Bankruptcy Court Considers Brunswick Offer

The trend toward “factory-direct” boat sales received
another boost recently when the Brunswick Corp. (parent of Sea Ray, U.S. Marine,
Boston Whaler and other brands) made an offer of $48 million for Olympic Boat Centers
to the Federal Bankruptcy Court. Olympic has 20 stores from San Diego to Seattle
and
is the world’s largest Bayliner dealership. A Brunswick buyout would seem to be
a welcome outcome for Olympic’s customers who might then reasonably expect an orderly
transition of the dealership’s responsibilities to a known industry corporation.
Olympic’s lawyers are saying $48 million is way too low and the bench isn’t saying
much other than there will be an auction.

Olympic Boat Centers is in Chapter XI and Brunswick Corp. has offered $48 million for its assets.

The Seattle Times reported last week that the bankruptcy judge is likely to schedule
a Sept. 23 auction of Olympic’s assets and spell out procedures for other bidders
to compete with the Brunswick proposal. Olympic Boat Centers is the largest Bayliner
dealership in the country. Bayliner started in Seattle, the home of Olympic, so
it is little wonder that Bayliner has long been Olympic’s main product line. Olympic
has had financial problems for quite some time and Brunswick bought 12% of the business
to help keep the dealership in business. The rest of the dealership is owned by
a Cleveland, OH venture capital company.



Just a few weeks ago Ferretti announced that it was buying Allied Richard Bertram,
following Azimut’s lead several years ago of buying David L. Fraser’s brokerage
company and dealership. Obviously Brunswick would like these stores to remain open in order
to keep Bayliner sales percolating along, but one wonders if this is part of a growing
industry-wide trend toward vertical integration or simply an emergency move by Brunswick
to shore-up sales.



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