSION

        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
 ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."

        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)

    ss
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[Bdunn1]

Stan:  Thanks for the complete explanation; I couldn't quite understand
what was going on when I happened to join into the stream a couple
weeks ago.  I believe you are due monies for any assistance you give
some one selling/buying a used boat.  No one else would give the
support on such a transaction for cars, houses, or ironing boards.  I
don't know how many boats are involved or the sales price but I would
think 10-15% of the transaction cost should be tacked on.  If that runs
the price up too much let them buy a new boat and get the "service" for
free.
regards,
Bill Dunn


-----Original Message-----
From: stan <stan@...>
To: The Rhodes 22 mail list <rhodes22-list@...>
Sent: Wed, Aug 5, 2009 10:16 am
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] Now comes General Boats










     This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art
C.
battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while
purporting
to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB
proposal
in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that
airing the
Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy
for GB
expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had
nothing to
do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has
nothing to
do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end
of the
debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this
private
Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the
other end
of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's,
Joe's, John's
and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic
to
consider.

     When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's
crazed
Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where
Groucho is
reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho
says, "You
have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone
knows there
is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty
clause that
we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat -
it is
purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for
all three
parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.

1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the
biggest
drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company
that will
still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they
share
that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's
welfare is
being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of
several you
have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.

2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money
is in the
big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders
is to
offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a
loss) to
get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.  
The Rhodes
business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not
continually
walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around
the Rhodes
and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It
is this
not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually
offering a
better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise,
featured in so
may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just
one more
recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us
before an
article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not
advertise so
they should not risk the wrat!
  h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response
is that
their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes
privately,
insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants
nothing,
you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.

3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We
have no
more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes
like
buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so
provide
the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a
customer -
only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one
lifetime.

     The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our
buyers, are
not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all
these
expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat
sales
these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope,
Rick's
comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the
responsibility of
private sales, does not hold water.

4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty
program?
We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and
simplify
the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid
diversion.
Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and
we sold
boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers:
providing
a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go
to the
bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit)
boat
show.

     When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to
business men
and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we
sold to
doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took
over,
sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do
something -
and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.

     Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf
Stars and
Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our
home, and
then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds,
Balboas,
Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an
amazing number
of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World,
who started
the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of
these
builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the
private
sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep
rising.
But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to
their
self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing
to do with
their buying and selling successes.

     The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why
does a
surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need
customer
support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB
to do
what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's
new boat
sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of
that boat
and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21
or 22 or
23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26
(Roger even
changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your
discontinued
model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  
(And what
are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands,
getting a
replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)

5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over
government Health Care today is no different than the battles over
government
Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment
Insurance, were
yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.
 "What
is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my
early
business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales
might be
indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times
morph
current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  
Today's
economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to
join already
sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the
wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.  
The news
today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding
technology
to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
  media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered
information.   No
one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking
what is
good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General
Boats. Take
it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  
A hollow
sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.

     Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.  
This year,
for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock
Yards where,
"we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes
sales made
at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by
private
buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs
for
bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days
rental of Navy
Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping
in
Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.  
"You can
see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much
time as
you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and
give you
a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."
Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's
itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
  e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits
to the
shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.

     We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one
would prove
a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private
Sales and
Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales
person then
wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the
grounds
that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional
support.
But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems
to be
taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB
into a
full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new
contractor
and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay
more
because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I
guess this
is the real thesis of this paper.

     Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge
each time
a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in
that
light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house
sale or a
broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that
particular
house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the
rational,
the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  
his or her
boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give
you, the
new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one
day need
and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a
tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying
side:   "Ask
the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with
GB's
voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make
sure the
seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
  yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going
along with
GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway,
then you
have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not
be
giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers
and buyers
who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable,
vital,
operating company.

     We have field tested this idea and the results have been
encouraging.   A
few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the
mutual
advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this
radical
idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had
thought it
over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.    


                                                                       
IN
CONCLUSION

         We understand that those of you who have not been in business
for
yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every
business,
sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business
cash flow
treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a
"personal
property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property
tax" on
the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the
standard
business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing
private
sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell
me the
hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you
check your
records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking
$X
dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm
thinking of
selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  
What do you
think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
  ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some
lookers
coming from SC."

         For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every
privately
sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make
private
sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the
territory"' ; For
those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an
accounting
entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After
all, we are
all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)

    ss
__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to
http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives
go to
http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________





__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________

[Arthur H. Czerwonky]

Dave,

Just in case there is any possibility of confusion, Stan received 10% commission on the sale of your BR.

Art

-----Original Message-----

>From: David Bradley <dwbrad@...>
>Sent: Aug 5, 2009 11:08 AM
>To: The Rhodes 22 Email List <rhodes22-list@...>
>Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] Now comes General Boats
>
>Stan,
>
>Thanks for taking the time to share your thinking.  I think it makes
>good sense as an owner and definitely see the rationale from your
>point of view.  If I were to sell my boat I would want you and GB to
>stand behind it, and I do agree that this is part of a strong value
>proposition to a prospective buyer.
>
>I have not been able to keep up with the list over the last few weeks
>but did see a number of well-intended suggestions on how you can
>better market your boat.  It seems to me your marketing approach is
>brilliant - a great boat, a great web site that sucks you in, a great
>community of advocates, a feature article each year, the occassional
>boat show.  The last thing you probably need is to manage an inventory
>of pens and logowear.
>
>The area where I'm guessing the List member could help most is to
>follow up on the suggestions of MJM and John to build and maintain a
>"best of" wiki.
>
>As for the royalties issue, I want to say for the record that when a
>few of us instigated the "boom room project" a few years ago it was my
>understanding we were helping you solve a design problem and the
>project had your support.  I'm dismayed to hear that you may not have
>been compensated for that and will take it personally to rectify that
>on my end.
>
>Best wishes for the next decade of GBI,
>
>Dave
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 7:16 AM, stan<stan@...> wrote:
>>    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C. battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.
>>
>>    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says, "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief will argue.
>>
>> 1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty proposal.
>>
>> 2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
>>  h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.
>>
>> 3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in one lifetime.
>>
>>    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers, are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope, Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.
>>
>> 4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable, and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer) had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.
>>
>>    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.
>>
>>    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home, and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds, Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and selling successes.
>>
>>    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast iron swing keel.)
>>
>> 5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over government Health Care today is no different than the battles over government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America" was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian extinction by asking royalties from other !
>>  media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.   No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.
>>
>>    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5 days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did get our messag!
>>  e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.
>>
>>    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this paper.
>>
>>    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their numbered Loyalty/Ro!
>>  yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway, then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a capable, vital, operating company.
>>
>>    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.   A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly correct.
>>                                                                       IN CONCLUSION
>>
>>        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
>>  ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers coming from SC."
>>
>>        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ; For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.   After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)
>>
>>    ss
>> __________________________________________________
>> To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>>
>> For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>> __________________________________________________
>>
>
>__________________________________________________
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>
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[Rick-139]

Stan,

I just got back from picking blackberries were I made the decision to
disagree with you on one other point.  By the way, the harvest of big, plump
blackberries is abundant this year as the result of a wonderful Canadian
summer we've had here in northern Ohio.

I have about a quarter acre patch of wild berries along a section of my
property next to some woods.  It occurred to me this evening that no other
human had been in my patch, even after a week of ripening berries.  Yet when
I was a kid, we would never have let the property owner keep all the berries
to himself.  On this beautiful summer evening (after a great day sailing), I
didn't chase a single kid out of my patch, let alone even hear the call of a
child.  They were all inside looking at screens.

You attribute the decline in boat sales to the rising cost of oil.  Wooden
boats were always more expensive than plastic ones.  And disposable income
has risen in real terms much faster than the price of oil.  Yet even during
the fat years of this decade, boat sales overall declined.

Stan, I think you are selling fewer boats for the same reason I am eating
more blackberries.  We are witness to a cultural shift in this country away
from outdoor recreation, especially for our children.  There is a book
called "Last Child in the Woods" that tells all about.

Those of us who want to save GBI, and boating in general, need to get our
kids, grandchildren, nieces and nephews out on our boats and into the
blackberry patch.

Rick

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 10:16 AM, stan <stan@...> wrote:

>    This paper on Loyalty/Royalty is apart from the ongoing GB vs. Art C.
> battle, having only been joined to that complaint because Art, while
> purporting to support GB, has, in the matter of Loyalty/Royalty, rejected
> the GB proposal in his own multiple Rhodes buying and selling.   It is hoped
> that airing the Loyalty/Royalty tender might end the myopic rational that it
> is crazy for GB expecting anything from the sales and purchases of Rhodes
> that GB had nothing to do with.   The factual truth is there are no Rhodes
> sales that GB has nothing to do with:   Rick's 7/26 5:28PM  e-mail supports
> that position at one end of the debate (how the private seller volunteered
> GB's time to clinch this private Rhodes purchase decision); to David Culp's
> 7/26 4:49 PM e-mail at the other end of the debate (re the high value of
> Rhodes re-sales).   For Ben's, Joe's, John's and all others' academic
> Loyalty/Royalty questions, here is the logic to consider.
>
>    When sane folks, who haven't thought it through, laugh at GB's crazed
> Loyalty/Royalty notion, I  think of the Marx Brothers' movie where Groucho
> is reviewing a contract where Chico is applying for a loan and Groucho says,
> "You have to sign the sanity clause" and Chico laughs and says, "Everyone
> knows there is no Sanity Claus".   There is no authority to the
> Loyalty/Royalty clause that we ask you to incorporate when buying or selling
> a Rhodes 22 Sailboat - it is purely voluntary.  But, the win, win, win logic
> of the value added for all three parties, is overwhelming, as this brief
> will argue.
>
> 1.    Boat Show goers fall in love with the Rhodes - but one of the biggest
> drags on a "yes" from wannabes has been, "Am I buying from a company that
> will still be around next year?"  Many current Rhodies let us know that they
> share that concern of who is going to back up their boat's welfare if GB's
> welfare is being allowed to deteriorate.   This decision-contributor is one
> of several you have to join in any conclusion re GB's Loyalty/Royalty
> proposal.
>
> 2,    General Boats builds a single boat.   In this business the money is
> in the big boats.  Accordingly the business plan of almost all other
> builders is to offer an entry level boat at the lowest selling price
> possible (even a loss) to get new sailors' brand loyalty and then walk them
> up the size line.   The Rhodes business plan, for better or worse, is just
> the opposite.  We do not continually walk around our boat seeing how we can
> save a nickel - we walk around the Rhodes and see how spending an extra
> dollar will make an even better boat.  It is this
> not-continually-coming-out-with-a-cheaper-boat, but continually offering a
> better boat, that keeps getting Rhodes, which does not advertise, featured
> in so may publications that thrive off advertising.  August "Sailing" is
> just one more recognition of  "what we do".     Invariably publications deal
> with us before an article decision and invariably we point out to them that
> we do not advertise so they should not risk the wrat!
>  h of competitive boat builder who do.  And invariably their response is
> that their readers have a right to know.   If you buy or sell a Rhodes
> privately, insisting to yourself that GB had nothing to do with it, so
> warrants nothing, you are diluting the facts and deluding yourself.
>
> 3.    The Rhodes 22 is the beginning and the end of the GB line.  We have
> no more profitable size to move you up to.   Nor is your buying a Rhodes
> like buying a car that you periodically do many times in a lifetime and so
> provide the seller many sales to amortize the costs of winning you over as a
> customer - only a handful of Rhodies have opted for their second Rhodes in
> one lifetime.
>
>    The effort/time/mail/phone/e-mails/visits/demos/etc. wooing our buyers,
> are not spread over multiple or moving up sales.  In a fiscal period all
> these expenses must be born by the few new boat sales and the many used boat
> sales these expenses make possible.  So, at least in GB's business scope,
> Rick's comfort-accounting reasoning for panning GB's position on the
> responsibility of private sales, does not hold water.
>
> 4.    Why, at the start of GB's second 50 years, the Loyalty/Royalty
> program?  We will spare you our political explanation, which is irrefutable,
> and simplify the reason with two words:  Oil, and a nameless second word to
> avoid diversion.  Boats are built of oil. When we started gas was 26 cents a
> gallon and we sold boats for $2,500 to firemen and policemen, teachers and
> auto workers: providing a large middle class base.  My daughter (the writer)
> had no time to go to the bathroom, she was so busy taking deposits at the
> Mt. Clemens (Detroit) boat show.
>
>    When inflation raised the cost a bit, our base shrank a bit, to business
> men and bookies.   When inflation continued, and at an increasing rate, we
> sold to doctors and lawyers; a shrinking base.  And, when inflation really
> took over, sales were restricted to a handful of Arabian Sheiks.   We had to
> do something - and we did:   Selling used Rhodes.
>
>    Recycled Rhodes saved the day for GB while we watched the Gulf Stars and
> Bristols, Allied Yachts, Marshals (who was an overnight guest at our home,
> and then killed himself), O'Days, Sovereigns, Irwins, Nimbles, Starwinds,
> Balboas, Windstars, Tanzers (whose plant we now occupy), Grampians and an
> amazing number of small and big builders in the US and Canada and around the
> World, who started the same time we did, go out of business.  And we watched
> the value of these builders' used boats plummet in the surviving market.  In
> contrast, the private sales of Rhodes became, and remain, easy.  And used
> Rhodes values keep rising.   But Art, and his co-thinking
> Rhodes-buying-and-selling crowd, cling to their self-serving myth that, in
> their particular instances, GB has nothing to do with their buying and
> selling successes.
>
>    The issue may be better framed by the answer to the question: "Why does
> a surviving company like Macgregor, who builds a single model, not need
> customer support?   You may be interested in the answer but, you do not want
> GB to do what Macgregor does.   When used boats begin to impinge on
> Macgregor's new boat sales and dealer channels clog up, Roger simply stops
> production of that boat and comes out with a different boat.  If you owned a
> Venture 17 or 21 or 22 or 23 or his cat or one of the many versions of the
> Macgregor 25 and 26 (Roger even changes the name of his boats), you have
> seen the price of your discontinued model drop, sometimes even before your
> classified hits the streets.  (And what are the chances of the next owner of
> one of these discontinued brands, getting a replacement for that lost cast
> iron swing keel.)
>
> 5.    The nature of business (and life) is "change".   The battle over
> government Health Care today is no different than the battles over
> government Social Security, government Medicare and government Unemployment
> Insurance, were yesterday.  Today they are all accepted as American
> way-to-go programs.  "What is good for General Motors is good for America"
> was the slogan in my early business days. If GM ever entertained the idea
> that used car sales might be indebted to the parent company, they did so too
> late.  Changing times morph current traditions into new traditions, when
> times call for it .  Today's economy evolution rubs it under our nose that
> boat builders need to join already sanctioned residual supported industries
> - if we  want to hold onto the wonderful variety of selections having many
> small builders offers.   The news today tells of newspapers and wire
> services turning to digital coding technology to fight off dinosaurian
> extinction by asking royalties from other !
>  media who freely lift news companies' expensively gathered information.
> No one is expecting you to feel for poor old GB - you should be thinking
> what is good for you.  And what is good for you is what is good for General
> Boats. Take it from the old man - flexible thinking keeps you enduringly
> relevant.  A hollow sounding idea today can make solid sense tomorrow.
>
>    Consider the Chicago Boat Show as an example of changing times.   This
> year, for the first time since the Boat Show's start at the Chicago Stock
> Yards where, "we were there", we did not go.   It is not that there were no
> Rhodes sales made at the last few Chicago Shows - there were.  But they were
> made by private buyers and sellers - sales where not one cent went to GB to
> pay costs for bringing show boats all the way to Chicago, paying for the 5
> days rental of Navy Pier space, for parking, manpower and the tabs for
> eating and sleeping in Chicago and the pleasure of doing it all in freezing
> winter winds.   "You can see the boat at the show, the salesman is great, he
> will take as much time as you need to show you all the features and answer
> all your questions and give you a great booklet to take with you - and then
> you can buy my Rhodes."   Loyalty/Royalty would have gone a long way to
> keeping this show on GB's itinerary.  A few Chicago buyers and sellers did
> get our messag!
>  e and earned our loyalty for denting our costs.   But there are limits to
> the shortfalls our Social Security checks can cover.
>
>    We appreciate suggestions such as yearly dues but feel this one would
> prove a burden for owners.   We have given much thought to Saving Private
> Sales and Saving General Boats and note that when we buy something, the
> sales person then wants to sell us a back-up policy.   My reaction is to
> decline on the grounds that if the item is new and guaranteed, why would I
> need any additional support.   But re-sale items are another animal.  Very
> little of GB's time seems to be taken by new boat buyers.  But private
> re-sales buyers are turning GB into a full time not-for-profit organization.
>   When we negotiate with a new contractor and feel the product or service
> has been under priced, we offer to pay more because we do not want to lose a
> source in the middle of a season.  I guess this is the real thesis of this
> paper.
>
>    Unless anyone has a better idea we think the solution is a charge each
> time a title is transferred.  A sort of sales tax, if you want to view it in
> that light, or as though it were a restrictive clause that survives a house
> sale or a broker's commission that repeats every time the agent re-sells
> that particular house, or a residual when new viewers see a re-run.   No
> matter the rational, the bottom line is that it becomes a powerful tool for
> the SELLER of  his or her boat:  " When you buy my boat the builder is going
> to continue to give you, the new owner, ongoing support to your questions
> and parts that you may one day need and even help  you when you want to sell
> your boat."    We think this a tremendous selling pull - to which we can add
> a push on the buying side:   "Ask the person selling you this particular
> Rhodes if they are on board with GB's voluntary re-sale terms.   If your
> seller tells you they are, then make sure the seller gives you their
> numbered Loyalty/Ro!
>  yalty certificate.  If your seller tells you that they are not going along
> with GB's voluntary private re-sale program and you buy their boat anyway,
> then you have to understand that it is only fair and reasonable that GB will
> not be giving you its time and attention at the expense of all those sellers
> and buyers who are providing ongoing support to keeping General Boats a
> capable, vital, operating company.
>
>    We have field tested this idea and the results have been encouraging.
> A few sellers have told us we must be nuts. But many appreciated the mutual
> advantages.  One seller, who told us to our face where to go with this
> radical idea, later sent us a letter, with a check in it, saying that he had
> thought it over and came to understand that the reasoning was exactly
> correct.
>                                                                       IN
> CONCLUSION
>
>        We understand that those of you who have not been in business for
> yourself, may not be cognizant of the endless vacuum crevices in every
> business, sucking out the dollars generated by trying to stay on the
> business cash flow treadmill.   Just a small example:  Can you imagine that
> GB pays a "personal property tax" on its cars and also pays a "personal
> Business property tax" on the same cars:  (The tax title alone is idiotic.)
>   Added to the standard business cash sucking faults,  GB has the burden of
> the ever growing private sales market:  "I am thinking of buying Joe Blow's
> boat.  Can you tell me the hull number?  Can you look up and get me the
> prior owner?  Can you check your records to see it there were any problems
> with this boat?  He is asking $X dollars, do you think that is a fair
> price?"  And sellers:  "I'm thinking of selling my boat.  It's an 88.  Here
> is a list of the items it has.  What do you think would be a good price.
>  Oh, yea, I need one of those thi!
>  ngs for the boom.  Can you get it out to me next day - I have some lookers
> coming from SC."
>
>        For those who still believe GB no way contributes to every privately
> sold Rhodes;  For those who believe. "sure, GB dollars and time make private
> sales possible but it should be a free-be that goes with the territory"' ;
> For those who believe GB can survive such free-bes by simply making it an
> accounting entry - we invite you to sit in this chair for just one day.
> After all, we are all in the same boat !  (I just couldn't resist.)
>
>    ss
> __________________________________________________
> To subscribe/unsubscribe go to
> http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
> For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go
> to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
> __________________________________________________
>

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[Basso]

Stan, I understand your conundrum, and I would like to play devils advocate with your idea.

It sounds like the issue at hand is the amount of "free" consulting time you are giving to buyers of boats where you get no compensation.  I have to wonder if you are trying to kill an fly with a .357 with your proposed approach.  I'm guessing you already have a good idea who has purchased from you or through you.  For those that did not, could you not simply charge a labor fee for the consulting time?  The advantages of this from my perspective are that you are tying the charge directly to the user of the service, you are not working on projects without compensation and then buyers and sellers who may not be aware of the RO/LO are not left out in the cold.  It has all the same features as your RO/LO, but the money changes hands for a service provided, not as a retainer in case service will be needed in the future.

As you know, I purchased from you rather than purchasing a used boat because I did value the time and effort you put forth in selling the boat.  Had I purchased the used boat instead, I would have been happy to pay for your time to help me retrofit/repair anything that would have been needed, and I would not have thought anything of it.

My opinion (not that you really care) is that the RO/LO is an administrative hassle for buyers and sellers.  I would play along with it if I ever sold my boat, but I'm thinking that buyers needing your service would still be the most happy to pay the money and the most likely to see the value in the money spent.

This is your business and you are the one who will decide what to do, so I simply sumbit my suggestion for your consideration.  BTW, I first saw the rhodes at the chicago show in 2004 and was very impressed.  Seeing it at that show prompted me to find one to rent (Snug Harbor Inn in Sturgeon Bay, WI).  I liked the ease of the furling and found it to be very comfortable to sail.  I kept it in mind for when I was in the market again.  So add another sale to your chicago presence, albeit for a recycled boat delayed about 5 years.

[Bob and Kathy Quinn]

 Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was successfully launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly 11 years with our recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a season with a borrowed R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a wonderful job.   We were the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has been around for years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their boat more than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy too!"

That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida area up to four.

Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
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[Mary Lou Troy-2]

Congrats Bob & Kathy!

We would of course like pictures!

Best,
Mary Lou

At 09:45 PM 10/30/2009, you wrote:

>  Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was
> successfully launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After
> nearly 11 years with our recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan
> 37, and a season with a borrowed R22, it was great to be sailing on
> a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a wonderful job.   We were
> the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has been around for
> years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their boat more
> than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy too!"
>
>That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart,
>Florida area up to four.
>
>Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
>__________________________________________________
>To subscribe/unsubscribe go to
>http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
>For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and
>archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>__________________________________________________
>
>No virus found in this incoming message.
>Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
>Version: 8.5.423 / Virus Database: 270.14.39/2469 - Release Date:
>10/30/09 07:52:00

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[R22RumRunner]

Bob and Kathy,
Congrats on the launch.
 
Rummy
 
 
In a message dated 10/30/2009 9:45:34 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
bobandkathyr22@... writes:

Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was  successfully
launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly  11 years with our
recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a  season with a borrowed
R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010  R22.  Stan and Company did a
wonderful job.   We were the talk  of the marina today.  One fellow who has
been around for years commented  "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their
boat more than any other boat in the  marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy
too!"

That should bring  the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida
area up to four.  

Cheers,  Bob and  Kathy
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[sail tds.net]

Bob and Kathy,

Congratulations...  I was able to see your new R-22 when I was recently at
the factory.  You have a beautiful boat.  If you ever get to my side of the
peninsula let me know.

>>ron<<
S/V Serenity
Gulfport, FL

On Fri, Oct 30, 2009 at 9:45 PM, Bob and Kathy Quinn <
bobandkathyr22@...> wrote:

>  Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was successfully
> launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly 11 years with our
> recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a season with a borrowed
> R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a
> wonderful job.   We were the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has
> been around for years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their
> boat more than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking
> spiffy too!"
>
> That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida
> area up to four.
>
> Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
> __________________________________________________
> To subscribe/unsubscribe go to
> http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
> For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go
> to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
> __________________________________________________
>

--
Fair winds,

>>ron<<
S/V Serenity
Gulfport, FL
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[Rob Lowe]

Bob,
What's NoKaOi 3 look like?  She red, perhaps?  I might have drooled over her at the factory. - rob


-----Original Message-----
From: rhodes22-list-bounces@... [mailto:rhodes22-list-bounces@...] On Behalf Of Bob and Kathy Quinn
Sent: Friday, October 30, 2009 9:45 PM
To: The Rhodes 22 Email List
Subject: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!

 Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was successfully launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly 11 years with our recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a season with a borrowed R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a wonderful job.   We were the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has been around for years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their boat more than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy too!"

That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida area up to four.

Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
__________________________________________________
To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list

For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
__________________________________________________

__________________________________________________
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__________________________________________________

[Arthur H. Czerwonky]

Ron told me that he lost control.  Simply a beautiful boat, and pictures would be appreciated.  

-----Original Message-----

>From: "Lowe, Rob" <rlowe@...>
>Sent: Nov 4, 2009 3:54 PM
>To: The Rhodes 22 Email List <rhodes22-list@...>
>Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!
>
>Bob,
>What's NoKaOi 3 look like?  She red, perhaps?  I might have drooled over her at the factory. - rob
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: rhodes22-list-bounces@... [mailto:rhodes22-list-bounces@...] On Behalf Of Bob and Kathy Quinn
>Sent: Friday, October 30, 2009 9:45 PM
>To: The Rhodes 22 Email List
>Subject: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!
>
> Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was successfully launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly 11 years with our recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a season with a borrowed R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a wonderful job.   We were the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has been around for years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their boat more than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy too!"
>
>That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida area up to four.
>
>Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
>__________________________________________________
>To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
>For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>__________________________________________________
>
>__________________________________________________
>To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
>For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>__________________________________________________

__________________________________________________
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__________________________________________________

[Bob and Kathy Quinn]

Pictures come shortly. 

Ron:  No, she is the standard really neat dark blue.

Bob




________________________________
From: Arthur H. Czerwonky <czerwonky@...>
To: The Rhodes 22 Email List <rhodes22-list@...>
Sent: Wed, November 4, 2009 8:42:12 PM
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!

Ron told me that he lost control.  Simply a beautiful boat, and pictures would be appreciated. 

-----Original Message-----

>From: "Lowe, Rob" <rlowe@...>
>Sent: Nov 4, 2009 3:54 PM
>To: The Rhodes 22 Email List <rhodes22-list@...>
>Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!
>
>Bob,
>What's NoKaOi 3 look like?  She red, perhaps?  I might have drooled over her at the factory. - rob
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: rhodes22-list-bounces@... [mailto:rhodes22-list-bounces@...] On Behalf Of Bob and Kathy Quinn
>Sent: Friday, October 30, 2009 9:45 PM
>To: The Rhodes 22 Email List
>Subject: [Rhodes22-list] NoKaOi "3" Launched Today!
>
> Kathy and I are pleased to announce that the "NoKaOi 3" was successfully launched and sailed today.  What a treat.  After nearly 11 years with our recycled '86 R22, five years with a Tartan 37, and a season with a borrowed R22, it was great to be sailing on a new 2010 R22.  Stan and Company did a wonderful job.   We were the talk of the marina today.  One fellow who has been around for years commented "oh yeah, thats the couple who sail their boat more than any other boat in the marina.  And they keep it looking spiffy too!"
>
>That should bring the number of Rhodes 22 sailing in the Stuart, Florida area up to four.
>
>Cheers,  Bob and Kathy
>__________________________________________________
>To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
>For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>__________________________________________________
>
>__________________________________________________
>To subscribe/unsubscribe go to http://www.rhodes22.org/mailman/listinfo/rhodes22-list
>
>For the list Charter and help with using the mailing list and archives go to http://www.rhodes22.org/list
>__________________________________________________

__________________________________________________
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__________________________________________________
__________________________________________________
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