When selecting a personality to profile for the Boating Industry Top Products Issue , veteran boat builder Steve Potts was a natural choice . As founder and CEO of Scout Boats , Potts has been fully immersed in product design and development for 57 years , from his earliest days as a teenager working at a retail dealership where he found his passion tinkering on a skiff named Scout , to a fulfilling lifelong career encompassing everything from small trailer boats to sailing vessels , yachts and center consoles .

Over the decades , Potts has earned four utility and two design patents along with dozens of documented product innovations ; his energy and drive show no signs of deceleration . In fact , he and his product development

By Wanda Kenton Smith team headed by son Stevie are entrenched in “ Project Everest ” – aka Scout ’ s flagship 670 LCS – reportedly the largest outboard powered boat on the planet slated for debut this September .

Boating Industry spoke with Potts about early challenges , his relentless pursuit “ to create what doesn ’ t exist ,” and many lessons he ’ s learned along the way .

Boating Industry ( BI ): You were plant manager of a fiberglass company and manager of composite operations for a sailing company prior to investing all your earnings to launch Scout in 1989 . Tell us about those early days . Steve Potts ( SP ): My wife Dianne and I had saved up $ 50,000 to start the business . I worked evenings and weekends through 1988 to design and build the plugs for two new Scouts , the 141 and 151 Sportfish . While I brought my skills in boat manufacturing to the business , I was young and naïve and didn ’ t know diddly about sales . I took the two boats on a double-stacked trailer to coastal towns every weekend . My strategy was to find a phone booth at a gas station , tear out the yellow pages for boat dealerships and then go visit … I was thrown out 75 % of the time !

BI : Your story is one of sheer perseverance . Talk about the natural disasters that challenged your young company . SP : Hurricane Hugo hit September 22 , 1989 , and leveled our building . We were paying around $ 500 a month for rent and working from a 100-year-old former horse stable . I visited the facility with my two young kids and brick by brick , we unburied what we could salvage . I never had the inclination to give in , but to just put one foot in front of the other . Dianne and I took turns standing in the FEMA line and got a loan for $ 10,000 which we used buy groceries , rent a

Scout Boats founder and CEO Steve Potts shares his rags to riches story in a new book coming later this year from Forbes .

smaller building with a dirt floor and just survive . Two months later , on December 23 , the worst snowstorm in history hit the area , caving in the roof of our building and once again , destroying everything we owned .

I remember asking , what was heaven trying to tell me with these two back-toback disasters ? We put the plastic up and restored things to the best of our ability . It set us back from two boats a week to one , but we just kept at it .

BI : What was the watershed moment when things turned around ? SP : It was 1990 . We had scraped together enough money to showcase three models at IMTEC in Atlanta – 14 ’, 15 ’ and a new 172 Sportfish . At the time , we had six dealers and had just hired a salesman . By the end of the show , we had 100 orders , signed up 31 dealers and sold out our production for the next 2.5 years . It was the highlight of my life !

BI : Why the resounding sales success ? SP : Most of the coastal boats at the time were kind of crude and dealers at the show were looking for something different . Our boats brought a new look to the market . I ’ d looked to Boston Whaler and Bertram for my benchmarks and our new Scouts featured finely finished touches throughout , different styling and a totally hand-laid , high-quality fit and finish .

BI : From its humble beginnings , Scout has emerged as a product innovator and highly respected global brand . What ’ s the scope of operations today ? SP : We have 500 employees operating from a 34-acre campus where we design

28 may 2024 www . boatingindustry . com