Five global launches at the Dubai Boat Show in March marked Gulf Craft’s intention of seeing 2011 as a year of growth, followed by a hugely successful Asian tour highlighting Gulf Craft’s vision of an emergence of a third large yachting destination globally, defined by the yachting grounds connecting the Middle East and SE-Asia cruising destinations. This led the way for the new dealer appointment of Eminence Yachting in Hong Kong, Singapore and the Philippines, and successful yacht sales in the Asia region.
Majesty 63 running shot
Looking within, the top management team of Gulf Craft is very much involved and accessible at every stage in the business internally and externally. Visible to their factory workers, as well as all customers and the media, the commitment of the management to travelling the globe, standing on stands at boat shows, giving guests personalized tours of boats themselves and entertaining on media road shows, all add up to give greater accessibility and clarity for all through this personalized approach.
“The personal approach is vital when you are a custom builder of yachts and superyachts”, comments Chief Operating Officer, Erwin Bamps, “When you are building and customizing someone’s chosen way of life on the water, you need to build up a special rapport otherwise you will simply never understand their requirements properly. Rather than selling products, we build lasting customer relationships that show our commitment to them and the boat we build for them. This approach is certainly one of the reasons Gulf Craft is so successful. The face to face personal approach has always been and always will be the way Gulf Craft does business.”
Continuing to show their commitment to customers and prospective customers, as well as moving with the current fast paced world of communication, Gulf Craft have recently invested and introduced a new Blog. Ready to use now, the Blog serves as an online ‘newspaper’ for everything Gulf Craft. The Blog contains and will regularly be updated with the latest press announcements, pictures of events, product news and media coverage, and will compliment the existing Facebook social networking pages in displaying Gulf Craft’s news and successes.
These online facilities are available to share with anyone, from customers and potential customers, to the media, dealers and suppliers. Gulf Craft believe that anyone interested in Gulf Craft, especially possible customers looking to invest in a yacht, will undoubtedly be interested in the story behind the product. Erwin Bamps explains; “Our customers are investing with us, therefore we wish to invest in them and we are using social networking and online platforms to get closer to existing and potential clients to tell them the Gulf Craft story and share with them all our news. Furthermore, for existing customers we see the new Blog and other online facilities as a way of further bonding our relationship with them by allowing them to keep up to date and stay within the Gulf Craft fold hearing the latest developments first. We are also in the process of further developing our YouTube channels – watch this space
