On Sun, 24 Aug 2008 12:21:36 -0400, "Eisboch" wrote:


"hk" wrote in message
...
A couple of actual boating-related message boards are reporting that Polar
Boats has "lost" a lot of its dealerships on the East Coast, and has
"consolidated" production. Some posters have reported quality control and
warranty issues. Unsubstantiated rumors? A harbinger?

Never heard of them.

They are a division of Godfrey Marine who make a variety of pontoon
style boats, glass deck boats and the Polarkraft line of aluminum
fishing boats.

The Polar brand was their entry into the world of fiberglasscenter
console and small cuddy cabin boats going back - oh, I want to say, 10
years or so.

I was always impressed with the Polar boats and have recommended them
to a lot of people looking to enter into the CC market. They were very
well thought out in terms of the fisherman - lots of storage, little
amenities like lighted floring around the CC, their step down consoles
were extremely roomy and had things like plumbed commodes on 21
footers with holding tanks, fresh water tanks - things like that which
you wouldn't ordinarily see on a smaller CC. When they started
manufacturing these boats, form, fit and finish were top notch -
comparable to Mako in the early days - equal to say the Sailfish line
and in some ways Contender's small CCs.

Recently, the past two years or so, there has been a decline in dealer
support which is a large part of the problem. They also had some
manufacturing issues that migrated from the deck boat division over to
the Polar line and thier quality started to slip a little. Recently,
there have been a rash of problems similar to what happened to Mako
before Johnny Morris took them over - forming mold problems
(indicative of not upgrading their molds), fairing problems in
production and finishes that were uneven and, frankly, sloppy.

Unfortunate because they started off well building a high quality
fishing boat. I've heard recently that their deck boat line is also
had problems resulting in dealers dropping the line and the resultant
drop in service.

Part of the problem is that Polar hooked up with new dealers, startups
and other inexperienced businesses and the service wasn't very good
which led to a down turn in sales, yada, yada, yada.

Too bad - I liked them a lot. Nice boats all through the line when
they were on top of their game.