Purchasing Fountain Powerboats
 

Hustler Powerboats is currently in negotiations to purchase Fountain powerboats and all its assets. As of Oct. 5th, Fountain powerboats will go up for auction and no longer be doing business. Hustler Powerboats will move its operations to NC and re-build the Fountain and Baja Line to full capacity over the next 4 years and keep the Fountain Legacy intact as we feel it is a big part of Performance boat history and do not want to see it die off. We are dedicated to re-strengthening both Fountain and Baja, keeping the same look and feel with improved quality and workmanship. Over these last couple years, Hustler has been blessed with sales and is running strong and would like to give back to the boating community by saving these companies from being auctioned off piece by piece. If you have any question please feel free to email me at [email protected]

I wouldn't talk about it until it is a done deal. Plenty of time for things to change.

So besides you telling us here, is it now public knowledge that this is a viable transaction or are you purchasing the scraps at the auction providing you are the high bidder.....

I received this same e-mail this afternoon at 15:50 from hustler... I guess we are many to receive it...

well if you did purchase it then u will have 3 good brands of boats to pick from i like all 3 and own a 42 fountain and would not hesitate on owning a hustler.

I wonder if they will keep it called fountain and I wonder if they plan to keep reggie in the picture?

There ia a local Hustler Dealer sending out emails to all also....

It's on Hustlers web site to.

Fountains getting Hustled :eek: Guess its better than the Gov owning it, they can barely run the bus transit

If it is going up for auction then it is possible there will be other bidders or interests there as well. However If it DOES go up for auction I would much rather see another boating company get it that wants to continue the lines.. :) Jamie / Lakeside

Talked to a reliable source on Tuesday and said best thing for fountain so all you keyboard cowboys give it a rest and go boating before summer is over!!

Ok then, now that your reliable source came through with that info I feel better, can you ask your reliable souce what stocks we should invest in so we can make lot's of money to buy one of the new Fustlers.
:coolcowboy:

Factory Tour
 

Went to the Fountain facility yesterday. The plant was amazing and we want to Thank Reggie and all his employees for making us feel right at home. Left with a very positive attitude.

Great to hear these things just take a little time !

as a lil peon here in az. seriously interested in a 38EC w/525's, yesterday for giggles i got on fountains website, and e-mailed them my interest in a 38 ec. a signed form letter from reggie arrived via e-mail informing me of my nearest distributor, in austin texas................and this morning 715am az time i got a call on my voice mail from austin marine, telling me my catalog was on the way to my home address.


now.............coming from a past, dog eat dog world(layed off '97) of selling CNC aerospace machine tooling to every mfg of anything including ICBM nose cones/nuklar bomb triggers/radiated parts at los alamos to seal team titanium .45 suppressor contracts and anything else that went boom bang or pffftt and everything mfged in btwn, i kind of have a damn good idea how sales and sales mgmt should work to get a sale good economy/bad economy................AND FOUNTAIN SHINED WITH PROMPT CUSTOMER SERVICE ! and i like that ALOT! and they will more than likely get my biz when wifey and i decide to buy.

i sure hope for everyone the restructuring works out.

"RECESSION HELL ! SELL!" and thats exactly what i was told by my father." welcome to planet earth and get yer ass out there and SELL SOMETHING!"

good luck to all involved.

If Hustler is negotiating to buy all of Fountain's assets, what's the point of holding an auction?::boat:

That is good news!:drink:

This is all Good to hear!

+1

Hustler Powerboats
 

Our acquisition of secured bank notes of Fountain Powerboats fell a few hours short to Oxford Investment as we were in meetings with Reggie Fountain at his facility on Thursday. It is our understanding that they will be able to run the bid up at the auction to 20 Million dollars. This number does not work to make this a viable investment from us as additional money will be needed to get employees back on the line, re-stock materials and keep the business up and running over the next two years while the country comes back from its current recession. We feel it is a sad day in the boating industry as our expertise and high standards would have helped enhanced the Fountain and Baja lines.

Our passion for building high quality boats is alive and well and we will continue to build Hustler’s full line of boats to the highest standards. We will be coming out with our new 29’ in our Rockit Series at the Miami Boat show to fill that current void in the market place and would like to thank everyone who wished us well over the last few weeks.

We will be looking at new ventures in our industry in the coming months.

SWEET!

John, hate that for you guys, I actually thought it would be a wise business move. As for this Oxford Group, I wonder who is going to be running the show at FPB????? Not to be rude, but if a company can spend its own money into closing its doors, how fast can it spend/waste someone elses?? If I was a stake holder in Oxford I would be pulling out, and questioning such an expensive high risk investment. UNLESS SOME ONE AT OXFORD IS IN WITH BRUNSWICK???

Oxford needs to get rid of Baja then discontinue all Fountain models that are poor producers to survive this economy. Fountain has great brand recognition and international presence but luxury items are taking the biggest hit worldwide.

I'm not sure what this guy is trying to gain by coming on here and telling everyone in the general forum, the Fountain forum, the Hustler forum that Hustler is buying Fountain and then coming on here a week later to say "oops we made a mistake the deal didn't go down because we couldn't get the financing". Why would the the heads of a privately held company come on a public forum and give details of a business merger/deal that has not been "closed" and boast about the oportunity and "the deal" and then come on here a week later and start name dropping banks such as Oxford invesments and then publicly shame a deal that you so much boasted about?! I just don't get it. All of the information that you have feed this board over the last week is considered crap in my book and makes no concrete sense whatsoever. If I was the chairman of the board of a large corporation and I was in merger talks with another competitor and a director, manager, or vp was leaking private information of a deal not yet closed he would be fired on the spot no questions asked. I just don't get it. Sorry just my two cents. I love Hustler and thier products but I think you may have been a little too forward with information that should not have been made public. Sorry I don't normally voice an opinion too much on here.

RAF

Well said.......I agree!

WHY? it doesn't cost any $$ to have the molds?? Fountain didn't even pay for BAJA. If someone orders a boat, build it, poor performer or not. If someone is in the market for a 26 Baja, just because you "get rid" of it doesn't mean they will buy a 38 Fountain. I wouldn'r get rid of anything, but I would not build a boat if their isn't a buyer for right now.

Can someone post the "OXFORD website" I did a search and don't want to read up on the wrong one.

Can you blame him? At $6Mill it is a great deal at $20 Mil it is a horrible deal.

Agreed! Maybe also another example of the type of guy Reggie is? :eek:

What ha ha happened :lolhit:

Of course he can!!!!!!
The point runafever is making is about disclosing a deal before it was closed, regardless of the reasons why it wasn't.
The only point where I disagree with him is about the need to fire anyone: considering that they announced the deal also in their own website, it doesn't look like a naive initiative of an employee posting on a forum.
Most likely, the chairman should only blame himself in this case. :lolhit:

I saw this as a real opportunity for the guy from Hustler to spam message boards and personal emails. Furthermore to bull**** us all with this altruistic crap about giving back to the boating community. And I thought Hustler was a reputable manufacturer. Oh, I'm right: "was" is the key word.

Pesky Varmint

I got that same spam e-mail from Hustler. Who gave out our e-mail addresses? I have never dealt with or even visited the Hustler website.

funny

I call Roshambo
 

First the "Huslter" says they are buying Fountain eventhough Fountain was going to auction, then they said they couldn't come up with the money. This sounds like putting the cart before the horse. It's like saying you've won the lottery then finding out your ticket didn't win..

I call Roshambo..

:bsflag:

:evilb:

Hustler sucks. thats all i got to say about that

I have heard through a good source that Oxford will try to make the company work and if they cannot they will liquidate it. I have looked over their portfolio and do not see any marine experience. Seem they have dealt with manufacturing companies that sales are based on huge manufacturing contracts.... No such thing in the boat business. Do they really think GE is going to give their dealers floorplanning right now? Just food for thought....

Is Oxford going to cover the Warranty on all boats built before their purchase... A question fountain owners should ask?

I am not willing to buy a boat from a company that may or may not survive.

Here is the link to their Portfolio http://www.oxfordinvestmentgroup.com...tprofiles.html

Setting the Record Straight
 

If you read my post you will see I did not state that we did not have the financing. Hustler had every dime they wanted for the bank note. While we are at the factory with Reggie, taking the tour to make our final decision on purchasing fountain, Oxford wired the money to the bank for the secured notes. We were sitting in Reggie's Office when he gave us the news.

We were very excited about purchasing Fountain and working hand and hand with Reggie. We think Fountain and the name is a staple in this industry and did not want to see it go by the way side or be bought by a huge conglomerate in my opinion wanting to make a quick dollar.

Wow Reggie does post on here........:bsflag:

whatever

Sounds like you jumped the gun on the aquistiion announcement. Oxfod must see some kind of value in the company to pay four times more than Hustler was willing to. It looks like they prefer to manage their investments independently, so I would not be surpised if Reggie sticks around.