I posted this in another thread and it's probably more appropriate here. Hell's Bay Madiera 24 https://vimeo.com/129922856 The competition: Islamorada Boatworks - Morada 24 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3NItWSwF8ZirwMhyj9TGBQ MBC - Pathfinder 2400 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPP_D7yFKBA Yellowfin 24 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yQTjYkwIOg
Why do you list IBW, MBC and YF as the competition to HB? MBC was the first and the other three listed have become their competition. I think Ankona is working on one as well - but I cannot say with certainty. Epic has built a wonderful bay boat as well, and Chris Craft makes an unbelievably beautiful bay'er. Oops, I would be remiss if I forgot to mention Ranger...
I thought lots of skiff builders had bay boats too. What about Carolina skiff, mako, Boston whaler, ecc.... I think ankona had a small bay boat called the tartuga back in the day.
This post was made as an offshoot to Marrietta Mike's thread about his evaluation of Hal Chittum's Islamorada 18 vs. HB Marquesa. The thread took the direction of new and exciting things builders like Chittum and Gordon are working on. Someone mentioned that HB was working on a bay boat (which IMHO is not very exciting, that market is already so saturated). When I found the HB Madiera video I posted it there, but the thread had already been derailed into too many different directions so I decided to start a new thread here. All 24' bay boats are in competition with each other. It doesn't matter who came first. Ankona is working on a 20' bay boat, but you can't really compare that to a 24. I did forget about ranger because the phantom isn't really that popular and they don't make any of the other skiffs any more, but you could certainly toss them in the mix. I don't think I would put Mako, CS, and Epic in the same category as the others. Epic especially has a horrible reputation around here (Louisiana) for cracked transoms and terrible build quality. The Chris Craft Catalina line seems more like a center console to me than a bay boat. The videos were not meant to be a comprehensive list, but to provide evidence to support my opinion that the new Madiera doesn't measure up in the $100K+ bay boat market and that there are better options out there. I think HB makes many incredible shallow water skiffs, but that bay boat is fugly.
Now I understand where you are coming from. Read that thread on rankings and you will see that opinions are rampant and HB should have no problem selling them, fugly or not.
