Yachts keep firm afloat

SMOOTH SAILING: Randy Borges, president of USWatercraft LLC, is seen at his Warren boat-manufacturing facility. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY
SMOOTH SAILING: Randy Borges, president of USWatercraft LLC, is seen at his Warren boat-manufacturing facility. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY

As in any other industry, manufacturers of luxury yachts survive and grow by learning what customers want.

Randy Borges, president of Warren-based USWatercraft LLC, initially opened a business focused on a particular niche, making racing sailboats faster and more efficient.

Beginning in 1988, the boat-service company, called Waterline Systems LLC, earned a reputation for optimizing speed in one-design boats, such as the J/24, a 24-foot racer, and larger boats competing in Grand Prix races.

The highly specialized work consisted of “trying to get every ounce of speed out of the boats by optimizing the underwater surfaces,” Borges said.

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By 2000, the business had shifted. Borges had an opportunity to become a contract builder, manufacturing the J/22 and J/24 sailboats for J/Boats Inc.

With his business partner, Gunther Buerman, Borges launched USWatercraft.

Sixteen years later, the boat builder employs 70 people in a highly specialized trade. The company still provides marine service, including hull repair, but about two-thirds of its business is in manufacturing of new boats.

“We’ve transitioned to a point where manufacturing is the main point of the business and service is secondary,” Borges said.

In 2012, USWatercraft purchased the assets of the Pearson Marine Group, including its facility, equipment and business interests in several luxury-yacht brands.

The company manufactures about 50 recreational boats a year, according to Borges, including Alerion Yachts, True North Yachts, C&C Yachts and North Rip Boats, a fishing boat.

The Alerion yachts are an elegant, classic sailboat design, but with modern construction and systems. The focus of the brand is on day sailing, Borges said. The line is based on the designs of Nathaniel Herreshoff, a Rhode Island designer who created the first one in 1912.

This month, USWatercraft has about eight or nine boats in production, at varying stages. The labor-intensive work can take several months. The manufacturing process, taking stage in the company’s 100,000-square-foot facility, encompasses design to completion. The outfitting of each yacht, the choice of materials and wood finishes, all are part of the process, Borges said.

Most of the USWatercraft boats are sold to dealers, and sold to customers at prices ranging from $40,000 for a 22-foot J/Boat sailboat, to more than $500,000 for the 41-foot yachts.

Despite the image, the luxury market in boats is not recession proof.

In 2006 to 2007, the company had 60 employees, which was cut to 15 in the depths of the recession.

One of the greatest challenges to the industry may not be in economic conditions, but in lifestyle changes.

Sailing is a time-consuming activity, and people are stretched in many directions now, he observed. The most popular designs, perhaps not coincidentally, are those that do not require much intensive labor on the part of the sailor.

“It’s just being able to be adaptive,” he said, of the evolution of USWatercraft. •

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