To tell the truth, I don't understand the total picture. In other words, I
don't know how much the other boat club fees may interact with the
haul-launch fees and perhaps there is some subsidizing. In some respects, we
have fees like a boat yard, only a lot cheaper.
But on the big one, the haul or launch, the general concept is that we split
it by the number of boats versus the cost of the cranes. My memory, going
back at least a couple of years, was that the cranes cost about $6,000 for
the day--and the operators sure earn it. That would only work out to $150
per boat for 40 boats, but I would never quibble with the math, as you will
see.
This single fee per boat gives the fellow with the 38-footer a "better" deal
than me, but there again, I'd be nuts to complain. Good for him, and good
for me!
Here's the general idea as far as I can remember it: A flat fee to haul or
launch a hull and step/unstep a mast, about $250 each way. A smaller fee if
you just want to launch a hull or just step a mast. A flat fee to store a
mast in the club racks (no fee if you put it on top of your boat), and a
flat fee to store the poppets, both of these about $40 each. A fee by the
foot for storing the boat for the winter, about $11 a foot.
(Remind me to mention that we should give great credit to the treasurer and
all the other members of the club who work on these details.)
For a C-27 like mine, where I do store the mast in the rack, it would come
to $500 plus $40 plus $40 plus 27 x $11. I think that comes to $877. That
covers the basic haul-launch, winter storage package for a year.
I look at that number and I think back to my experience with my C-25 at a
place called Captain's Cove in Bridgeport, where they charged fees that made
you gasp, they regularly damaged your boat on haul and launch and then
pointed to a silly clause in the yard contract (if you were stupid, you
believed that "we are not responsible for any damage done to your boat while
it is in our Travel Lift" was a valid clause), they allowed vandals to
attack your boat whether on land or at your slip, and they abused you
verbally whenever it was time to haul or launch. Gee, I miss those
days--NOT!
It seems to me that any club is going to be better than a marina, but surely
there are some marina owners with a good heart, somewhere. There are some
other clubs that are somewhat like ours, up and down the Connecticut coast.
There are also some rather pretentious clubs, where the fees definitely must
be a lot higher.
I guess I should also mention that when I bought my boat and said where I
would keep it, the marina owner let slip that we're known in the area as the
"communists" because we take care of our boats ourselves in this cooperative
fashion. Our burgee is red, white and blue, though, with American stars, not
a hammer and sickle.
--Dave Shugarts
On 6/28/07 9:05 AM, "Joe McCary" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Dave, can you give us an idea how much this costs per boat/member? Does
> everyone pay the same or is it proportional to boat size displacement?
>
> Joe McCary
> Aeolus II
> West River, MD
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> On Behalf Of David Shugarts
>
> To be on any of these crews takes no particular skill, but the leaders of
> the crews have a lot of experience and judgment. The (hired) crane operators
> are very skilled and have been doing this for many years.
>
> <SNIP>
>
> It's a long day but the savings is enormous, and we have the satisfaction of
> basically knowing everything that happens to our boats.
>
>
