TEAK ISLE’S GOLDEN TICKET

I doubt anyone will mistake Teak Isle’s massive 200,000-square-foot manufacturing campus for Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, but don’t be too quick to dismiss its impressive influence.

While I didn’t spot any Oompa-Loompas among the approximately 340 employees spread out over four separate buildings during my recent visit, the harmony and precision in which this Florida-based company runs and operates is truly movie-like.

When it comes to Charlie Bucket-like good fortunes, Teak Isle Manufacturing appeared to have found its own “Golden Ticket” when it created Boat Outfitters over ten years ago. Today as a division of Teak Isle, it has become an online aftermarket resource for DIYers looking to revamp any boat, new or old.

On top of that, Boat Outfitters with Teak Isle supports hundreds of boatbuilders with custom components with many top manufacturers keeping them on speed dial with needs for new model year releases and other needed parts. The Boat Outfitters website supplies all sorts of parts, components and accessories, but is arguably best known–at least in the pontoon segment–for its storage drawers, tackle centers and glove boxes designed to add more versatility using spaces on board that are typically not being used to their maximum potential.

“Who really even uses a changing room anyway?” smiles Orlando Boat Sales owner John Palmer who as a dealer often installs units on his pontoons that are designed specifically to fit the space behind the back of a chaise lounger. “Plus these units are super easy to install.” With Teak Isle working closely with top pontoon manufacturers, Boat Outfitters offers specific products for each boat brand that are designed to match the color schemes and provide a factory OEM fit. John sees this as a huge advantage over his competition.

DEALER SUCCESS
Part of my tour included a drive to John’s nearby dealership that has been selling Avalon pontoons for nearly 20 years. Orlando Boat Sales works directly with Teak Isle and feels its products give them an advantage over other pontoon dealers. Its drawer units with dual glove boxes are the most popular upgrade they install and they easily fit where pop-up changing room enclosures typically are found on most pontoon boats.

“The best advantage is the sealed, dry storage; that’s probably the most important thing with these units,” added John. “It seals very well. I don’t care which boat you have, there’s no real sealed dry storage available and everything gets moist if not soaked under your pontoon seats.

When a boat that has a drawer unit on it comes in for service, everything they own is in that box. Everything they want to put on their boat that they need to keep dry is in that box.” To show how easy it is to install a drawer unit, Sandro Alvarez installed one on an Avalon LSZ 2185 CRB that Orlando Boat Sales had on the lot during our visit. Sandro had the changing room door off and the new drawer unit from Teak Isle in place within minutes.

“It slides right in and then just eight screws hold it in place. It takes five to ten minutes tops,” said Sandro after completing the install. “It looks great and matches with the rest of the interior.” Now the upgraded Avalon includes a locking glove box and two slide out drawers with the larger drawer below complete with two removable dog dishes.

“The doggie bowls are popular and have been catching on lately because everyone likes to bring their dogs on board,” said John. “But the biggest selling points to the entire unit again are the dry storage and the fact that it’s lockable. Dry storage is always going to be a fight for every brand and I feel installing these units for our customers gives us an advantage over other dealers. It gives us an edge.”

PONTOON DOMINATION
While Teak Isle and Boat Outfitters have their hand in many segments of the boating industry, their dominance in the pontoon market and its custom accessories is truly impressive.

“There’s a lot of underutilized space on pontoon boats so we make all sorts of components that are easy to add,” says Pat Brown, co-owner of Teak Isle. “Among them are table toppers that hold happy-hour ingredients, tackle centers with rod holders, and even a pull-out drawer with cutouts for pet food and water bowls.”



FAMILY TIES
Teak Isle is co-owned by brothers Pat and Dave Brown who bought the business from their father Sandy nearly 25 years ago. “My father started the business with Sonny Jones in 1979 selling teak swim platforms, but it’s an interesting story of how it all began,” recalls Pat.

“He worked at a boat dealership and had earned some ownership and because of the way he ran the dealership he was invited to be on the Wellcraft dealer council. They would bring the dealers in to get their opinions on different models and in his relationship with them became aware of a need for a good teak supplier and that was the start of Teak Isle.”

Dealers were having trouble sourcing teak so Sandy started making and selling it around the state and he also milled and sold teak trim. Even after selling the business to his sons, Sandy was still involved with the company until recently when he passed away. “One of the things my dad was very good at is he could touch any motor and make it work,” says Pat. “He could fix anything and loved being around our machines.”

THE FIRST BIG BUY
Today there are 12 computer-numeric-control (CNC) machines at its four different plants, but that of course wasn’t always the case. “The first big thing we bought was a CNC router and that was a big purchase,” recalls Pat.

“We then committed to buy five of each one of the different thickness of King StarBoard, manufactured by King Plastic Corp. We fretted over that buy at the time and now looking back we use several million pounds of it each year.”

Teak Isle is among King Plastic’s highest-volume customers and around the main facility you’ll find stacks of the material arranged by color and size in large racks.

On average the company gets about two truckloads of it each week. King StarBoard supercharged Teak Isle’s business in the early `80s and the addition of the CNC machines helped the company to grow. The routers run continuously throughout the day and can cut just about any size and shape part from sheets of King StarBoard, acrylic, marine-grade plywood and Corian.

“They’re the bread and butter of our business; we couldn’t do the volume we do without them,” states Pat. “The machines also help reduce scrap by utilizing as much of each sheet as possible. You can’t have an operation like ours without scrap and we turn over about 1.1 million pounds of scrap each year to a recycling company, so there’s ultimately very little waste.”

King StarBoard, acrylic, Corian, aluminum and marine-grade plywood go through CNC machining before skilled craftspeople transform the materials into stowage drawers, tackle stations, doors and other components critical to the boatbuilding trade and retail market. When the company first started, Teak was what was being used on boats, but it was this new marine-grade polymer called King StarBoard that helped the company become what it is today.

“We started working with the material because we could get it in large sheet sizes, and it was easy to fabricate and required little to no maintenance in the marine environment,” says Pat. “It’s durable and workable, which means we can craft just about anything with it, from console-entry doors to rod holders to slide-out cooler racks and more.”

NEXT GENERATION
Pat’s son Andrew and Dave’s son Parker are the third generation from the Brown family to work at Teak Isle. Parker works as an OEM sales associate while Andrew as the director of eCommerce, oversees Boat Outfitters and has helped it grow to where it brings in an estimated 20 percent of the business.

“Andrew and the people have done a really good job with Boat Outfitters,” says Pat. “Our customer service team is top notch.” Boat Outfitters started right after the economic downturn in 2011. “Our goal is to be the place where people can find hard-to-find replacement parts, outfit their boat, and order custom parts and components,” says Andrew.

Pat and his brother Dave as co-owners have taken Teak Isle and Boat Outfitters to a high level never thought possible when this family-run business was first just getting started and is showing no signs of slowing down. As the best place for do-it-yourselfers to go when upgrading or refurbishing their boats, Boat Outfitters is clearly that “Golden Ticket” that our industry depends on and only time will tell what the boating industry’s version of Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory will come up with next.


FOR MORE INFORMATION

Avalon Pontoons
www.avalonpontoons.com

Boat Outfitters
www.boatoutfitters.com

Orlando Boat Sales Inc.
www.orlandoboatsalesinc.com

Teak Isle Manufacturing
www.teakisle.com