Highs and Lows of Marine Retailers.

I have been holding out on you for purely selfish reasons. I waited to tell you about the best darned marine book selection until I found the last book I really, really wanted. Yes, West Marine will carry a few books and you can always order books online but if you are like me and kind of enjoy hunting for a bargain then these options will not satisfy as much as hunting and gathering in person. Maybe its a girl thing, this need to seek and find an object and bring it home.

The best darned marine book selection ever is at the Half Price Books store in Clear Lake. While they don't get everything in stock and you do have to be willing to wait and to dig a bit, the selection of sailing related books at bargain prices is pretty darned amazing. While they say that the books will be sold at half off the retail price, they run sales fairly often. So often that I've picked up excellent books- both helpful and just entertaining such as Chapman's Piloting brand new for around $8.00, The Motion of the Ocean for about $6.00, Nigel Calder's Cruising Handbook for around $20 and so many others. (I've included links for those impatient folks who just want to order them, will happily pay shipping and get on with it.)

The one, last book that I have been searching for for literally months finally appeared, I snapped it up happily and paid around $16 plus tax. I scored what I consider to be the best overall, comprehensive book for  long distance sailors- Beth Leonard's Voyager's Handbook.  Yes, I know that time and money I spent on gas searching for it is probably greater than the shipping costs from Amazon but again, thrill of the chase. Girl Thing. Move on.

HPB only had one copy and its now mine and since I no longer have any books I feel like I need to have, I can tell you about the treasure trove that is Half Price Books. Seriously, a really great selection of books that is ever changing and at great prices. A bigger selection than I have seen even at dedicated marine stores.I have to ding Half Price a little though because I think every great book store must have a cat in residence. They used to have a cat but he has not been seen in a year or two. No cat, no 5 stars from me so if you want to get bumped back up to 5 star status get a cat. Preferably a really fat orange one who likes to lounge on the sales counter and really doesn't like anyone but stoically endures everyone lavishing him with praise and affection.

And now for the latest round of marine retail low points. I try to keep my complaints to a minimum but sometimes I get overwhelmed by the sheer lack of business savvy displayed by marine suppliers. I guess maybe they figure since the customer doesn't exactly have a ton of choices that they can strive for mediocrity and we will all just suck it up because again, how many choices do you actually have?

My nominee for the Marketing Genius of the year award goes to Porta-Bote. Mark and I wrestle with what dinghy to purchase and after speaking with folks who have lived with one, seeing them in person at the Annapolis Boat show almost 2 years ago we thought this was the way for us to go. It wouldn't be ideal, but it would allow us to skip davits which we really want to do and if we decided later we needed an inflatable, well those are available pretty much anywhere you find boats. Porta-Botes aren't perfect, but they are tough as nails, easy to stow and have many other attractive attributes but there are some trade offs that are less than desirable.

Then I saw the Porta Bote Crib and low, it appeared that all of the drawbacks I thought we would have to accept would be just washed away. This could be the answer for us! I in my naivete, contacted Porta Bote telling them that I had gotten the information on the Porta Bote, had seen it in person but was really interested in the Porta Crib and could they send me the pricing information and would they have one at the Houston show they would be attending?

Now, I am not going to point out that a company that has sold over 90,000 boats should be able to hire a web designer to put together a real web page that does not look it was originally hosted on Geocities. What I am going to point out is how desperately they need to hire someone with some kind of marketing background. Any Girl Scout who  has served as a cookie pusher would do a better job. When Porta Bote replied to me, they promised to send me the information I requested. They then went on to tell me that no, they would NOT be bringing a CRIB to the Houston Boat Show because IT IS OVER 3 TIMES THE COST OF THE PORTA BOAT AND AT $6000 ITS TOO EXPENSIVE TO BRING TO A BOAT SHOW.

What kind of intellectual giants are they employing? Anyone with even the tiniest bit of marketing savvy would understand that if you are offering a product that is much more expensive than your usual offerings you probably want to, I don't know let people see why its more expensive and to be able to show the value. I could be wrong...no. I am not wrong. People wonder why they don't see more Porta Botes out and about and I think we have the answer. No one there has a clue about marketing.

Oh and when I finally got my information package in the mail it contained the price list for the Porta Bote, which I had explained I already had but absolutely zero information or pricing for the CRIB. So now I have to rethink the whole dinghy option because I am seriously wondering if perhaps they are just too dense to do business with.

So, I am off to go do yet more dinghy research and yacht tender navel gazing. I still think the Portland Pudgy is pretty darned nifty...if only it were just a little bit bigger. *sigh*

People in your neighborhood- Kemah Hardware

If you happen to be in the Kemah/Seabrook area of Texas and you just happen to be doing repair work on your boat, we highly recommend you stop by Kemah Hardware and Supply. This is not your shiny, sterile, overpriced West Marine populated by sales folk in matching shirts, name tags and insincere smiles. This is a real, old fashioned, locally owned, mom and pop hardware store- an endangered species.

They carry every solvent, epoxy system, stainless shackles and thimbles that West Marine carries, but at a much lower price point. Plus they carry teak lumber and stainless drawer pulls, knobs, etc. so you can build your own custom piece of cabinetry instead of making do with a mass produced item that might nor might not fit. You can still buy nails and screws by weight, weighed out on an honest to goodness scale, unlike at say Home Depot. If you happen to be in need of a trough for your horse, they have those too. Need crabbing supplies? They have everything you need but the chicken necks. Need a tiki style beach umbrella? Yup, they have it. Don't have a boat? Not to worry, they sell a kit and the wood so you can build your own.

You should get yourself to Kemah Hardware and have Larry ring you up (all good hardware stores need a Larry on staff). There won't be any piped in muzak, no endless stream of uniformed smile-a-trons asking you continually if you are finding everything ok, no overpriced geegaws, no digital readouts, UPC scanners or anything of the like. What you will find is a colorful cast of local characters, the supplies you need, and a staff who will help if you need them but will otherwise leave you the heck alone. Everything we think is fantastic in a retail establishment. Yup, we love this place.

Rock Star Moment

For many years, I made my living as a musician. Not in some hipper than thou angsty rock band, but in an odd, very specific subgenre of music (think Lithuianian polka band.Not really, but Lithuianian polka band is funnier). Usually we would go from town to town, festival to festival and while those peeps who actually followed that type of music would know who we are, we could stop at a local Denny's, order a Grand Slam and clean out the toys in the claw machine without ever being "recognized". Every once in a great while, someone in say- Hayti, Mo. would be a displaced follower of Lithuianian polka music and would recognize us and we would get approx. 5 minutes of "fan time". We called these moments, Rock Star Moments. I had my first blog Rock Star Moment.

Yesterday morning I was sitting in Starbucks enjoying their free and very fast WIFI. While I was pulling up the blog to do a bit of admin stuff, a gentleman behind me piped up. "You read Ceol Mor too?" He pronounced it as Seal Mor so I knew he wasn't a displaced Scot. "Actually, I write it" I replied. I'm kind of surprised that anyone other than my Mom reads this but Jim is retired so I suppose he has some free time to read and I did once mention Kemah in a post, which is how he found us.

As it turns out, the gentleman's name was Jim. He reads lots of blogs about cruising, boats getting ready to cruise and most especially boats getting ready to cruise with little kids. See, Jim and his late wife cruised with their children through out the Carribean, South America, the US and Europe in the late 1970's.

Jim said that reading about our getting the boat ready while trying to ensure these kids have a childhood and while having our original time frame slip away from weeks to years was so familiar to him. He hand his wife had purchased a 32 foot boat in order to go cruising with their 2 boys, aged 3 and 5. As it turned out, they did go cruising on a 32 foot boat but with their 3 boys- aged 18 months, 7 and 9. Sound familiar? Jim had what might be my favorite quote of the year about cruising. "Cruising is the most fun you will ever have with your family while being absolutely miserable". I admit that hearing him describe cruising for a few years on a 32 foot boat with 3 young boys made me feel like a real whiner about our boat. Never have I been more grateful for 10 feet!

So thanks for the words of enocouragement Jim. Thanks for letting me know that al 3 of your boys have grown into responsible adults despite being vagabonds for a few years and missing out on the public school experience. Thanks for reassuring me that all of this frustration and hard work will indeed be worth it. I look forward to being absolutely miserable all over the world.