Boat Manufacturers Statistics
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Boat Market Statistics
Boat Building Market Statistics
Boating Statistics
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Market research, extensive data and market statistics on the power boat industry, marine drives,
boat building, boat manufacturers, boat dealers, marinas, related industries, boating and boaters.
Note, while we have tried to categorize the materials, many sources overlap several categories. We suggest you
browse the entire page.
This page does NOT cover PWC's (Personal Water Craft) OR Sailboats
We, Polson Enterprises, and a few other companies specialize in providing boating industry market reseach. We tend to be more technical oriented and focused on the future, while they tend to focus on other areas (registration databases, market share data).
Some comments concerning the quality of data available.
Top level data (full U.S. data) from several sources below is usually relatively current and somewhat accurate. Much of it is
aggregated from state registration data and each state counts things a bit different. Segment data (bass boats, houseboats,
pontoons, 14-18 ft. aluminum boat annual sales, geographical sales data, etc.) is a little harder to find. Outside the United
States, Canada probably leads the rest of the world in data quality and availability, but they are quite a ways behind the
U.S. Reporting in many other countries is dismal, making segmentation, other than megayachts very difficult in many regions
of the world. In almost all cases, the larger the boats you are looking for, the more reliable the statistics.
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Overview of the Industry
A few sources overview the entire industry.
Boat Production and Boat Population Statistics
An attempt has been made to list the resources below in the order you might find them most helpful in rapidly gaining a
statistical understanding of the boating industry. The free (or nearly free), most widely available resources with good
general overviews are listed first, followed by resources that may prove more difficult or costly to access.
- Marine Stern Drive Production Volumes and Market Shares: An Overview -
written by us, this page identifies stern drive manufacturers, provides current and historical market share data.
If you are interested in the stern drive and inboard engine market, be sure to review the materials we link to from
EPA's OAR-2004-0008 docket in the OAR-2004-20008 section of this page.
- National Marine Manufacturers Association - The NMMA maintains several industry statistics on their
web site. In addition to the statistics provided online, they sell
several more in-depth reports.
- Boating Industry (magazine) annual statistical review.
Once a year, BI prints a "USA Marine Market Annual Industry Review" as part of a regular issue of their magazine. This review provides a great overview of the industry and it is free (yes you have to buy the magazine, but studies like this often cost thousands of dollars). It pulls information from the various sources available and does an excellent job of graphically presenting the data. The resulting 10 to 15 pages of information are easy to understand and completely cover the industry. If you can only come up with one report of the industry, you need this one. Contact BI for information on how to obtain a copy. You might be able to find a copy of the annual industry review issue in a major library near the ocean or Great Lakes (heavy boating areas). Issue dates of the recent reviews include:
- 1995 annual review - Jan 1996 issue - we posted some info from this report as an example
- 1998 annual review - Feb 1999 issue
- 1999 annual review - Feb 2000 issue
- 2000 annual review - Feb 2001 issue
- 2001 annual review - March/April 2002 issue
- 2002 annual review - March/April 2003 issue
- 2003 annual review - the entire Sep/Oct 2004 issue is titled Boating Industry Market Data Book 2004 (Vol.67 No.5) with a price of $79.95 printed on the cover (it came free to normal subscribers). This is a much more indepth study than those in the past and provides a great overview of many segments of the industry.
- 2004 annual review - the entire August 2005 issue is titled Boating Industry Market Data Book 2005.
- 2005 annual review - the entire August 2006 issue titled "Market 2006 Data Book".
- 2006 annual review - the entire August 2007 issue titled "Market Data Book 2007".
- Boat & Motor Dealer annual Retail Market Review - Boat & Motor Dealer, a trade publication, prints an annual review in on near its February edition. It is somewhat similar to BII's review above, but the two complement each other in several areas (each one has some statistics the other one leaves out).
- Show Boat International magazine's annual Global Order Book covers luxury yacht orders over 80 feet. Their 2006 edition appeared in the Dec 2005/Jan 2006 edition. Statistics from this publication were briefly reviewed in Soundings Trade Only in their Jan 2006 edition on page 47.
- Info-Link publishes a Bellwether Report showing sales trends from year to year for several boat categories.
- Be sure to view the references listed in the Boating Safety Statistics / Boating Accident Statistics section.
- Outboard Motors from Japan - 180 page report released on in February 2005 on the Yamaha - Mercury outboard dumping case by the U.S. International Trade Commission. Investigation No. 731-TA-1069 contains outboard production statistics. Some of it is blacked out (represented by ***). Several documents referenced by the report contained the data now blacked out when they were first posted online by the USITC. We have copies of the original documents.
- Manufacturing & Distribution USA 2002, published by Gale. Older copies are titled, Manufacturing USA.
Manufacturing & Distribution USA is printed every couple years by Gale. It provides extensive statistics for hundreds on industries. It also identifies a number of companies in each industry, has data on the inputs (materials consumed) and the geographical distribution of the industry. SIC code 3519 is for Internal Combustion Engines, nec (not elsewhere classified). This is where the marine engines are. SIC code 3732 covers the Boat Building and Repairing Industry (also see NAICS 3366). It also provides some ratio information for the industry such as the number of employees per establishment, payroll per employee, hours per production worker, shipments per employee, investment per employee, and investment per Production Worker. This publication is available in the business section of most major libraries. Oklahoma State Library call# 338.4767 M294.
- US Census Current Industry Reports (CIR). Until recently, the U.S. Census published manufacturing statistical data on marine engines (not including outboards) as part of their MA33L Internal Combustion Engines report.
- U.S. Industry & Trade Outlook -
The U.S. International Trade Administration has been printing the U.S. Industry & Trade Outlook on an irregular annual schedule (previously known as the U.S. Industry Outlook).
This excellent report is in process of being moved online. It is available in the business or federal documents section of most major libraries. It provides an overview of hundreds of industries, including the boating industry.
- Annual Corporate Reports - Several major firms in the industry print an annual report and file a
10K report with the Security and Exchange Corporation (SEC). 10K reports are basically non-glossy versions of
annual reports. Some firms participate in several industries and fail to provide many details specific to the
boating industry (Bombardier, Volvo, Honda, Suzuki, etc). Others such as Brunswick are more focused on the marine
industry. Their annual reports provide many statistics on themselves and the industry. Most are viewable from
their web sites under a link to Company Information, Investor Information or Financial Information. Annual reports
you may find the most helpful include: Brunswick,
Fountain Powerboats,
Marine Products Corporation,
Sonic Jet,
MarineMax and
Travis Boats & Motors / Travis Boating Center.
Some useful information can also be found from historical reports such as Genmar Holdings (last 10K filing was
1997 before going private) and OMC. Most annual reports can be viewed from EDGAR.
Related to annual reports. Some firms with recent Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) have printed investor prospectus with large amounts of industry information and statistics in them. These include MarineMax and Pursuit Dynamics (a UK firm).
- EPA has a NonRoad Model that can be used to estimate past, current and future boat populations (boat population is often called Boat Park by those in Europe) by drive type and by outboard horsepower class. It takes a while to master (plan to spend most of a day with it), but can be really helpful.
- Houseboats - two studies of the geographical clustering of certain industries specifically address the cluster of houseboat
manufacturers in Kentucky and the market for their boats.
- Proposed Regulation Market Studies - often when the government proposes new regulations in areas such as engine emissions, boat
building emissions (styrene) and fuel emissions a market study is performed to determine the number of units in the field, current build rates,
economic impact of the proposed regulation and other variables surrounding the regulation. Those studies can often be found as EPA or U.S.
Coast Guard documents. Sometimes access can also be gained to responses to the proposed regulations from those who will be effected by them.
Their responses frequently contain industry statistics. A few examples are listed below.
- Economic Impact Analysis of the Boat Manufacturing NESHAP covering the
impact of proposed regulations surrounding emissions during forming boat hulls is an example of one of these studies. It contains many
industry statistics.
- Recreational Boating
Industry Characterization 1999 EPA document, excellent stern drive and inboard coverage, some Outboard information.
- Documents concerning the recent marine engine spark ignition regulation - great coverage of outboard, stern drives,
and inboards. Part of EPA Docket OAR-2004-0008. Some of the most interesting documents are linked to below. Enter the docket number in the
Docket ID search box to view over 800 more.
Several places to look for EPA reports are listed below. Additional sources of EPA data are listed in the Miscellaneous Sources section
near the bottom of this page.
- Government Sales - a few pages you might find useful investigating sales to the U.S. Government are the General
Service Administration (GSA) marine catalog, GSA Schedule 19.1, the Commerce Business Daily (CBD), replaced by a system now called FedBizOpps, FBO a third party system with better indexing of FedBizOpps from Loren Corp and the government's old CBD archives.
- Census Data-
Major coverage of the boat building industry is provided every five years in the Economic Census. The most recent data is from 2002.
Several relevant census industry reports can also be found from links on our Census Data Page.
Some of the census information is pretty dated (old) while other reports are fairly current. You can view the older reports to gain
an understanding of the types of variables reported, then search for the newer reports of interest. Or
hire us to find the data you need.
- Coast Guard Data File - The U.S. Coast Guard prints a CDROM titled,
Merchant Vessels of the United States.
The CD is updated monthly. It focuses primarily on larger vessels, but does provide significant coverage of larger
recreational boats as in order to obtain a loan to purchase the boat, many banks require the owner to register the boat
with the Coast Guard. We frequently use this resource. It is a DATA ONLY CD. You must have your own database software
and write software to retrieve the data.
If your pretty tech savy, you can actually download the data and use the record descriptions from the
Bureau of Transportation Statistics and get up and running for nothing.
- Business Trend Analysts, Inc. - BTA aggregates several data sources, creates some
brief profiles of industry firms and publishes and sells a report titled,
"The
U.S. Market for Pleasure Boats every few years.
- Also see the Company Directories & Company Profiles Section
International Statistics
- Data by country - Boating Industry International magazine has a sister publication, International Boat Industry which covers the international market. Similar to BII, IBI is a printed magazine in conjunction with a web site. IBI prints some excellent reviews/studies on the international market by country. They also recently started a European edition titled, European Boatbuilder.
- National Trade Database - NTDB provides several boating industry reports by country. They can be viewed online for a fee or can be viewed online for free from several major libraries.
- International Boating Market excellent 2005 report by state of Maine
- Canadian Statistics -
The Canadian government provides Canadian boat building industry statistics on line. The site also includes some U.S. and Japanese boating data. Be sure to click on the chapter headings near the left of the page to view their full report. Strategis (the Canadian statistics site) also often supplies some country reports.
- Japan Boat Industry Association provides some information on their home and export markets. For those that can read Japanese, additional details are available on their Japanese site. Sail-Japan provides some more detailed historical information from the Japanese Boating Industry Association.
- U.K. Statistics
- ICOMIA provides some international boating statistics data for sale and a few free samples.
- FAO (Food & Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) provides coverage of the fishing industry in many poorer countries that use "boats" for fishing instead of recreation.
- U.S. Import & Export Data
- USITC Trade Data Web. You will need to create a login and learn how to use Harmonization Codes (Tariff/duty codes). Harmonization Codes can be found from The Tariff Information Center. USITC Trade Data Web's database takes a while to get used to and you need to make sure you really find the product you are interested in and all the ways it might be imported or exported (for example a boat motor as parts, powerheads, complete assemblies, or as part of a boat).
- Some common boating industry Harmonization Codes can be found at Import Codes and Export Codes. Sometimes you can find additional codes allowing finer breakdowns of the data.
- Export.Gov also has access to US Export data. A search of their site currently also searches Buyers USA Info a U.S. Dept of Commerce site with some international boating reports that has not yet enabled its own search site search capabilities.
Yacht Statistics and Megayacht Statistics and Market Information
There has been considerable interest in this category in recent years so we are listing some of the data
and market research sources specific to this segment below. Because many are built outside the United States
some foreign sources are also provided.
- We used the U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Vessel database to find the number of vessels registered with the U.S. Coast
Guard by length from 40 to 75 feet in 5 foot intervals to provide some insight into how fast the population drops off in
size as vessel length increases, and to the total number of vessels in this category.
| U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Vessel Database
May 2007
Self Powered Recreational Vessels
(no sailboats)
|
Length
in feet | Number of Vessels |
| 40 to < 45 | 38,102 |
| 45 to < 50 | 17,363 |
| 50 to < 55 | 9,191 |
| 55 to < 60 | 4,584 |
| 60 to < 65 | 3,147 |
| 65 to < 70 | 1,817 |
| 70 to < 75 | 1,486 |
Total
40 to < 75 | 75,690 |
Note the table above does not include charter boats, fishing vessels, rental boats, excursions boats, etc. Some craft over
40 feet, built as recreational vessels, end up being commercial vessels of some sort. You can sort the database by hull ID
number to find craft built by popular recreational builders that have found their way over into the commercial category.
- National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA)
2003 Recreational Boat Registration
Statistics reports on page 20 that 67,512 mechanically propelled recreational boats 40 feet and over in length were
registered in the United States in 2001. 67,662 were registered in 2002 and 69,081 were registered in 2003. We
would anticipate most recreational boats that stay in the United States over 40 feet to be registered.
- NMMA's Boating Statistics 2002 provides
estimates of annual sales of inboard cruisers by length as a percentage of the total number of inboard boats sold.
The same page indicates 11,800 inboard cruisers were sold in 2002. Of those, 25.6 percent (about 3021 boats) were
41 to 49feet, 6.2 percent (about 732 boats) were 50 to 59 feet, 2.2 percent (about 260 boats) were 60 to 65 feet,
and 0.3 percent (about 35 boats) were 66 feet and over.
- Annual sales of inboard cruisers significantly decreased in 2003-2005 per Boating Industry's Market Databook 2006
(August 2006 issue of Boating Industry magazine). They cite the NMMA data, but list a different figure for 2002
(they list 10,200 in 2002 vs. the 11,800 listed by the NMMA perhaps the rest are imports?). BI's Market Industry Databook
lists 8,100 Inboard Cruisers sold in 2003, 8,600 in 2004, and 7,800 in 2005, citing NMMA's 2005 abstract for all the data.
- Merchant Vessels of the United StatesCoast Guard Data File
is a CDROM database of vessels registered with the U.S. Coast Guard. The CD is updated monthly. It focuses primarily on larger vessels,
but does provide significant coverage of larger recreational boats as in order to obtain a loan to purchase the boat, many
banks require the owner to register the boat with the Coast Guard. Additionaly, boats moving betweeen states often register
with the Coast Guard. It is a DATA ONLY CD. You must have your own database software and write software to retrieve the data.
We used data from this database to create the table by boat length in this section. Note - this source was used to produce
the table above.
Many Sources, including the New York Times in 2006
and in 2007
quote Jim Bobrow of Show Boats International saying there are currently an estimated 7,000 motor yachts over 80 feet in use,
up from about 4,000 only a decade ago. The quote appears to date from late 2005.
Showboats International prints an annual Global Order Book. It provides statistics on luxury yachts on order 80 feet
or more in length.
The Luxury Superyacht Market: Sizes,
Market Share And Positioning Superyacht Sept. 2006 issue.
U.S. Large Vessel and Ship Populations
Megayacht stats on pgs 9-11.
International Luxury
Yachting Market : Economic Report 2005-2006 2006 Monaco Yacht Show report
2003-2004 Yacht Building
Statistics by Builder over 80 feet? courtesy Yacht Forum
Yacht Manufacturers Directory
The International Council of Marine Industry Associations (ICOMIA) is in process of trying to create a
worldwide set of boating statistics. Once created, they will probably be most accurate for larger boats as
they are easier to count. They program is
discussed online. ICOMIA currently sells stats for many countries, but much of their
data is pretty old.
Economic Impact
of MegaYachts on Southern Florida Palm Beach Post. 25 Oct 2007.
U.K. Leisure Boat Building January 2004 report benchmarks
them against the Italian yacht builders
Magazines and Trade Publications
The Luxury Yacht Market from Nautica (Italy)
Superyacht Career Training a crew training related site, also provides some
industry statistics
SYinfo Super Yacht info hosted by Yacht Reporter
Superyacht Society an industry trade organization
KPMG Analysis of the U.K. Leisure Boatbuilding Industry contains
several metrics that could be applied to the yacht industry worldwide.
Conferences / Symposiums
Customer Satisfaction Index / Survey
Prospective Boat Owners and Barriers to Boat Ownership
- Prospective Boat Owners a study of first time boat buyers funded by the NMMA and published in July 2004. It segments first time buyers into several different segments.
- Quantitative Barriers Research a Power Point presentation on barriers to boat ownership. It presents the results of a survey of Barriers and Competitors funded by the NMMA and published in Sept 2004.
- Leisure Alternatives Funnel Chart this chart created by us several years ago shows how boating competes with leisure alternatives and how people come into and leave recreational activities.
Market Share Data
Market Share data seems to be what everyone wants and it is the hardest to come by. Many large firms spend a lot of money trying
to estimate market share. Some estimates of boat builder market share can be found in the annual reports of firms in the industry
(see Annual Reports entry in Boat Production and Boat Population Statistics section above). Other estimates can be found
(or computed from) in articles published by Statistical Surveys, Inc. in the
trade magazine, Soundings Trade Only. Still more estimates can be found in news items,
court filings, and press releases. Local estimates can be made by field counts at lakes on holidays. Population market share can
also be estimated by watching the number of boats for sale in online and classified listings. Most seeking high quality data
utilize one of the industry research firms.
An article titled, Brunswick Growing in Two Directions, appearing on page 40 in a section titled Independent's Day of the Sept/Oct 2004 issue of Boating Industry magazine has a great chart showing U.S. annual boat production by major boat manufacturers from 1999 to 2003. It specifically charts Yamaha, Tracker, OMC, Brunswick, Genmar, three groups of independent boat builders (ABA, UMMA, IBBI) and other. That information can be used to create a corresponding market share chart. The data comes from Info-Link Technologies.
Outboard Motors from Japan - 180 page report released on in February 2005 on the Yamaha - Mercury outboard dumping case by the U.S. International Trade Commission. Investigation No. 731-TA-1069 contains some outboard market share information. Some of it is blacked out (represented by ***). Several documents referenced by the report contained the data now blacked out when they were first posted online by the USITC. We have copies of the original documents.
Our Marine Stern Drive Production Volumes and Market Shares: An Overview identifies stern drive manufacturers, provides current and historical market share data.
Other marine drive market share estimates can be found in some of the annual reports, court filings or be made by field counts, boat show counts, trying to estimate drive types from registration data and other means. None of them are very easy.
Gale Research prints an annual titled, Market Share Reporter: An Annual Compilation of Reported Market Share Data on Companies, Products, and Services". The Market Share Reporter reproduces market share reports from a wide variety of resources and usually includes some entries in the boating industry. This publication is available in many major libraries. OSU Call Number #380.105 M345.
How People "Feel" About Boating
- Several journals regularly publish articles on the leisure science surrounding boating. Many of those studies include statistics in areas of how boaters interact with other boaters, how they feel about boating, how they decide to go boating, obstacles to boating, overcrowding, etc. The studies frequently involve surveys.
These journals include Journal of Leisure Research published by the National Recreation and Park Association and Leisure Sciences published in the UK. These excellent resources are very poorly utilized by our industry.
Marina Industry Statistics
- Annual International Marina Survey -
Boating Industry International prints an annual International Marina Survey that provides many statistics on the marina industry. The 2002 study was published in their Sept/Oct 2002 issue.
- Marina Financial Information Reports - The
International Marina Institute offers several marina industry financial reports.
- Marina Dockage magazine covers the marina industry.
Diesel Powerboat Market
For a great review including market shares, engines, repower, frequency of dual engines, percent by boat types, lengths, etc, see:
North American Diesel Powerboat Market Still Facing Choppy Seas
Diesel Progress North American Edition
November 2007
Pgs. 80-85
And
A Rising Tide? A Perspective on the North American Diesel Powerboat Market
Diesel Progress North American Edition
August 2004
Pgs. 40-45
Marine Engine RePower / Rebuilt / Rebuild / Remanufacturing Market
- The late 2003 "outboard dumping" court case between Brunswick and Yamaha resulted in a 29 Jan 2004 U.S. International
Trade Commission document on January 29, 2004 that includes an estimate the
annual sales of outboards for REPOWER on pages 88-90 to be about 15 percent of the total sales of new outboards.
- Engine Builder has several great articles on the marine engine rebuild market
in their "Search for Back Issues" section. Several of them estimate the marine gas engine rebuilt market at 110,000 to 130,00
engines a year. Just type the word "marine" in their seach back issues search box.
- An EPA Regulatory Impact Analysis on marine compression
engines (Diesel) page 1-15 reports the Engine Rebuilders Association surveyed 2500 rebuilders and found 53 percent of them
rebuilt marine engines in 2002. Those sites rebuilt approximately 57,630 engines. They mention many rebuilds are also performed
by ship and boat builders at their facilities.
- The EPA has a very large model to estimate emissions from all types of off road vehicles, including boats. Part of that
model includes estimating the useful life of outboard engines, inboard engines, and stern drive engines. Their model can be used
to estimate how many are scrapped or repowered each year in the U.S. Its a fairly complex system and takes a while to get up
and going. They call it NonRoad2005 Model. A couple papers accompanying it
of particular interest to those studing the rebuild market are:
Calculation of Age Distributions in the Nonroad Model
-- Growth and Scrappage, NR-007c and
Median Life, Annual Activity, and Load Factor Values
for Nonroad engine Emissions Modeling, NR-005c.
The model estimates the median life of outboard engines as 16 years (half are repowered or scrapped by then and all are repowered
or scrapped by 32 years). Simliarly it estimate the median life of stern drive and inboard engines as 20 years (half are
repowered or scrapped by then, all are repowered or scrapped by 40 years). They use a life curve that has the bulk of
the engines coming out of service near their median life.
- Examples of rebuilders include:
- A few companies focus on the stern drive and inboard repower market by manufacturing new drives specifically
for that market. Those include Konrad Marine and
Sterndrive Engineering
- Diesel Progress published and excellent discussion of the marine diesel rebuild market.
A Rising Tide? A Perspective on the North American Diesel Powerboat Market
Diesel Progress North American Edition
August 2004
Pgs. 40-45
- Engine Rebuilders Association is a trade association for those rebuilding engines of
all types, not just marine engines.
- At least two marine market research firms, in addition to us, supply data on the rebuild market.
Company Directories & Company Profiles
Boat Dealer and Marine Retail Statistics
- Annual Boat Dealer Survey -
Boating Industry International used to print an annual boat dealer survey similar to their Boating Industry Survey and Marina Survey, but it is no longer on their agenda. It was an excellent source for dealer statistics. One of the last (if not the last one) was in their Apr. 1999 issue. Some dealer statistics are in their Annual Boating Industry Survey.
- Marine Retailers Association of America (MRAA) provides some summary statistical information about its members in the member profile section.
- Boat Dealer Industry (SIC 5551) from AT&T's Business Network web site (site no longer in operation, data is stored here). Not sure of exact year. Is probably 1996 or 1997. Although the data is old, it provides some concept
of the variables.
- Annual Corporate Reports - At least one coalition of dealers, MarineMax publishes
an annual report. Plus annual reports are still available for Travis Boats & Motors / Travis Boating Center, no longer in operation.
- Boating Industry magazine prints an annual Dealer Directory listing over 5,000 dealer by state and city with
contact information. It also identifies which of the following areas they operate in: new units, used units, parts
and accessories, finance and insurance, storage facility, restaurant, and marina. Their May 2008 issue was the Dealer
Directory.
- Boat Dealer mailing lists - in addition to the listing in Boating Industry magazines Annual Dealer Directory
mentioned above, InfoUSA.com and several other traditional mailing list companies
sell boat dealer mailing lists.
Number of People Boating
- National Sporting Goods Association - NSGA produces a number of sport participant studies. You may recall reading some stats from them in other publications about which sports activities are growing or decreasing in participants. In addition to the basic numbers, they sell a number of in-depth sports participation studies.
- Factors Related to Recreational Boating Participation in the United States [PDF format] . Excellent study by the Responsive Management National Office. It also provides statistics on many other areas of boating.
- National Recreational Boating Safety Survey. This U.S. Coast Guard survey has a great deal of participation data as well as data that might be used to segment boaters based on their types of boat, favorite boating activities, skill levels, etc.
- Simmons Study of Markets & Media - printed by Simmons Market Research Bureau, this huge multi-volume annual study interviews thousands of Americans to determine their buying and participation habits, plus documents the media they are exposed to (magazines they read, newspapers, tv shows, etc). Careful use of their stats can allow profiling of users of certain products like boats in different size. It also covers some other water related activities such as fishing.
- Lifestyle Market Analyst - SRDS prints an annual study with a great deal of information about sports participation (and countless other activities) in the United States. It also breaks the country down into hundreds of geographical regions. it is available in many major libraries.
Boating Safety Statistics / Boating Accident Statistics
The U.S. Coast Guard supplies an annual report on boating accident statistics.
Economic Impact of Boating / The Cost of Boating
Many papers have been written on the economic impact of boating in certain geographical regions. Some have been written on the cost of boating.
One recent excellent paper in this area is:
Estimating Recreational Boater Expenditures on
Trips and Boating Use in a Wave Survey
by Hee-Chan Lee
Leisure Sciences
Vol. 24 No.4. Pgs. 381-397 (2003)
In July 2007, the Association of Marina Industries (AMI) and the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) opened a web
site for calculating economic impact of general boating areas, a marina, a group of marinas, and even for a specific
boat ramp. Much of the data by boat size behind the model is available in an article in Marine Dock Age, Sept. 2007 titled,
"AMI and NMMA Offer Free Economic Impact Web Site". Pgs. 34 & 38.
Several other economic impact of boating papers can be found on our
Economic Impact of Boating Folder.
Availability of Resources (open water, lakes, boat ramps, marina slips, etc)
- National Recreation Lakes Study - In 1999 the National Recreation Lakes Study Commission produced two large volumes titled, Reservoirs of Opportunity. One was called the Report of Record and the second was called the Final Report. They provide an exhaustive census of available lakes.
Research Firms Specializing in Boating Industry Statistics
Boat Building Industry Trade Magazines
The following magazines primarily cover the industry from the perspective of those in it, most are not consumer magazines. Most also have a web site, but much of their content is only available in the paper issues. Some can be searched in online databases available at public libraries.
Trade Associations
Independent Boat Builder Buying Groups
The industry is dominated by two very large players, each owning several boat companies. To raise their volumes and compete more effectively, several Independent builders have joined together to increase their buying power (reduce their costs). They are even able to reduce their costs associated in doing business with one of their larger competitors (ban together to purchase marine drives from Mercury Marine, a Brunswick Company).
Online Boating Discussion Groups
Much can be learned from online boating newsgroups, discussion groups, online forums, etc. Be sure to read FAQs, and search them before posting a question that may have already been asked several times. Among the major groups are:
Miscellaneous Sources
Some of these involve quite a bit of legwork and poking around, but sometimes good statistics can be found. Try searching for firms
making the kind of products, boats, etc you are interested in.
- A few states publish exellent boating statistics, for example Oregon has a Triennial Boating Study full of boating statitics.
- Law suits
- Patent lawsuits
- Product dumping (unfair international competition claims)
- EPA Multisystem Query
- Echo EPA enforcement and Compliance History Online
- Part 70 Operating Permits (emissions documents for facilities with large quantities of emissions, filed with the state environmental quality department the facility is in. These are updated as changes occur (new emissions source is added, etc). They often contain detailed information. The state of Minnesota has a nice fact sheet describing the program.
- When searching state and federal environmental filings, always search both air quality and water quality filings. They are usually not together.
- OSHA Establishment Inspections
- Periodical databases (products and industries are often written about)
- Regional business publications some include;
- Local newspapers near boat industry manufacturers
- Current boat shows can identified in our Boat Show Folder.
- Web sites of industry firms. See our Powerboat Manufacturer Links Page
- Our How to Learn About an Industry or a Specific Company Page lists hundreds of additional places.
OLD Data / Historical Data
We store a few "OLD" examples of the types of data available on the industry. For current data, consult the sources listed above. This section also lists a few OLD studies available from other sources.
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