For more than 20 years, the DCB Performance Marine leadership has wanted to establish a strong East Coast presence for its catamaran line. But the challenge was two-fold. First, the now-Phoenix-based company didn’t offer full tunnel catamarans—all of its cats were of the center-pod variety. Second, with roughly a dozen builds as maximum production capacity selling anything other than factory-direct made no business sense.
But now DCB has 35-, 37-, 42- and 45-foot full tunnel catamaran in its line-up. The company also recently located to a larger and more efficient facility in Phoenix, and the DCB team believes output will rise to 15 boats a year. Based on those two factor, the company has entered into what is best described as a “hybrid deal agreement” with SLT Collection of Fort Lauderdale.
The company held an open-house event last night to celebrate the new agreement.
“We’ve honestly been working with DCB for years—since before they moved to Southern California to Arizona—but back then they didn’t have the models needed or the production capacity,” said Scot Conrad, the owner and founder of SLT Collection. “With DCB’s current line and current production facility, now is the time.”
Conrad, who co-owns the Cigarette of South Florida dealership based out SLT Collection and Grove Harbour Marina with marine industry veteran Wally Castro, met DCB vice-president Tony Chiaramonte last week during the Miami International Boat Show.
Chiaramonte said the arrangement has been “a long time coming,” but added that most DCB sales will still be factory-direct.
“I am not telling people they cannot order factory direct, but if they are on the East Coast we are going to steer them toward SLT Collection,” he explained. “This agreement is more like a commission structure than at traditional dealer setup.
“It’s definitely the right time,” he added. “This year and last year we lost what we called the ‘lake-boat stigma.’ And Scot is already talking about having us build an M42R for his inventory.”