ibinews.com International Boat Industry | JUNE–JULY 2019 39
What was the strategy that went into
this decision?
BP: “Our objective here is, in partnership with
Freedom, to engage as many consumers in the
industry as possible. There is so much passion
and energy around the industry and it is also,
really, to shape the future of boating experiences.
We think there is a large market; there are a lot
of consumers today that, if there were the right
solutions, would participate on the water, and so,
our goal is not only to support and strengthen
this business model – because it is a great
business model – but also, how do we really grow
participation in the industry?”
In five years FBC has doubled locations and tripled
membership. Is that type of growth sustainable?
JG: “When you look at the overall participation in
boating, not relative to boat ownership, but just
participation, there are so many people that recreate
on the water. So, there is a pool of people that
typically would not be in the market to buy a boat
but there in the market to get out on the water, so
I think the pool is much larger for the consumer
that we track than the typical boat purchase
arrangement. I think there is an unlimited amount
of people out there. The only barrier to growth, for
us, quite honestly is marina space and slip space.
As long as we continue to have access to water
and access to marinas and good locations, there is
nothing that’s going to slow down the Boat Club.”
OnBoard, in part, was to expose Brunswick
product to consumers. FBC utilises a variety of
brands. Is there a timeline to roll over and adopt
the fleet to Brunswick products?CC: “I think the first point to make is we did not
acquire Freedom Boat Club in order to enhance
our boat and engine sales. There will be a nice
benefit that gets unlocked over time associated
with that, but our primary objective here is to tap
into a completely new consumer segment. We
know that a very, very large portion – call it 99%
plus – of folks that are joining boat clubs have no
intention of buying a boat at the time that they join
the club. We see this as an opportunity to tap into
a whole bunch of consumers that are looking to
experience boating in a way other than ownership.
As it relates specifically to fleet adoption, we’ll be
looking to John and the entire team to figure out
what makes sense and what a thoughtful approach
there would be. We don’t come in with any
preconceived notions and we understand over time
and over the years, our job is to create value for the
franchisees, and if there’s opportunities for them to
adopt our product and they see value in that, than
we will obviously entertain that. But that’s not our
primary objective here.”BP: “And if I could just add, this partnership is
really rooted in our foresight in the market and a
focus on the consumer and where we believe the
consumer is going. And as you think about the
trends from a sharing economy, certainly engaging
more millennials, this is going to be one of the
models that we think is going to be a mainstay in
the future of marine. That was the starting point
for this partnership and our interest in this space.
I think it is natural that we bring some synergies
to the table but those really have to be very
thoughtful in how we engage and move forward.
There is a large group of franchisees and partners
we want to hear from. We’re also excited how the
insights that we’re going to gain from the Freedom
organisation can help our core business from a
product development standpoint also.”Are you suggesting the clubs can serve as
a testing ground?BP: “I think it could be. And when you look at John
and his team’s ability to engage a new consumer
and how that begins to inform boat design and our
ability to access new market, you can see a lot of
opportunity there.”JG: “We’ve done that a lot in the past with other
engine and boat manufacturers because there’s no
better testing ground than the day-to-day, some
might say ‘abuse’ but I’ll say ‘day-to-day USE’ Brenna Preisser, Brunswick Business Acceleration