Electric boat dealer setting out on 10 city EBOAT EXPO demo tour
Electric boat dealer Electrified Marina of Norfolk Virginia has organized ‘EBOAT EXPO 2024’, a 10 location, 5 state tour with 12 e-boats where you can get out on the water and ‘experience the future of boating’ for yourself.
The boats include models from Candela, Duffy, Four Winns, Halevai, Ingenity, Rand, Vision Marine, Voltari and X Shore and the EBOAT EXPO 2024 locations are taking pace in Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
Find out where EBOAT EXPO 2024 is coming and book a test ride
There are hundreds of electric boat motor dealers in the United States, and dozens of dealers that carry electric boats. But Electrified Marina, is the only ‘electric only’ dealer in the country and has not only the largest selection of e-boat brands, but also electric motors, a rental service, and refit shop.
We had a chance to chat with Co-Founder Erick Pinzon, who started his working career as an automotive mechanic, became a master tech for BMW and then had his life turned upside down in 2011 when a buddy convinced him to take a ride in an EV.
That ride turned him on to the possibilities of electric cars so much he joined the EV company the next year, grinding his way through tumultuous years at the then-struggling startup where the 100 hour-a-week work load was so heavy he had to beg his supervisor to get time off for his crew to just wash their clothes.
As the company grew he rose in the ranks and spent time looking after operations in cities throughout California, in Maryland, Montreal Canada and in Richmond, Virginia before landing in his hometown of Virginia Beach.
When the EV company asked him to start up a new shop there, Erick decided he was actually looking for something a little less stressful and took a giant life leap when he resigned and took up the opportunity to invest in a local plant-based delicatessen.
EV and Rocket experience
During his time at the EV company he had invested in small real estate holdings and used his knowledge in that area to help find a new location for the Honest Pastures deli he smilingly refers to as the ’vegan Subway’.
Through all of this he met Erin Gatling, a literal rocket scientist who had worked at a well known private rocket company for 10 years, then returned to Virginia, where she had done her internship at the NASA Langley Research Center.
When Erin left the rocket world she and her husband had planned to spend a couple of years sailing around the world together with their two young kids. After selling their house to buy a boat and touring around the Caribbean for a few months, they knew they had made the right decision. They headed back to Virginia for a major electrical and kitchen refit to get the boat ready for an around-the world voyage.
Then fate stepped in when it fell off its jack stands in the middle of the night just a few weeks before they were to set off. Erin and her young family now had to settle down, at least in the short term. They got themselves a motorhome they called their ‘land yacht’ and Erin started looking for something to fill her time that would include her passions of sustainability and water.
Erin knew of a marina for sale in the area, and mentioned it to Erick. He was intrigued by it, but for the price the owners were asking, running it as a regular marina and renting out slips was never going to work financially. As they were talking about it, though, they realized she knew boats, he knew electric transportation…maybe there was a different way of running the marina but with a focus on electric boats?
‘How do we figure it out?’
The other thing they realized is that they both had what he calls the ‘kind of maniacal outlook on life and business bred by the owner of the EV and rocket company: you don’t say ‘no’, you say ‘how do we figure it out?’ So they started looking at ‘an electrified marina’ seriously.
There was already a small electric boat rental company in town, but they were not interested in working together, so Erick did some research. He found Vision Marine Technologies (VMT), who not only build electric boats and motors but also have a division dedicated to electric boat rental operations. They quickly worked out an arrangement for Electrified Marina to be both a sales agent and rental operator for VMT.
They found other electric boatbuilders by reading Plugboats (thanks!) and searching on the internet, then went to the Miami Boat Show and saw some in real life: X Shore, Ingenity, Nautique, Four Winns, and of course a lot of electric propulsion companies.
Erick says ‘It reminded me a bit of the equivalent of electric cars in 2012, where you had the Nissan LEAF, a Chevy Volt, and others, and your use case and budget decided that very quickly.
So the team set out to build a stable of brands for the different boating use cases. They now carry boats from all of the companies listed at the beginning of this article. Literally something for everyone, from slow cruising cocktail boats to electrified pontoons and dayboats to the X Shore Eelex 8000 sportboat and hydrofoiling Candela C-8.
Electric boat dealer has ‘something for everyone’
All of this is exciting, but Erick is realistic about where the market is at. “I think the key part is tapping into those people that want to be early adopters. But a lot of it right now is education.”
He remembers from his EV days the naysayers and trolls on social media, and is encountering them again with electric boats. When they mention, for example, that an electric boat has only a 40 mile range, he knows that research from the NMMA and others show most people go about 10 miles a day.
The Electrified Marina team thinks the best way to educate customers is through what he calls ‘butts in boats.’ That’s where the EBOAT EXPO 2024 came from.
They are happy to get any boat owner or prospective boat owner out to see and hear and feel for themselves what it’s like. “I tell my team that whether it turns into an immediate sale or not, you’re planting seeds with every one of these, and the person is thinking about it, talking about it with their friends.”
Now the electric boat dealer is taking this show on the road, or rather ‘on the water’. There are many people who agree with Erick’s observation that when you get people out on an electric boat they are very impressed. Some even say it is eye opening. If you are located near the east coast of the US, this is a great opportunity to experience electric boating for yourself. The tour is on now until November 3. The link to the schedule is below.
EBOAT EXPO 2024 Electrified Marina E-Boats for sale from Electrified Marina in Plugboats Markeptlace
