Main powerboat segments declined slightly in July, falling 0.5% year-over-year in all eight categories with a total of 33,519 new registrations. Year-to-date registrations were down 10.9% from 2023, totaling 236,440 through July.
As noted in this month’s Pulse Report survey, which appears on page 71, dealers are facing reduced foot traffic, elevated inventory levels, high interest rates and a wait-and-see attitude from consumers ahead of the upcoming presidential election.
“As you can see from the data in the Pulse Report over the last three presidential election cycles, it’s common to see reduced retail activity in the four or five months prior to the election,” says Matt Gruhn, president of the Marine Retailers Association of the Americas. “On the flip side, you can see that retail activity has historically climbed back up fairly rapidly after the election.”
INFO-LINK“We’re hopeful and expecting that post-election, along with a couple more interest rate drops, that we will see a strong boat-show season.”
The data for new-boat registrations was provided by Info-Link, a Florida-based company that compiles new-boat registration numbers from the U.S. Coast Guard and individual states.
The most significant registration declines in July were in the runabout, tow-boat and pontoon-boat categories. Runabout registrations were down 8.4% at 2,318 units, tow boats were down 6.4% at 1,284 and pontoon boats declined 2.1% to 7,822. Saltwater fishboat registrations were down in July by 2% at 2,612 units.
“As we really begin to hit what we believe is the bottom in this post-Covid marketplace,” Gruhn says, “we believe that dealers that are diligent about improving their approach to creating and managing leads going into boat show season will come out ahead. But the last two years have required dealers to get back to the basics of learning and implementing winning sales and marketing tactics, in addition to building the right model mix in their inventory-management efforts. For those who have not yet re-established the fundamentals in their businesses, the time to do so is now, before prime selling season arrives.”
The cruiser/yacht category saw a marked increase in July registrations to 572, an 18.4% increase from the month a year ago. Freshwater fishboats ticked up slightly by 1% or 5,690 units in July, and pontoon boats were up 1.3% from a year ago in July at 12,606 units. The unclassified segment grew 7.3% with 572 units sold.
By state, Florida led the way with overall registration numbers in July, with 3,193 registrations. Texas trailed slightly at 2,700. Still, both were down year-over-year by 7.6% and 9.3%, respectively. Bright spots included Pennsylvania with 1,118 registrations (up 37% in July), Kentucky with 418 registrations (up 35% in July) and Alabama with 989 registrations (up 27% in July). The biggest contributors to those states were the resilient freshwater fishboat category, and the pontoon and towboat categories.
For the full year through July, pontoon boats were down 11.6% with 55,637 units being registered in 2024 versus 62,910 in 2023. Also notable for 2024 to date were personal watercraft, which were down 17.6% at 67,859 units compared to 82,390 units in 2023. Runabouts also continued a downward trend, down 14.7% to 16,356 units compared to 19,180 units in 2023. Saltwater fishboat registrations declined 9.7% to 24,091 units through July compared to 26,671 in 2023.
