News: The NMMA Wants Our Minorities and, Our Babies?

Source: NMMA Grow Boating Summit

The NMMA (National Marine Manufacturers Association) recently sponsored a Recreational Boating Stakeholders Growth Summit.  Professionals from across the marine industry gathered in hopes to collaborate on ways to grow the industry; specifically growth over the next ten years.  First, let’s review the gloom and doom.  Obviously, new boat sales are still at record lows; not even going all the way back to 1965 has the retail market been this low.

Source: NMMA Grow Boating Summit

Combine that with the fact that the average age of a boat owner is increasing, the average age of a used boat is 20 years old, and the amount of recreational boats in use are is declining; I would think a depressed market would be a safe assumption.  But, there is some hope for the future, continue reading after the jump.

There were four main “Vision Themes” of the Summit.

1.       Unified Industry

2.       Boating Participation Soars (large growth)

3.       Access to Boating

4.       Fewer Regulations, Better Education

There are hundreds of pages and vast statistics to sort through (you can dig through them here if you’d like), but the glimmer of hope for the future of boating may lie within growing minority populations (short term) and our current offspring (long term).  Of the growing minorities in the U.S., the Hispanic population has been the fastest growing over the last ten years according to the Census Bureau.  The Hispanic population is the second largest demographic in the U.S.; yet, they make up less that 1.1% of boat owners.  Check out the map below for growing Hispanic populations across the U.S. 

Source: NMMA Grow Boating Summit

The Summit hopes to learn how to better target Hispanics, as well as Asians, Blacks, and other minorities in hopes to make boating more appealing to these demographics.  As for long term growth of the industry, the statistics show that 78% of current boat owners were exposed to boating as a child.  I certainly hope I can pass on some of my love of the water to my little girls.  So what can we take away from all this?  I would say, your current climate permitting, go and take someone boating this weekend.  Take your kids boating.  Hopefully it will catch on.

Do any of you have boating plans for the weekend?   Leave a comment with your plans.  If you don’t own a boat or have access to one, what is your biggest obstacle to owning one?

Source: Recreational Boating Stakeholders Growth Summit