FEEDBACK
In his blog titled “Where will all the money
go?” Norm Schultz discusses the NMMA’s
decision to halt the national “Grow
Boating” campaign and redirect the
majority of the funds to manufacturers
to help spur dealer sales.
won’t have to argue about food and water
after they become hungry and thirsty.
Anyone in this lifeboat who thinks the redistribution of the Grow Boating wealth is
going to improve the status of the industry had better find a recipe for fricassee
seagull — and I don’t mean an old British
outboard motor!”
“Now, it’s not my view that the decision
is necessarily a bad one, given the economic realities. However, it is surely an unfortunate one,” he wrote. “Dropping the excellent national media campaign that has
been building momentum over the last
three years is a major setback at a time
when it would be most desirable to continue the forward motion.
“The greatest risk in all this will be the
nearly impossible task each boatbuilder
now faces in trying to deal fairly and equally with all dealers,” he added.
The following is a sample of the comments received on our “Dealer Outlook”
blog site in response to the post.
David G. Brown wrote:
“Killing Grow Boating and passing
around the money is about as smart as
castaways in a lifeboat eating and drinking their fill on the first day adrift so they
*
Larry Rodriguez wrote:
“Norm and all of us know when something you’ve been using successfully no
longer works because the market changed,
it’s time to reassess and change the ‘
something,’ not do away with it altogether, or
worse yet, dock it and send [money] back
to those you worked so hard to convince
originally, about the wisdom of an unbiased party doing it!
It’s unfortunate indeed; worse yet anyone
(present non-boaters) who visited the recent Fort Lauderdale boat show and had to
pay $18 at the door (on regular days, mind
you) just to walk through it (never mind the
parking fees!), and in these economic
times, well ‘my friends’ (to quote McCain),
they will tell you in simple terms, Ouch!” n
COMMENTS
Arch wrote:
“Good stuff, Norm. Here are my 2 cents.
If the money is going back to its source, it
shouldn’t be up to NMMA to decide what
they do with it. These companies are LOSING MONEY; it should go straight back into
their bank accounts. With boat show season around the corner, I’m sure the money
will be spent on boat shows anyways.”
* *
Jeff wrote:
“My questions: 1. Why should the
dealers continue to give boat manufacturers any Grow Boating money? For
every dollar the dealer invests, at most
the dealer will see 85 cents back!
(Sounds like government to me!) 2. Boat
manufacturers already have funds budgeted for marketing and boat shows.
How can Grow Boating verify to the dealers that the 85 cents we get back is in
addition to those budgeted funds?
(Looks like the dealers will be funding
their own programs!) 3. Is this what the
media has been referring to when they
discuss “redistribution of wealth?”
*
Gordy McKelvey wrote:
“My 3 cents worth: Give the money back
to the boat owners. They are the ones who
ultimately paid for the Grow Boating boondoggle. Basically it went like this: NMMA
extorted the money from the manufacturers, the manufactures passed the cost on
to the dealers, and the dealers passed the
cost on to the boat buyers. Sort of like the
Bush tax rebate. Ya Think!”
Your thoughts?
Weigh in with your own opinion
by e-mailing
editorial@tradeonlytoday.com
