Boating Industry

July 2014

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July 2014 | Boating Industry | 15 www.BoatingIndustry.com fi shing, great. We looked at ethnicities and that's when we started to see a problem. In the time pe- riod where the Hispanic population in this country grew exponentially, Hispanics as a percentage of the total fi shing population actually dropped. By 2020, there's going to be 66.3 million His- panics and they're going to account for more than half of the population growth. By 2050, they're going to be a third of the population. So how can you ignore them? At the same time, the current fi shermen and boaters are getting older. Anyone who looks at population trends or the changing face of America has to realize that at some point we're going to have start engaging this audience. Boating Industry: How will Lopez Negrete help you reach this community? PETERSON: Most of the major brands have a general agency and a Hispanic marketing agency to attract this market because the market is dif- ferent. Of all the areas we were advertising and promoting, there wasn't a single publication in their Top 40. The only thing that started to hit the Hispanic market was our partnership with Disney. We did a search and hired Lopez Negrete, and they confi rmed for us a lot of what our thinking was: Hispanics are heavy into radio, they watch certain TV shows, they read certain publications. Lopez Negrete has the experience. They have long-term relationships with Bank of America, Walmart, some major, major brands that, early on, dipped their toes in the Hispanic marketplace. Boating Industry: What are some of the key barriers that have stopped Hispanics from participating in fi shing and boating? PETERSON: The whole cultural relevance issue – it is not part of the heritage of this au- dience like it is among non-Hispanic whites. Language is an issue to a certain extent. Most of the people we're going after are bilingual … and sometimes you have to provide materials in both [languages]. Rules and regulations, particularly on the fi shing side – the idea of having to have a license to go fi shing for something that is free in nature is counter-cultural for them. Just the total lack of awareness of the sports, period. Univision, in the presentation that they came up and gave to us, showed the Top 30 out- door activities that Hispanics engage in, and then the general market. Fishing and boating is right there in the general market, but not even on the page with the Hispanic market. The other part of it is the experience. We have to provide experiential events for these folks … that idea of getting people out on the water. We're trying to do that with 15 experi- ential events that we're sponsoring with Disney and Univision, but we're also trying to get some of the industry stakeholders. MarineMax has been a big player with that, so far listing about 20 events where they're going to invite these people into their operations to enjoy some boat- ing and fi shing activities. Boating Industry: You've talked about build- ing mindshare before we can build market share. How are you doing that? PETERSON: We're starting out in Texas and Florida. We'll move to probably California, New York and Illinois next year, then nationwide after that with a large national media and expe- riential campaign. We're building a photo library that can be used in marketing. We're working hand-in-hand with NMMA on some joint market assets. We're coming out with a brand-new Hispanic "Get Started" boating guide. We're working with Dis- cover Boating on a new video … telling a story around a Hispanic family. Just, in general, building an advertising cam- paign like we have on the "Take Me Fishing" side – without, by the way, negatively affecting the "Take Me Fishing" side. I heard a couple of comments that people thought we might start to ignore the general public. That's not the case. We're still spending more on the general public than we are on the Hispanic campaign. Boating Industry: How has the industry re- acted so far to these efforts? PETERSON: We're doing this on behalf of the industry, and we're getting a lot of cooperation and support. We're trying to grow a new audi- ence that they themselves may not have the wherewithal to do now. The fact that you have a MarineMax jumping on board with events where they have stores in Hispanic areas, I fi nd that very encouraging. It's like anything else. If it doesn't meet the expectations or we don't start seeing more His- panics fi shing and boating, it will quickly lose its luster. People are looking for instant gratifi cation, but we're in this for the long haul. Boating Industry: What do you see as the biggest challenge for the industry in trying to bring this population into boating and fi shing? PETERSON: I think the biggest issue is that every meeting you go to, every boat show you go to, every event you go to, the industry is not as diverse as it should be. I'm not the fi rst person who's noticed that. We have to embrace this. We also have to be willing to change. Change is tough. We have to be willing to invest. Who's going to step up? Who's going to invest? We have a fi nite amount of dollars to invest in this and I think it's going to need more. We just have to be more open to new ideas, new thoughts, new ways of doing business. EDITOR'S NOTE: There are several re- sources available for companies that need as- sistance in marketing to a Hispanic audience on the RBFF website, TakeMeFishing.org, in- cluding research, webinars and a photo library. RBFF has also produced a series of Spanish- language how-to fi shing videos available at YouTube.com/takemefi shingfi lms. "I think the biggest issue is that every meeting you go to, every boat show you go to, every event you go to, the industry is not as diverse as it should be." P14x15-BI14JUL-Q&A.indd 15 5/28/14 11:46 AM

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