Adios GENMAR! WOW,,..who woulda thunk?!

[Bill McElroy]

On BASSFAN this a.m.!







Genmar ceases to exist 1/20/2010







Jan. 20 is marked as the closing date for the Genmar bankruptcy sale, which means today, Genmar Holdings, Inc. is officially dissolved.



It also means that all current Genmar employees are no longer employed with the company and must apply for rehire. It's not clear what form that process will take

 

[Dan J.]

Man, I hate to see that for all those good, hard workers at the Genmar brands. Irwin definitely has developed a "brown thumb" with everything he touches.

 

[Bill McElroy]

No kidding,...he should stick to buying and selling merchandise from store's going out of business.....and NOT buying and running companies out of business!!!:angry:

 

[Mini]

Its STILL not over for the individual brands. I still think there will be a push by Jacobs to re-aquire Ranger.



It is a bad day in the marine industry to see one of its strongest "groups" dissolved....

 

[Bill McElroy]

I think if he ended up w/Ranger.....you'd see them take a MASSIVE hit in the market as far as market share. The fishing industry would be just fine sans Irwin! The best thing in the world for Ranger would be for Forrest to get it back OR the employees to buy it from Platinum...but I fear neither will happen! The fishing world is on par with the national "attitude" right now.....the fishing crowd is as fed up with Jacobs as the country is with the Pres. and their liberal agenda,..IMHO!!



Time to make changes WE want....not necessarily what THEY want...

 

[Greg Meyer]

None of these brands stands more than a 50% chance of surviving 2010 if credit does not become available. That may be the only thing that saves Ranger, Platinum may have the ability to get floor plan and end financing for their dealers.



Jacobs isn't totally bad or totally good. His marketing plan for Ranger was very one dimensional.. tournaments and pro-staff. On the other hand he did make Ranger a premier brand... un-paralleled in size and reputation.

 

[Bill McElroy]

Ranger was a premier brand long before Irwin stepped on the scene......he just bought it at the right time from Forrest. The Wood family and the employees made the brand's reputation what it is (thru their unparalled customer service)....NOT Irwin, (infact Genmar had started to mettle in that and denied a lot of CS claims during the Jacob's tenure IMO.) He just used the brand to build up the FLW and to get Walmart on board to finance his boat sales agenda. Like most rich people...they get that way by using other people's money! (or companies' money) in his case.

 

[Rich Stern]

Mac, if I'm not mistaken, Jacob's net worth has taken a big hit with the downfall of Genmar. He had skin in the game. And, if he's like most business owners I know, he had a lot of personal pride tied up in what he was doing, and probably carries a lot of guilt over the bankruptcy. For most people who are responsible for the livelihood of others, it can be a monkey on your back when it goes south.



We've all seen this before. In the boat business, the big brand aggregators are the least nimble when the inevitable economic downturn comes. While some small boat builders get whacked because they lack the financial depth to continue, the big boat builders, consisting of many brands, sometimes get whacked because they can't shrink fast enough.



I say this as a Larson owner who no longer has warranty support on a three-and-a-half year old boat.



I hope many of these plants are able to stay open under new managemnt, but the bottom line is, there were too many plants and too many people building boats when the bottom dropped out. That has to shake out. It will.

 

[Greg Meyer]

I don't argue that Ranger was a premier brand before Genmar... But, the entire FLW structure was designed to promote boat sales, and did, in a big way. (As an aside, that leaves the FLW future in serious questiion). Through the Genmar years Ranger sales ballooned. You have to wonder if anybody could have made it work through the last two years. Hardly any company would have had the reserves necessary to weather this latest disaster in the marine industry.



As I said, what is going to happen in 2010 and beyond?

 

[JR F]

Hey Greg I still have your boat here waiting on you to come and get It...

 

[Tornado]

I have a friend that maintains that Forrest Woods still owns the Comance series of Ranger. Has anyone else heard this?

 

[fatrap]

Two customers I talked to at BPS said they were unhappy with their Rangers. Both previous Ranger owners. They said that their boats looked like they were built in a hurry. Runs in the gelcoat and little things that you'd never in a million years find on their previous boats. ONe of the guys said he wished he had his previous Ranger back as it was solid as a rock.

I looked at a Reatta(sic)at Cableas and it looked great to me so maybe isolated incident. Always wanted a Ranger.

fatrap