Despite the crisis, the global order book for super-yachts is considerable enough to feed demand for berths, boosting the industry's prospects, Camper and Nicholsons Marinas International Ltd chairman Nick Maris told The Sunday Times on Thursday.
At the beginning of this year, super-yacht orders stood at over 1,000, the highest ever, Mr Maris said. The anticipated widespread cancellations did not materialise, and while pricing and new orders may have been affected, the industry is healthy.
Camper and Nicholsons's flagship marina, the Grand Harbour Marina in Vittoriosa, has continued to enjoy high occupancy in the third quarter of the year, and enquiries continue.
According to the interim directors' statement last month, marina operator Grand Harbour Marina plc, in which Camper and Nicholsons holds a 79 per cent stake, pontoon berths remain full and super-yacht berthing for the summer stood at 104 yachts. Winter bookings have maintained the super-yacht berth occupancy for the period compared to last winter. Rental price and square metre occupancy have been increased.
Grand Harbour Marina plc reported a half-yearly post-tax loss of €168,167 to last June. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation stood at €50,247 for the first six months of this year, more than double the figure for the corresponding period last year. There were no super-yacht berth sales in the first half of the year.
"Grand Harbour Marina was laid out for the international super-yacht business," Mr Maris explained. "It is a necessary component. It has made sales over many years, and the rates have been rising. They started at €500 per square metre of water area, now they have reached €2,200. The company has really significant profit potential even by making a single berth sale a year. However, just based on the rental berths, we have brought the company into an operational break-even situation, and that will continue to improve."
Mr Maris pointed out that "spectacular profits" on rental berths were not registered because in water area terms, these berths occupied a third of the marina. He emphasised that despite their commanding position in the Mediterranean market, berth rates in Malta were lower because of publicly owned marinas which have essentially subsidised yachtsmen with below market rates.
Grand Harbour Marina sold three berths for over €10 million in 2007, the equivalent of three years' projected berth sales. Mr Maris is confident sales will pick up but will not reach past levels for some time. Meanwhile, the world, he pointed out, will continue to create wealthy people - between 1980 and 2005, the world super-yacht fleet grew 17 times over, despite international financial crises.
Camper and Nicholsons, arguably the world's oldest yachting brand (it was established in 1782) is among the most recognised. Its marinas are situated in some of the most beautiful locations in the world including Grenada's Port Louis, Italy's Porto San Rocco, Egypt's Port Ghalib, and Turkey's Port Gocek. Construction on its marina in Port Louis will be finalised this weekend. By May, a joint venture marina in Cesme, Turkey, should be completed.
Grand Harbour Marina is, however, its showcase. Mr Maris, who travels to Malta on business every month, will host a Chinese delegation here in January as part of consultations over a marina in China. A Cuban delegation will travel to Malta in March or April.
"Every new boat constitutes a demand for a berth," Mr Maris said. "We market very widely to the major shows in Monaco, Genoa, Fort Lauderdale, London, Paris, Istanbul and Dusseldorf. It is partly mass marketing, partly business-to-business, partly super-yacht.
"We organise familiarisation trips for the media, charter brokers and yacht brokers or yacht managers. We visit them on their own territory, we are present at sailing events, on the web. We are marketing globally across a very wide spread of boat sizes - from eight to 100 metres."
The industry's prospects are positive primarily because of the difficulty in creating supply in a sector constrained by geography and environmental concerns. There were waiting lists for berths at marinas all over the world, from Malta to Florida.
Malta, Mr Maris stressed, has a small, finite coastline which should not be consumed by unnecessary marinas. He believed only 'brown field' marinas - those within existing harbour areas - should be built. Kalkara, for which a request for proposals for the management of a temporary marina has been issued, is a 'brown field' marina. It is one which Camper and Nicholsons supports, but despite its location in the creek adjacent to Grand Harbour Marina, it is one the company may not necessarily be interested in. Its small size and eight-year lifespan means it does not fit the company's business plan involving international customers.
Mr Maris cautioned against striving to accommodate all demand for berths. If Malta used its projected peak of around 3,700 berths significantly for low-cost, low-service marinas, the industry's international repute risked being damaged.
"The government has been very attentive to the infrastructure around the sector," Mr Maris said, praising the excellent services that were available in Malta to the wider yachting community.
"The reasonable leisure needs of Maltese people must be catered for, but equally the international standing that Camper and Nicholsons and others are building should not be sacrificed by turning Malta into a mass marina destination."
It is a year since Camper and Nicholsons opened an office in Malta to act as its nerve centre. It has now grown to encompass a team of 12 and recently added a human resources director to its staff. The office runs Camper and Nicholsons's finance, technical, business development and several operational functions, although the company maintains representatives in the Caribbean and France to handle enquiries and market marinas in the regions.
Grand Harbour Marina employs a staff of 16 and has 17 subcontractors. Camper and Nicholsons and Grand Harbour Marina are, to Mr Maris's knowledge, the only two quoted marina companies in the world.