Considering the number of $300,000+ boats it's not surprising that the show's numbers are down. While the builders are thrilled that the high rollers are willing to plop down stupid money for the latest in bling the reality is the under 30' performance boat market has all but dried up. The working man/woman who used to be the ones buying the 24' - 30' performance boats are either keeping what they have, buying used or simply getting out of the sport because their priorities are changing.

It's a volume thing too. You would get 10 times the number of buyers when the average price of a performance boat was under $100,000 and gas was $1.50 / gallon.

I think it really comes down to dreams. When the boats and price tags were smaller a lot more people could imagine themselves owning one. Now that the price of entry seems to be $300,000 and up a lot less people aren't willing to waste their time money ($400 hotel rooms, GIVE ME A BREAK!) looking at something they they know they could never afford.

That's just my opinion, take it for what it's worth...... ;)

$5.50 at Hawks Cay in the Keys

:eek::eek:

I have to agree that the boats in the show were pretty blah in comparison to years past. I have been coming since 2005 and I also think that the crowds were definately smaller. One thing that burns me is $15.00 for a red bull and grey goose. Gets pretty expensive fast!!

$15.00 for a drink makes that $5.50 for a gallon of gas look reasonable. I guess it's all a matter of prospective .:cool-smiley-027:

Attendence was definatley down on Thursday and Saturday compared to other years. $ amounts asked for new boats is going to turn the sport back into a wealthy (as opposed to upper middle income) sport. We fall in the top 5% income wise and I just do not see a new boat for awhile. Market needs to come back up, election needs to be over, economy needs to stablize, and the news media needs to stop screaming the sky is falling.

$15.00 for a mixed drink is absolute insanity.

They were $30 at the Voodoo lounge in Vegas. And took about 30 minutes of standing in line before you got the opportunity....