Psst! Want to buy a narrowboat building business?

There's an unnamed narrowboat builder for sale on BizQuest - described as being somewhere in the 'East Midlands' and 'among the top names in the industry' - for £295,000.

This company was established in 2002, utilizing the generic 11+ year old skill set of the company’s two Directors.  The company has been very well managed with great dynamics and forward vision.  Their business model is built on delivering top quality products of both traditional and innovative contemporary design within the growing industry of building Canal/Narrow boats.

... The company has seen steady growth over the last seven years and, from their current solid trading platform, they are able to offer the new owner a strong forward order book of 18 months and circa £1,000,000 value.

All of their boats are custom built to the purchaser’s individual requirements, with fulfillment of the customers dream being a clear objective.

I'm interested to see the reference to the 18-month £1m-value 'forward order book'. 

Building most English canal boats is mostly such an art - or should I say a craft, or even a 'floating cottage' industry - that while you can sell your name, the reputation that you pass on is frankly resting on eggshells.  The business purchasers can only buy themselves the premises and staff, time and a bit of publicity until their first boats in their new regime are produced and sold.

And even then, the administrators can be winding up the business long after before the quality of the first boats has been forgotten.

[Update: hmm, not a great turn of phrase there, but I hope you get what I mean.]

Some narrowboat builders, when sold, have quickly ended up scuttled.  I seem to recall that Lees Narrowboats ended up sinking in 2006, a couple of years after taking over the prestigious name of Warble Boats (Manchester Evening News story here).

Others have taken over with some success, but I'll leave you to tell me which ones those are.   I'd love to hear experiences from people who order their boats from one boatbuilder, only for it to have been built by another business altogether.

Comments

[Capt Ahab]

Hmm, I think you are right. The goodwill tied up in a boatbuilders business all rests on the experience of the owner / builder. Generally, if he sgoes the goodwill evaporates and all you are left with is the yard, the tooling and the stock.
Capt Ahab