Both sides of my family come from Ventura, Calif., a hip little surfer city about an hour north of Los Angeles. Well, it used to be little. Now it sprawls, with condos and mixed-use developments pushing their way into the strawberry fields that are worth more as commercial real estate than as agricultural ventures.
I had not been to the city in almost a decade, and the change was readily apparent as I went back in June to visit the seaside boatyards and see the Channel Islands National Park where I boarded my first whale-watching trip as a kid. It felt like a sort of coming home.
Anacapa and Santa Cruz islands looked the same as I remember, despite the surrounding area having changed so much. Being there reminded me of how much I love the extra saltiness that being on the ocean adds to a local maritime community. You can feel the ruggedness in the boats, the people and the town’s harbor, which provides access to the Pacific.
While I was there, Ron Ballanti of Strike Zone Communications and Jim Hendricks, my colleague from Firecrown titles Boating and Salt Water Sportsman, took me out of Huntington Beach to pursue a species I’d never caught: the California sheephead. Hendricks delivered, and I was thrilled to reel in a 15-pound male that was both the ugliest and the prettiest fish I’ve ever caught. The change of location was a nice detour from my usual East Coast fishing. I want to thank the gents for a nice morning on the ocean.
It’s not a coincidence that we have two stories with California history in this month’s issue. The first is about retailer West Marine, which got its start in Sunnyvale in — like many early California startups — a garage. I’ve been thinking a lot about the company being on the rocks since it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May.
Contributing editor Kim Kavin did a deep dive with retail experts to find out exactly what happened to the massive company, which is shuttering 59 stores while vendors and other parties wonder if they’ll ever get paid what they’re due and the rest of us think about whether the company can make a comeback. You can read Kavin’s story starting on Page 24.
The second California-based story comes from the high desert about an hour and a half outside Los Angeles in Hesperia, the most unlikely place one would expect to find a boatbuilding operation. It’s here at Mag Bay Yachts where father-and-son team Mike and Barrett Howarth have built some of the finest sportfishing boats on earth.
Mike, who was a founder at Pacific Seacraft and Cabo Yachts, is a craftsman at heart with a passion for perfection. There’s definitely an attention-to-details gene that he handed down to Barrett, who pursues the same level of perfection with each hull the boatbuilder splashes. As an example of the obsession, the pair describe the stainless-steel metalwork that goes onto each boat as jewelry-quality. The story about the men and their business starts on Page 32.
Continuing the generational family business theme is a profile of Aquila Yachts by senior editor David Conway that begins on Page 28. The prolific builder is now passing the baton to the next generation at the Sino Eagle yard, MarineMax and inside the company’s operations team. The organization has taken a product category that once suffered an image problem and turned it into a viable, profitable market segment for dozens of builders around the globe.
A story about boat security system manufacturer GOST rounds out our feature well this month, and much of it discusses how the AI revolution is helping the company produce better products that help boat owners feel more at ease when they leave their pride and joy at the slip, in a boatyard or even on a trailer in their own yard. Owen Burke’s reporting begins on Page 36.
Last, transition is afoot at Soundings Trade Only. After nearly five years at the helm of this amazing publication, I will be stepping away on Labor Day weekend to make way for a new leadership team that has big plans for the print and digital offerings. The good news is I won’t be going far: I’ll be taking over as editor-in-chief at our sister brand Soundings, which I first picked up and read 36 years ago when I started working in the marine industry. I wrote stories for Soundings in 2013 as a freelancer, and was its senior editor from 2017 to 2022.
Like my trip to California, going to Soundings feels a bit like coming home. I look forward to seeing all of you at the fall shows.
