This is especially true when talking about selling into the aftermarket accessories segment with its multitude of outlets that sell directly to the boat owner/consumer. Add to that the challenges posed by geographic distance in the USA, with the major accessory players being a thousand miles away or more from each other, and its no wonder that efficiency is not a word that is used.

The good news is that change is underway and accelerating quite rapidly thanks to the trade show and format which is the Marine Aftermarket Accessories Trade Show - MAATS.

MAATS is organised by the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) and modelled on a successful format from the computer industry. The 4th annual MAATS show took place in Las Vegas in July and what makes MAATS unique and efficient is that the show is structured round the needs of the buyers who attend the show to find out about the "latest and greatest products in the marine aftermarket - from both existing and prospective suppliers".

There were 355 buyers at this year's event compared to 260 in 2003, a 37% increase. As you might imagine a large majority of the buyers were from US companies (these domestic buyers account for some U$2.2 billion of accessory purchases) but there were also some from other countries. These included Marathon Leisure, Mailspeed Marine and Mark Dowland Marine from the UK, Herman Gotthardt from Sweden, Technomarine Group from Russia, Vidal Marine from France as well as companies from Australia, Argentina, the Caribbean, Finland, Mexico, Singapore and Turkey.

Private appointments The major attraction and advantage of the format is the pre-scheduled, private appointments between buyers and suppliers.

"My aim was to source new products directly with the manufacturers, but the sales booths are very small and it's easy to miss products because the presentations are done in the individual meetings, " said Simon Relph, managing director of Mailspeed Marine.

The whole structure of the show is very different to the Windsor Trade Show, he added.

"There's a lot more emphasis on the one-to-one meetings."

This year's show was Mailspeed's first visit to MAATS, but Relph says he'll be back next year and will get more heavily involved with the meetings.

Buyers attending MAATS have to let the organisers know which companies they wish to meet and/or the types of products they are looking for.

Suppliers, who have to be exhibitors at MAATS, can request pre-scheduled, private appointments with those same buyers.

The organisers then act as a dating service and try to match everyone's ambitions.

What is not so widely known is that the buyers have the power of veto insofar as they can say that they do not wish to meet with a particular company.

"MAATS is a valuable show for us, said Marathon Leisure's Tim Millinder, who reckons 20% of his product portfolio is now US products. "I had a room and people came to see me - I had 14 meetings in two days."

But, he added, half the people who come have no idea at all about what it takes to sell into Europe. They come with products that have no CE approval and have no export pricing set out.

"Some I got rid of quickly, " he said. "If they're not prepared there's no point spending time with them."

But Mark Dowland of MDM says he's not interested in the dating service. "I went over for 2 1/2 days as an independent, " he told BB. "I arranged my own meetings and I didn't have a booth - five or seven days is just too long - and I just walked the floor."

Great draw Dowland's view is not backed by the Americans. "Uninterrupted one-on-one meetings are a great draw for buyers, " says Karl Tollefson, purchasing agent for Fisheries Supply Co based in Seattle. "Those meetings, plus those that take place on the floor, provide the face to face contact that makes this industry work."

The private meetings take place in hotel suites (for domestic US buyers) or in the International Meetings Center.

For meetings with domestic buyers there is a cost of U$85 for a 25 minute meeting and U$170 for a 55 minute meeting.

Meetings with international buyers cost U$65 and last for 55 minutes. The money raised in this manner goes toward suite/hotel room costs and in return buyers commit to attend all meetings and events.

Other events include New Product Previews and the NMMA Innovation Awards.

New Product Previews last five minutes - "they're very strictly timed" said Millinder - and take place each day over a breakfast/luncheon in front of a guaranteed audience of buyers. Products presented in this manner are automatically entered into the NMMA Innovation Awards.

As you might now expect there is a cost for this as well - U$250 to be exact. The NMMA Innovation Awards are judged by Boating Writers International and the winners are announced at the MAATS Awards Reception.

Winners this year included two from the UK - Barton Marine's Clam Seal in the water sports segment and Echo Pilot's Collision Avoidance Sonar System, which tied for the award in the aftermarket electronics segment.

All of this is supported by an exhibits hall, open for five hours a day, where 295 companies displayed their products to the buyers and other qualified trade personnel.

With all the talk of buyers buying billions and introduction to them of new products it is worth reminding ourselves of what the show can and cannot do.

Efficient format It does provide an efficient format for introducing new products and new companies to the US and now international markets. It will only do so for those companies who invest the time and effort in understanding the needs and wants of the buyers as well as the needs and wants of the market place consumer.

Pro Mariner is an excellent example of what can be achieved. For decades the company was known as an OEM supplier of electronic products such as galvanic isolation and monitoring, battery isolators and the like.

"We made the strategic decision three years ago to dramatically increase our aftermarket sales and decided MAATS was the way we would approach that market segment, " said Gerald Demirjian, vice president, ProMariner. "We have increased our aftermarket sales over 450% since then and now our OEM and aftermarket sales are roughly equal."

Our success can be attributed to three things, added Demirjian. First, the ability to work with the organisers and schedule appointments with those companies we wished to meet. Second, we clearly identified what we wanted to get out of the meetings and third, our preparation for the meetings was very thorough and included us taking samples of the products we were discussing to the meetings with us.

MAATS does not take the place of efficient and professional follow up of sales and delivery promises made and it does not take the place of the equally important routine flow of information and problem solving.

It will not take a great leap of imagination to see one of two things happen in the future. One is that the same format will be copied to a large extent and put into place at a trade show in Europe - METS for example.

The other is that MAATS will become THE global trade show for aftermarket accessories and equipment thus rendering other trade shows obsolete.

Will MAATS become the global show?

"If the MTS used the same one-toone meetings, they would have to separate them from the show, " said Millinder. "Then it would be very very useful."

But Dowland - whose MDM has around 30% of its portfolio in US products - thinks there's little the MTS can glean from MAATS.

"They're two different types of show, " he said. "MAATS is a distributor show and the MTS is a chandlers show."

If there's anything we can learn from MAATS it's small booths, a short and sharp show and not long hours, concluded Dowland.

Will MAATS take over the world?

Dowland said only that timing is everything. "It's at the right time of year for us, " he said. "METS is too late - anything we see there can't get into the next year's catalogue."

The Americans would rather we all went over to MAATS and then they wouldn't have to come to METS, said Dowland.

Millinder doesn't think MAATS will go much further. "The Americans are almost too scared of investing enough into MAATS. I don't believe they get enough foreign visitors." PN