Marinas weighing last minute reservation service

It’s a sunny day when you were expecting storms and you decide you want to take advantage of the good weather and set off for a night or two on your boat, but have no reservations along your route.

Or you’re already in an area you haven’t stayed before, but decide you would like to spend the night. How do you locate a marina to accommodate you?

Enter SlipFinder.com, which claims to make all the arrangements you need, even at the last minute via a smartphone app.

It’s a niche entrepreneurs Keith Cooper and Todd Brice found missing from existing reservation services.

Mr. Brice, who runs Yacht Service Ltd. out of Amityville, embraced the concept and worked with Mr. Cooper for the past year to develop the app, specifically distinguishing it from other reservation services because of its ability to list those last minute openings at marinas.

“It’s a service no one else in providing,” Mr. Cooper said.

An Internet search provides listings for some potential competitors, but none that are doing exactly what SlipFinder is doing — providing guidance for last minute reservations.

DockHop.com, presently merging with Dockwa of Newport, Rhode Island, launched about the same time as SlipFinder and aims to change the way boaters search for dockage and storage facilities. But it concentrates on working with dock masters to replace antiquated systems to book reservations with an Internet-based system, according to Tyler Kneisel, one of DockHop’s founders who will now be working with the newly merged company.

The fee for its bookings falls to the boaters who pay 5 percent of their reservations. But its aim isn’t to try to fill those last minute empty slips as SlipFinder does.

The difference between SlipFinder and other services is that no one else is currently offering to link the boater with an open booking that can be booked directly through the app at the last minute, Mr. Cooper said. For the convenience, the boater pays SlipFinder a fee of 10 percent of the booking. SlipFinder handles the billing process online on behalf of each marina.

Sounds like a good idea, and for some marinas, it’s proving to help them fill slips, especially during the week when they might otherwise have a number of empty spaces.

With 88 million recreational boaters throughout the country, Mr. Cooper is confident the app will gain enough popularity to make it viable. Currently SlipFinder has relationships with 95 marinas along the eastern seacoast from New England to the Bahamas, in the areas of the Great Lakes and in San Diego with the aim of expanding.

Officials at both Townsend Manor and Port of Egypt, who have signed on with SlipFinder, say it’s too early to assess its effectiveness.

But others have concerns that it’s not a service that will help their businesses.

James Brantuk at the Island Boatyard and Marina on Shelter Island said the jury is still out for him. He hadn’t yet had time to fully evaluate the new business.

His inclination is to wait through the first year, assuming that like many new services, it could take time to work out “kinks.”

But his concern is that even though there’s no cost to marinas to sign on for the service, he might have to use more manpower to update his listing. He also wants assurance that anyone booking would be signing on to his terms of use, so he wouldn’t be chancing increased liability.

“The concept is great,” Mr. Brantuk said. “I think we will be on eventually.”

Less enthusiastic, for somewhat different reasons, were two men who operate Greenport marinas — Jeff Goubeaud at the Mitchell Park Marina and Mike Acebo at Brewer Yacht Yard.

Like Mr. Brantuk, Mr. Goubeaud said it was not the time of year for him to evaluate a new service, but he’s concerned that despite efforts the two app developers have incorporated to ensure a smooth booking experience, the boats that show up may not fit in the spaces he has open.

A space for a 30-foot boat isn’t adequate if the craft turns out to be a wide catamaran, Mr. Goubeaud said. His staff knows the questions to ask so each booking will fit the needs of the customer. That includes the power needs, since they vary at different places at the Mitchell Marina.

Mr. Acebo points out that Brewer is one of a number of membership yacht yards from Maryland to Maine that respond to needs of its members first. Any Brewer member is able to use an available, appropriately sized slip without further charge, but that could be compromised by other bookings coming in from the Internet, he said.

He sees an website booking as intrusive to his business.

Not only would he have to be checking the Internet regularly, but would face the possibility of having to go back and forth with potential customers so all information is clear. A single telephone call with a customer to one of his trained staff could get the booking arranged in a single shot.

Mr. Cooper counters by noting that someone trying to book a slip can actually provide a picture of the craft or forward a picture from a dealer to the marina. And once boaters create a profile, they don’t have to recreate it for each marina they might want to use.

With three quarters of marinas privately owned and operating with “an inefficient or cumbersome reservation system,” Mr. Cooper remains optimistic that many others will sign on to the service.

“We’re revolutionizing the boating industry by giving marinas and customers a means to communicate in real time,” he said.