In this exciting episode we talk with Carl Blackwell, the former President of Discover Boating and CMO of the NMMA (National Marine Manufactures Association). Carl, a legend in the business of boating is responsible for establishing the largest recreational boating lifestyle website (DiscoverBoating.com), which put boating in the eyes of generations. He didn’t do it alone! Hear how an approach of hiring for smart, ambitious, and nice people came to create a winning team in the difficult subject of boating!
Transcript ——
Speaker 1 [00:00:00] Shipshape.pro, the number one resource in the U.S. for Marine professionals, professionals.
Merrill [00:00:17] Today on the Shipshape podcast, we have Carl Blackwell. Carl Blackwell is the former president of Discover Boating. Former CMO of the NMMA and the to host today our MerrIll Charette a liveaboard on a Ta-Shing Tashiba 36 in Boston, Massachusetts, and Ali a liveaboard in Boston, soon to be in France. How are you doing today, Carl?
Carl [00:00:42] I am doing great. It’s great to be talking to you guys.
Merrill [00:00:46] How’d you exactly get into the maritime industry to begin with?
Carl [00:00:50] Well, I first of all, I grew up boating. And, you know, there’s something about having that experience as a kid that kind of builds that love for the water. I was working for the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, which nobody’s heard of, but they may have heard of the campaign called beef. It’s what’s for dinner. And I was working for them. I’d been there about eight years. I was running their marketing for them and new products, believe it or not. And I went to the doctor one day and he he looked at my blood work and he said, What are you eating? I’m like, Well, I have all these home economists that work for me. So I’m I’m they all have kids and they’re all slimy Girl Scout cookies. So I’m eating Girl Scout cookies and beef. And that’s about it. And he said, well, you’ve got to make a change there. So I decided to look for a new job. And fortunately, my timing was perfect because right around that time, the National Marine Manufacturers Association, the Boating World Association that represents boat manufacturers, they were looking to start their own national consumer marketing campaign. So my timing couldn’t have been better. And so when I saw an ad, I mean, who sees that ad anymore in a newspaper even? I think that was the last time that I probably ever looked at the Help wanted ads in the newspaper. But tiny little ad looking to start a national advertising campaign for boating. And I’m like, Wow. I mean, I grew up boating. I love boating. You know, I got to get out of beef. Maybe I’ll eat a little bit more fish if I go to the boating industry. I answered the ad and I had a lot of interest. I interviewed with them the the Boating Association about seven times. I had interviews with board members. I had interviews with pretty much every staff member counterparts. And, you know, I also was interested I interviewed with people that were going to report to me. So that’s always kind of interesting because they’re asking me questions like, Are you going to be a tough boss? And what do you say to that? I’m going to be a fair boss. I’m not going to be a pushover. And they made me take psychological tests. I mean, I could have told them I was crazy, but 8 hours of testing and I was starting to get a little frustrated. I’m like, All right, guys, you have to make a decision here because you’re wasting my whole summer. I’m going to be out boating. And so they sat down and they got it, gathered everybody in the room that talked to me, and they were trying to make the final decision. It was me and another gentleman and one of the staffers you would have reported to me who actually did eventually said, you know, I don’t know. I think we should go for the other guy. Karl is going to make us accountable. And I’m like, and the president, Tom Ridge, looked at her and said, well, that’s exactly why we should hire Carl. So I have that former staffer to thank for saying that I would make them accountable for my job within the boating industry. And I got to tell you, I’m so lucky that lucky that work have worked at an industry that I grew up was passionate about and I could do marketing. And that’s really what was my professional passion. And so I started there in 2003.
Merrill [00:04:10] So grow boating and discover boating. You know, they’ve made a ton of impacts when it comes to bringing people into the maritime industry. So when you were coming in, what was the scene like for boating in general?
Carl [00:04:24] There wasn’t a Discover boating campaign when I started. Well, I should say there was, but it was just a shell was a really bad website and a couple of brochures, and they did a couple of events and they weren’t reaching anybody, not anybody to speak of. And the industry had tried to actually start this three times and then it could never come to consensus. At least they understood that they needed to have an umbrella campaign to get people interested and start it and replace all those people that were getting out of boating and on the industry was, you know, chugging along, doing okay. They weren’t they? Are gaining a lot of customers, but they weren’t losing too many. So I give them a foresight to actually, you know, want to get out in front of this. So we did a tremendous amount of consumer research, pulled together all the research that people had done in the industry. We got a lot of consumer insights and we actually based our pitch on the industry on that research. And it’s hard to argue with research facts and figures. And that’s what was happening before everybody was arguing on opinions and not on facts. And so that was what we did differently this time. And sure enough, the industry voted unanimously to support the Discover Boating campaign. Everybody contributed and off we were running. And so that first couple of years I had to build a new website that was back when DVDs and CDs were popular. So I had to create a CD too, that could send out to people to get them engaged and interested in voting. And what that also was for the voting industry. That was a lead generator. Hey, this person said, I want to get into voting. And so we captured their information and then we were able to connect them to both manufacturers and and that actually gave the manufacturers some tangible benefits to keep them interested and continuing to fund this. But in 2005, we launched our first television ad campaign. We also had big three page spreads in Time magazine, Sports Illustrated. We did a lot of digital advertising. And you got to remember, back in 2005, digital wasn’t very big and and off we went. And so that’s kind of how it started. It’s really just getting everybody in the industry in a room and pleading our case. And they all signed off on that.
Ali [00:06:52] Very interesting. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with it’s sort of an Internet trend, but it’s how it started versus how it’s going. We just heard how it started. How is it going now? How would you say, you know, things are current day?
Carl [00:07:08] Well, in the beef industry, but we were federally mandated funding every time a head of cattle got. So the dollar went into a pot and that was federally mandated to be spent on marketing. It’s a lot of commodity co-op programs out there that are, you know, are done that way well in the body world. And any time leaders of the industry have said, we’re not going to fund this anymore, you’re not doing a good job anymore, darl, we’re pulling the plug. Well, that didn’t happen. And it hasn’t happened yet because, I mean, it’s a voluntary thing, even though, you know, you have to contribute if you’re a member of the National Marine Manufacturers Association, they you know, the leaders could, you know, decide we don’t want to do this anymore. So over the years, it’s been doing really well. I will tell you, though, a couple of stories about the recession. You know, when the recession hit in 2007, boy, the bottom fell out of both sales and both manufacturers were pretty much stopped their lines. They were just trying to sell the inventory that was in the pipeline. But I remember one significant boat manufacturer say to me, Carl, we’ve hit rock bottom. I no longer have any orders in my system. And this particular company just built a gigantic expansion. Its invested millions of dollars and he had none. No, no bids. And so the the industry got together, said, listen, we’ve got some great momentum with Discover boating, but we cannot continue to fund it at the level we were. We’re going to cut it back to $1,000,000 a year. I Carl, you got to keep the lights on with the billion dollars a year. Now, that may sound like a lot of money, especially back then. But for a national advertising campaign, that wasn’t a lot of money. And so what we turned to, believe it or not, that kept us going was we kept our website up, certainly, but we went to Facebook, this funny little social media company called Facebook, and we started to grow organically and we actually paid for, you know, people to come to our page and start to interact with people because people didn’t stop boating. We just stopped funding our advertising. In fact, there was they didn’t sell a lot of boats during that phase. But, you know, people that owned those boats, that was their escape. And so we built this really strong Facebook community. We actually at the time, I don’t I don’t know if it still is this big, but we had over a million followers. And I know that is by far the largest boating group on Facebook in the world. In fact, they did case studies on us. And during that recession, we actually created a couple of games. We created the first, what we call it, a movie maker, where you could download seven or eight photos from your Audi. On bugs and we created a we we take that and create a video out of that. We would we would we attach some music to it and all of a sudden eight pictures you create a memory of your day on voting. We did a lot of different tactics like that, and so we decided to submit what we did in this case study to the organization. And that is one of the top advertising groups that offer awards. And but it’s based on how best to be where there’s a lot of there’s a lot of ad campaigns out there that you could create a beautiful, pretty ad. And it may not do anything, but the campaign actually took into account all of the results from it. And we beat out everybody and the $1 million and less category in the world, the best advertising campaign under under $1,000,000. So that was one of my you know, we don’t want to things get tough. You know, you get tougher. And and I knew that at any point the boat manufacturers could kill this program and I might be without a job. So I needed to make sure that we kept boating front and center. And then fortunately, things like that, the economy started coming back and off. We run again and we’re in the campaigns going strong to this day.
Merrill [00:11:16] Well, when you’re talking about all of this, it sounds like an unbelievable amount of work. So, you know, you totally had a team. How did you build out your team?
Carl [00:11:25] Hey, we had a great group of staff. In fact, you know, some of those staff are still there. Some have moved on and they’ve turned out to be just superstars in the industry. And I would say probably one of my most cherished accomplishments is hiring a great group of people, keeping them motivated, and frankly, having them work on boating wasn’t that hard. I mean, they loved boating as well, and that’s keeping them together and keeping them focused. And we did a lot of great things. And I could tell you about some of the things we did together, but we also hired a really strong marketing agency. At the time I was Olsen. And, you know, when you surround yourself with good people, good things are going to happen. And I wasn’t the kind of a leader that was worried about somebody taking my job. I mean, frankly, if somebody came in and took my job, I probably deserved to. But I thought I’d said, I’m going to bring in good people, people that are smarter than me and these areas that I don’t know all that above and came in and shined. And we built a great team. Again, one of my most cherished accomplishments. I’ve been very fortunate throughout my career. I’ve been surrounded myself with very good people.
Ali [00:12:36] So besides just pure luck went well. What have you done or what did you do to build that team that you think brought out the best in the people of the industry? And it worked so well? Yeah.
Carl [00:12:48] Well, you know, some of the things that I did, I never put myself above the fray. I was always in the trenches. I was never afraid to get in and do what they were doing or show them, you know, how I have done it in the past. I mean, fortunately and you grow up and I’ve been in marketing positions all my life and I got a chance to be a teacher now, and I really got a kick out of that. And so I would get in the trenches with these guys or we would find a problem and we would work it out together. And you got to recognize the folks, too. And, you know, I had a great boss myself, and Tom Dobrik is a fantastic mentor and, you know, just an incredible industry leader. And he encouraged me to just just work with these folks hands on and make them know that you care about them, fight the fights with them. And I put a lot of I put in a lot of hours. Unfortunately, I probably spent too many hours there, 9 to 9 every day. But, you know, the simple things get in the trenches with them, show them your care, let them come up with some ideas, don’t smother them, let their creative juices. You got to motivate them, too. You’re going to hire smart people and turn them loose. You can’t micromanage them. And because we had experts in different areas, I mean, one of the bigger challenges in making sure everybody got along and worked hard together and I spent a lot of time, you know, trying to make sure everybody played nice in the sandbox. So I hired here’s a here’s a little chap I hired smart, I hire ambitious people. But the secret ingredient was nice. It had to be nice. And if they were smart and they were ambitious, but they weren’t nice, that created problems for me. So I had to bring in people that were nice and that really just enabled the success of the team. How did it work? Every time? And then there was a couple of people that snuck in that maybe didn’t fit very well, but 90% of time I had those three traits. We were going to be successful.
Merrill [00:14:50] Now, when it comes to marketing in the maritime industry, and you’re going to have to tell me if I’m wrong with this, but there is like a you kind of need to know the language. Have both in order to really be able to market and write content and in all of that. So how do you manage that where a lot of these people coming in already voting? You know, at some point in their life, or how did you educate that?
Carl [00:15:13] Well, a lot of the types of skill sets that I was hiring for, especially early on, didn’t exist out there in the industry. There were a lot of great websites. There weren’t a lot of great, you know, advertisers and good PR people. So I had to actually take some of these people and with those great skill sets and I had the happy patients and teach them about the industry. But I will tell you, I strived all the time to find the boating, the boating knowledge, first and foremost, because it takes a good year to to I mean, it’s a22 year commitment to 1a2 year commitment to get people up to speed. And especially when it comes to contents, I hired you know, I mean, if you’re writing content, you have you’re going to get called out. If you don’t know the right stuff about boating, you show the wrong picture, you use the wrong term and boating. And the boaters, the boat industry will call you out. Boaters will call you up. Absolutely. So my content people were definitely calling from the boating world. And I’ll throw out a little you know, the best person I ever hired was Kim Kardashian, who was a content person for Boots.com. She came to work for me and she did a fabulous job. And now she’s doing it for Boat Center. But our content is the relatively new thought process, and it’s so undervalued. I mean, the writers in this industry are so undervalued. I don’t know how they I don’t know why you guys don’t get paid twice as much as you do, because what you do is valuable.
Ali [00:16:48] And I’m like, I pay those guys and we can’t afford it. Yeah, right, Right.
Carl [00:16:53] Well, people ought to pay for content and celebrities.
Ali [00:16:57] Right. I couldn’t agree more. And it’s funny when you say that, I’ll call you out. If you say the wrong word, they’ll call you out. If you say the right word, it’s just not the right word for them. Right. Letters are extremely opinionated.
Carl [00:17:09] Oh, yeah. And we always are on our toes. Believe me, we had to apologize. We had to go out and make edits by somebody. And that’s the beauty of our digital world. We can make those changes pretty fast.
Merrill [00:17:20] So, you know, when it comes to discover boating, you know, before you left, how many did you ever come up with the statistic of how many people you actually got into the industry?
Carl [00:17:31] Well, you know, data was hard to come by. I know that we we were crushing ladder parts the last 2019 or so. We were pushing 2 to 3 million people from our websites to boat manufacturing sites. And that’s a lot of interested people. And if they drilled down on our site and got all the way to a boat manufactured site, that they probably were pretty interested in boating and we were putting in we were using cookies back at the time to try to figure out, you know, information about that, not personal information about it, but, you know, to really try to track where they went when they left our site, did they go to that boat buying section? But there was only so much we could do. But I will tell you, when people used to fill out forms, when they’ve signed up for a DVD or they signed up for for something, we could take that information and then scrape that against voter registration databases. And what we found that 12% of the people that signed up for a DVD or a brochure on Discover Boating ended up buying a boat that has one heck of a batting average really for a lead system. And that’s what kept the boat manufacturers and the dealers all behind us. And sometimes, you know, if they didn’t sell, they did sell a boat themselves. Well, you know, they didn’t know that that person went to our site always either because they weren’t reporting their sales to us. But the Coast Guard and, you know, through a voter registration database, was able to provide that to us. And and then we could just scrape those names against that. And we had a heck of a heck of a run there. So we sold boats. But our mission, though, was to sell boating. We needed to get people interested in boating and we needed to get them on the water. We had to inspire them to get out on the water because you guys know this. If you get people on the water and they’re going to boats, they’re, you know, that’s the strongest tool anybody has. That’s what I love about this industry is we have this recreation that is so appealing. When I get people on my boat, when they step off the dock and they step on the deck of my boats, they just change. Their whole demeanor changes. And then when I start to pull out of the harbor and I ask them, how do you guys feel it now? And they’re like, We’re on top of the world. We’re happy. And it’s just you can see it because when you see it before on the dock, they’re a stressed that I did this with media a lot, you know. They come out, you know, they’ve got to worry about deadlines and get them on a boat and they don’t want to come back because they just love it out there. So there’s magic, you know, boating, certainly magical.
Ali [00:20:10] Yeah. So I’m speaking about your boat. Tell us a little bit more about your boat in the background, I believe.
Carl [00:20:16] Yeah, that’s my boat. I’m proud of my boat. It’s a little cabin cruiser. I’m on Lake Michigan in Chicago, and you kind of need a boat. I mean, 32 feet. You need you need a boat that big to be able to kind of weather the winds and the waves and and just be able to cut through the water pretty well. And I it took me a year to name my boats because, you know, I’m president of Discover Boating. You know, I’m all about marketing the boating lifestyle. I can’t just go with any boat, you know. And I come up, my friends were giving me a lot of ideas, you know, some names that were probably a little R-rated or, you know, I’m like, you know, I’m not going to go with that. Maybe, you know, I can’t do that. And one name was I thought was kind of funny, was kind of named after, you know, a dog is your best man’s best friend. Well, I kind of thought a boat was man’s best friend. So that was going to be the name at one point. But so I would bring out a bottle of champagne every time he would go out this one bottle. And we were sitting around drinking that champagne one time. And a friend of mine asked me, you know, why the champagne bottle? You know, why do you always bring a bottle of champagne every time we go out? I said, No, there’s really no reason we’re celebrating life. Life is good, man. We’re on a we’re on a boat. And then it dawned on me. The name is Champagne for no reason. Champagne really being a a symbol for celebration and no reason means celebrate every day. Because you could go on a boat every day if you want. And so it just kind of stuck champagne for no reason. And I’ve actually won a couple of contests for best boat names. And this actually is my second boat with that name. My first boat job, I made an agreement with the dealer that the know the name was going off the boat. I didn’t want anybody else with that name, and I didn’t really want to name my new boat Champagne for no reason too, because the name is kind of long and I didn’t want to add any more words or symbols or anything, so. But yeah, I spent a lot of time on champagne for no reason.
Ali [00:22:21] I love that. Let’s start.
Merrill [00:22:24] How often do you get to go out?
Carl [00:22:27] I’m in a really great spot here in Chicago. I’m really close to Soldier Field, and there’s also a little island out there called Northerly Island, and there’s a concert venue there. And so I could get out to my boat and I didn’t even have to leave the dock. I could sit there and listen to concerts. In fact, the Goo Goo Dolls are playing there tonight. And if I wanted to go listen to the Goo Goo Goo Dolls, I could go down, open the boat up, crack open a beer, or maybe a bottle of champagne and listen to the music without leaving my boat. And it’s right in front of the bar in a park yacht club where I’m a member. And so it’s so convenient for myself and my friends. So I just spent a lot of time really right at the dock. And we have a whole community out there. And if you guys know your boats that are dock, it is a community and everybody helps each other. You could be a plumber or you could be an ice surgeon, but you’re equal when you’re on the boat or on the dock, and everybody just helps everybody. And I just really love that about the boating community is we’re all equal. We’re not pretentious. Maybe some people are, but not on my dock and we’ll help each other out. In fact, we stay friends. We’re in Chicago, so we get only boat five months of the year. So we stay friends year round. We really enjoy our company.
Merrill [00:23:43] Yeah, it’s definitely a unique situation to be in and, you know, boat ownership and the relationships that you make, you know, it is a commonality. Like you run into some of the fanciest, richest people and you have a commonality of boat, and so you just immediately bond. And, you know, that’s one of the things that I’ve loved about it.
Ali [00:24:03] Yeah, No, I think keeps everybody at the same level, which is really important. You know, I think in the whole world that would be a lot like that. Boating does a really good job of exemplifying that. Absolutely.
Carl [00:24:13] So, you know, you need help from people like, you know, how did you tie that? Not I mean, simple stuff like that. And that’s a common thread through all boats are who do you call when something’s wrong with their windless or, you know, clogged head for heaven’s sakes. You know, you know and if you’re if you’re a really rich, super bad guy or if you’re, you know, a little tiny runabout, you know, you’ve got those issues and so you can bond together.
Merrill [00:24:40] So what is give me a good boating story. What is one of your favorite boating memories that you have?
Carl [00:24:46] Wow. Well, I have. And I make them every weekend. I try to at least I could tell I could tell you my worst day in boating. How to do it. Yeah, I’m actually a little infamous for that. This is kind of embarrassing, but this is going to be now a more realized. But I was talking to a billionaire owner of a boat company. One day I was heading to the boat. I was trying to get out early on a Friday. So he was yelling about to me about something, something that wasn’t even my fault. But I had to take it anyway because he was billionaire boat owner and he was a bully. And you just did that with this gentleman. I’m better. People out there could probably figure out who I’m talking about. You’ve been around here very long. And so after I got done getting berated for an hour on the phone, I, I had a flip phone at the time. And so I clapped the cops, the phone, and I brought my elbow back and my elbow hit up here or a pylon and it hit my funny bone and then my foot, my phone went flying out of my hand and I could see it, you know, ten feet down in the water. But I lost my phone. So that name of the day was just getting worse. So I had that. This time I was on a star dock, which is sort of like a mooring, a remote mooring. And I had to roll my boat out there to it. So I rode my boat out there, got on it, got to the boat, and I needed to check my engine room to see to check something in the engine. And I got down there and the engine in this case was it was a 26 series. So I had to get down into the belly of the boat and the hydraulic lift. Something snapped and it came crashing down and it left me about two or three inches of air. So now I’m stuck in this hydraulic, you know, in this room with a hydraulic lift attached. I couldn’t lift it and push it back up. I want to mooring, remember? So there’s not a lot of people around there. And it’s a hot summer day without my phone. And so I’m like, oh, boy, what am I going to do? And I’m like, Well, it’s a Friday. I hope I have some friends coming out here on this Friday afternoon. So I’m down there for a while and I found this metal bar and I thought, Well, you know, I want to take my shirt off. I have a white shirt on, so I’m going to try to bend this bar to get out of that three inch gap. I’m going to try to hold it up and wave the white flag when boats are driving by. So I did that for about 2 hours. I’m hot down there. You remember I’m in an engine room and I’m trying to waving the white flag, but nobody could see it because I could barely get it on the wall. And so I thought, what am I going to do? Am I going to have to put a hole in the side of this boat and add this fiberglass to get my way out of here or I’m going to die in the bottom of this boat? So finally, a friend of mine came over on a start up one away, and I heard him work it on his boat and I’m screaming at the top of my lungs. And Bailey says, Carlos, that’s you. And I’m like, Yes. And he can’t see me. And of course, I said, Help. We he had to row his boat over to me. And fortunately, he got me out the end of that story. I thought I was going to die on a hot summer day in Chicago. So I rode my boat back in. I get my car, I throw my t shirt and my keys in the front seat. I go right back and shut the trunk and I realized I had locked my keys in the car with my shirt in there. And I had no keys, I had no phone, and I had really sweaty and smelly. And some girls walked by and they they took pity on me. They were leaving. I said, could you I’ll sit in your trunk. I’ll sit in the back of your car. Can you give me a ride to my house? I don’t have any money. I don’t have a driver’s license. I don’t have a phone at all. I’m sure I stink. So they take me to my place, my condo. Fortunately, they were there. They took pity on me. They were kind of cute, and I would have probably hit on them. But I knew they weren’t interested in me. So I go to go to my doorman. He buzzes me. Yeah. And then I start. I’m shirtless, I stink, and he looks at me like you can’t walk in the lobby because I’m in a high rise. You can’t walk in the lobby without your shirt on. And so I said, Don’t start with me. I’m walking in this lobby, I’m going up to my condo. I don’t care if I’m Shermans. So that’s the end of my terrible day. I took it. I went down and apologized to the doorman for yelling at him. But that’s my worst day in boating. I mean, and my friends, my colleagues will. We’ll talk about the time that I got stuck in the engine room all the time. And now. Now more of them. Well.
Ali [00:29:22] That is a great story and I need to compose myself.
Merrill [00:29:28] That would have been quite interesting. And for, you know, the founder or president of Grow Boating and Discover Boating. Yeah.
Carl [00:29:36] That thought did go through my mind. But the I guess the benefit was there was I wasn’t going to have to tell the story because I would have been very, very well-liked. But because I always think about all the soundbites I’d have to come up with to try to explain this. But it happened about 15 years ago. So, you know, I haven’t done it again, but I won’t go my engine room without making really darn sure. Or the left’s not going to break anything.
Merrill [00:30:01] How long were you actually trapped in the bowels of the boat?
Carl [00:30:05] I was there for 2 hours and I knew I could probably bust into the water tank if I needed water. I mean, the ones that drill a hole in your own water tank, You know, I had I think I had one tool, which was a hammer with me that I could reach as I was, you know, with that three inch gap. So my I really was thinking about busting a hole to the side of the boat, but then I might fit my leg because I probably would have braided a leak and then I would have been a problem.
Ali [00:30:33] Oh, well, you might save someone’s life someday by sharing stories. Yeah.
Carl [00:30:41] There you go.
Merrill [00:30:42] So getting back to the maritime industry, you know, how has the dynamics of the industry changed since you came in in the early 2000 compared to what it is now?
Carl [00:30:53] Well, you know, there’s been a lot of consolidation in a lot of niches. I mean, when I first started, there were and there still are there were like a thousand boat brands. I mean, I don’t know how many car brands there are, but they’re probably only, you know, 30 or 40 that really make any kind of volume of boats. And the boat industry, there are a lot of brands out there, small little brands serving small little niches. So there there wasn’t a lot of money to spend and research and development and new technology. Basically, they were just trying to keep the doors open by building a few niche boats. And then we started to see a little bit of consolidation. And and so then that enabled these companies to afford to do a little research and development and create more synergies and, you know, think out of the box a little bit. And you’re seeing that obviously with Brunswick and and some of the other companies out there that are buying in. And now you’re starting to see, you know, two or three brands team up and work together because they have to be to be competitive. And so you see that in the marina world. You see a couple of big companies emerging and buying up marinas. You see that in the dealer world, you know, because there’s we just need to be able to afford some efficiencies out there. If the world’s going up and our world is going to evolve, you’ve got to be able to afford that research and development and making those investments. So I think that’s a good thing for the industry and it’s not something that anybody should fear. You know, it it really they embrace it. And so that’s yeah, that’s one thing that I think is happening. And I also should mention that’s happening in the boats, the accessory community as well. It’s just guys are starting to consolidate a little bit more. And I really do think that’s positive and there’s not enough business to go around for the number of brands that there used to be. We just need consolidation. I also think that big data is finally reaching boating, boating. We need to take the data out there that the automobile guys have embraced and apply some of that stuff or just play our own data and come up with data and and make boating easier for people. You know, people don’t have a lot of patience these days. I mean, you guys are sailors and you understand that full well, that, you know, that takes a lot of time and effort to to sail. And now that the younger adult or the older adult really doesn’t want to, you know, spend that time and energy to do that. So I think you’re seeing boating made easier. And that’s got to continue. I think that there’s there’s companies out there today that do boat monitoring that can monitor all the systems within your boat. So you’ve got a smart boat and that’s going to help the consumer know when, hey, there’s there’s trouble coming. I mean, in the past I know my boat, my impeller needed to be replaced. I didn’t think about it until it went bad. Today’s technology, I’m going to get a warning before it goes bad and I’m going to be able to solve that before I get out on the water. My boat gets overheated and I could think of a thousand different applications there with with having good data on your boat. And, you know, some of the some of the websites that are springing up to help with service service is key to loyalty, and that’ll drive people out of boating. If you don’t have a good source for service or you’re not getting good service, you know nothing’s going to drive you out of boating faster. And I think the industry recognized that and are trying to address the service issue as well. And it’s so important to our industry. And, you know, the boat doesn’t have to stand for break out another thousand. Really. I would like boat to stand for best of all times when we’ve got a ways to go. But I see those trends emerging that I think are really going to come to the forefront.
Merrill [00:34:47] Now, you’re also considered a master networker in the maritime space and the social dynamics of, you know, people And in this industry are I. Feel like unique. Could you talk a little bit about that?
Carl [00:35:01] You know, when I first started in the industry, I was an outsider. I came from the beef industry. Well, I got to do with boats, although they both start with a B, you know, there’s nothing there. So one thing I did really early on in my career was I bought a boat because I felt like I needed to bond with people. And having that boating knowledge, that really accelerated my boating knowledge. I mean, we had a company boat and Mama and I took advantage of that as often as I could. I learned to drive the boat and I did a lot of the maintenance myself. But inevitably, all the good weekends, the president would take the boat out and I would be stranded somewhere. And so I said, I’ve got to have my own boat. So I went and bought my boat and by my learning curve just skyrocketed. And now I was one of them. I was one of the other people in the industry. And I don’t think it’s as bad today. But I’ll tell you, back in 2003, if you weren’t a boater or you didn’t have a connection to the boating, it took you two or three years to break in. And I don’t know you guys are a little newer to boating than I am. I don’t know if you faced the same experiences that I did back then, but I’ll let you answer that. I think I’d be interested to hear what you guys.
Ali [00:36:17] Well, I can say that. I mean, I got into the boating industry in around 2010. I want to say I’ve been a liveaboard for about ten years and I’m about to leave living board for a while. Moving on to land, which I described, I think in my last piece is like I feel like I’m like cutting my arm off and swimming across the ocean to France. This is not an easy transition, but I feel like I’m finally at a place in my career where I don’t have to be a liveaboard or own this boat to be taken seriously. So I can relate to what you’re saying. For a long time it was like if I didn’t own a boat, our wasn’t living on a boat. My opinion was sort of less valid. Like I didn’t know what I was talking about. How could I?
Merrill [00:37:06] And then, you know, my side of things, like coming into the industry, I had a lot of good advisors. So not only did I build a general contracting company, so I had to wrangle a bunch of harbor pirates to basically, you know, accept the jobs that I gave them, but I also did chartering with this guy that, you know, pretty much in Boston, he would be like the Lord pirate. And he had such an attitude. He was one of the meanest people I ever met. But it taught me really how to, like, communicate with other people because maritime is full of extremes. Right? And everyone is like has this unique perspective and, you know, just learning how to communicate effectively to, you know, be taken seriously. I never really had too much difficulty with that. I will say that coming into the space and, you know, kind of what I’m doing is innovation. There’s some people that like innovation and are working towards that and we’ll help you out. But there are other people that are just, you know, too busy with other things that they got going on that, you know, they’re less forward thinking, I guess.
Ali [00:38:22] Considering most of our demographic are people that didn’t necessarily grow up with most of my demographic, at least for the magazines, are people that didn’t grow up with the Internet and stuff like that. It’s it’s a difficult transition. But I think what Merrill is saying, like, it completely overlaps with marketing too, because it’s like, how do you get these people in to what you’re trying to share without offending them or making them feel comfortable and not like you’re beyond what they’re capable of sort of understanding?
Carl [00:38:56] Well, you know, I think it takes an open mind to if somebody is coming into the industry, you know, with discipline, marketing disciplines, you know, and that are very good, you know, they just have to be patient. I mean, their skills are needed. We need their skills in our industry. There are nuances that aren’t obvious to in our industry that they’ve got to pick up on. And one of the things I tell young people when they get into the industry, I’m like, Shut up and listen. Now they can be really smart, but just shut up and listen for 90 days. Ask questions, be curious because you’re going to be a hell of a lot smarter in this industry in 90 days, and you are going to be in day one and I don’t care how talented you are. And so but, you know, Merrill, I’ve watched you and your career and, you know, I really admire the networking that you’ve been able to do. And people can do that. Now, people out there in the industry as our patterns or what you want to call us, you know, we are we want to help you, you know, I mean, we like to we like to talk. And we like to help people. And I always encourage people to get out and ask network because I think people, you know, that’s human nature. They want to help. They want to pass their knowledge along. Especially especially older ones. You know, we definitely because we don’t have anything to lose, you know, let’s just let’s just pass our knowledge along to people. And I really encourage people to network. You know, now you’ve got these wonderful tools like LinkedIn and you’ve got all these other ways to network with people, and I encourage you to do it to pick up the phone and call. I mean, I do think people have kind of forgotten the the habit of picking up the phone and calling. Nothing establishes the relationship faster than a phone call or what we’re doing today where we get on a Zoom call with somebody and you know you’re going to bond. I mean, there’s a couple of people I’ve been talking to here recently. I spent an hour with them. You know, they call me up again. I’m going to talk to them and I’m going to help them in whatever I do for them. It’s never going to come back to me, but it’s good karma. And so I really appreciate people that are brave enough to pick up the phone and call and talk to people, because I really do think they’ll they’ll they’ll help you.
Ali [00:41:10] I couldn’t agree with you more. I do think picking up the phone is terrifying. Personally, I hate doing that, but when I do, I end up having a two hour long conversation. If they’re in the building and usually, you know, it starts off about something professional. And then we’re telling our story about how I got stuck, you know, in the village on the boat for 4 hours. And it drags on and on. But it’s that’s how you build the connections. And I feel like in that table and network.
Merrill [00:41:39] So as we start to wrap this up, what would be your best piece of advice that you’ve gotten in the maritime industry and the best piece of advice that you’ve gotten outside of the maritime industry?
Carl [00:41:52] Well, I think I told you I went when I went and bought a boat, I’m pretty sure somebody told me to to get in the industry because I was asking like, how do I break in? How do I break through? And these old salty dogs, you know, they don’t want to talk to me. And I got a pretty important job to do and I need to talk to them. And it was probably Tom Dom who told me that, you know, you got to just you got to become one of them. And, you know, Tom is a great leader, a great mentor, and you got to seek those people out and stay stay in touch with them. So I would do that. So I would say that’s part of what I learned in the industry. You know, I’ll give you a piece of advice that find balance. I worked a lot of hours in my career and but at the end I was burnt out, though I’m not done. I mean, I took a little sabbatical and I’m back now, but I took a little sabbatical. I was burnt out. And it’s because I just didn’t take the time to find balance. So that’s important. You don’t have to work 9 to 9 every day. Your staff doesn’t want to work 9 to 9 every day. So remember that you’re in boating and practice what you preach, Get out there and boats and a couple of other little pieces of advice I’d give younger people today. And it goes to that relationship building skills. I told you I wanted to pick up the phone and call them because you just that’s much stronger than texting or emailing. Take an improv class. How about that for advice? Have some fun. Take a improv class. Take an acting class, because that’s going to make you a better public speaker and that’s going to take away that shyness that you might have and make you a little bit more confident and have fun doing it. I mean, I took a lot of public speaking classes. None of them really stuck until I took an improv class, decided to have a little fun and to be able to talk off the cuff. And so I highly encourage people to do that. And another thing that I would do to make you think strategically. Play chess. I could play chess before I was six years old. I did that before I could read. Now it takes it takes a long time to play chess. Well, so maybe there’s something else today digitally that you could play that would teach you strategy. My point is, is that chess enables you to think two or three steps down the road and makes you think about the different paths that you can take because there are a lot of path you can take. There’s a lot of path to victory you could take and just think through each step in that path. What makes the most sense for you? So anyway, maybe there’s another game out there that’s a little more practical than chess, but think about that.
Ali [00:44:29] I heard the word all is pretty popular right now.
Merrill [00:44:33] Yeah, I thought it was pretty funny. The improv section. I was coming from standup comedy at one point, and so I got booed off the stage a good bit, you know, pretty much more more than, you know, claps. So, you know, I got used to talking and being, you know, on the hot seat.
Ali [00:44:54] When we both come from a creative background. I was a playwright, but I didn’t have to get on stage. This is as close to understand as I’ll ever be, and it’s terrifying.
Carl [00:45:04] I just took the classes. I never had the guts to go and perform. So you went further, Merrill?
Merrill [00:45:11] Yeah. Well, you know, I didn’t take a class, and that was abundantly clear. So, you know, it was great talking to you. And, you know, where can people kind of find out about you or. Or hear what you’re doing or follow you? Yeah.
Carl [00:45:30] Well, I have a pretty big LinkedIn following, so you can find me on LinkedIn. I do have a Twitter. I haven’t been using it much lately, but you can find me there as well. But LinkedIn and I did just start a new job. I came out of retirement. It has been announced yet, so you’ll have to follow me on LinkedIn to figure out where I got it. It is a job that inspired me to retire from retirement, so it had to be something pretty good and it enabled me to really I wanted to make a difference in the industry and boating has been on fire the last couple of years, but that now there’s a challenge of keeping people and boating. So it has something to do with retention and it’s something that I studied a lot when I was in my job. And now I’m going to pour myself into this and I’m really looking forward to getting back in the industry. So I’ll be talking to you guys often.
Ali [00:46:25] Are you afraid of Shark?
Carl [00:46:27] No, not really. I know.
Merrill [00:46:29] There’s no sharks out in, you know, those Great Lakes.
Carl [00:46:31] Right? You know what? I tell people that sometimes it’s pretty funny that some people actually believe me. But no, I mean, I swim. I mean, I’m not going to jump in with a hammerheads swirling around, you know, with a bloody leg or anything. But I love wildlife. I’m fascinated by Fish and Wildlife and certainly I’m fascinated by sharks.
Ali [00:46:53] They are great.
Carl [00:46:54] Questions.
Ali [00:46:55] Your standards are pretty low. Like you’re not going to jump in with a bloody leg. Okay.
Merrill [00:47:02] Well, it was amazing to talk to you, Carl.
Ali [00:47:05] Yeah. Thank you so much.
Carl [00:47:06] My pleasure, guys. Thank you.
Speaker 4 [00:47:14] And check back every Tuesday for our latest episode and be sure to, like, share and subscribe to shipshape. Doc Pro. Doc Pro.
Engine 
Electrical 
Plumbing 
Transportation 
Boat Builder 
Yacht Designer 
Below Waterline 
Hardware 
Above Waterline 
Sailboat 
Power Generation 
Winter 
Interior 
Haul Out 
Surveyor