Middlewich Narrowboats

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

Narrowboat Hirers please help

 

I have just bought a great name in the narrowboat hire industry

 

MIDDLEWICH NARROWBOATS

 

I have been a customer with this company myself many times over the last twenty years and always had a fantastic time but I have heard mixed reviews from recent hirers.

 

I really would like to understand the company’s reputation.

Have you hired from us? What can you tell me about our reputation? Would you hire again, why?

 

Any other advice gratefully received. There is a lot to do at Middlewich Narrowboats for next season to make sure that our hirers have a great time, It will be done. Thank you all for your help

 

Greg

[Albion]

Narrowboat Hirers please help

 

I have just bought a great name in the narrowboat hire industry

 

MIDDLEWICH NARROWBOATS

 

I have been a customer with this company myself many times over the last twenty years and always had a fantastic time but I have heard mixed reviews from recent hirers.

 

I really would like to understand the company’s reputation.

Have you hired from us? What can you tell me about our reputation? Would you hire again, why?

 

Any other advice gratefully received. There is a lot to do at Middlewich Narrowboats for next season to make sure that our hirers have a great time, It will be done. Thank you all for your help

 

Greg

 

I have never hired from Middlewich Narrowboats and it is some time since I have been past the hire base but, in the past, MN had a reputation for aging, basic craft that were usually more traddy than most other fleets. The impression was that they kept their boats way past the normal sell by date but that this suited a certain type of customer who wanted traddy and basic, but would put many others off because the hire boat market had moved much more up-market by then, leaving MN stuck in the past. It seems to me that MN gradually reduced their market appeal by appealing more and more to hard core enthusiasts rather than the ordinary hirers, as the fleet got older and older.

Roger

Edited December 3, 2011 by Albion

[journeyperson]

Are you going to keep the name? I hope so.

[Mac of Cygnet]

Are you going to keep the name? I hope so.

 

Well I certainly hope it's not going to be the Chugalong Hire Company

[the grinch]

pretty much what albion has already said.

are you aware of the security problems last year? batteries were being nicked at a steady rate!

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

THANKS FOR THE COMMENTS

Yes, aware of the battery pinchers

Name, Probably keep the name unless it's reputation is too bad to save

I understand the comments on the fleet and plans are being made appropriately

[Graham Davis]

We looked a couple of years ago, but thought the boats basic and jaded.

[Athy]

Basic good, jaded bad. There is a market for basic hire boats at popular prices - not everyone wants granite work tops and three types of exotic wood inlay. But if the boats look clean and fresh inside and out, that would increase their appeal.Are you the ones whose fleet includes a real trad with a vintage engine in a centre engine room, or am I confusing you with someone else?

[Guest]

Basic good, jaded bad. There is a market for basic hire boats at popular prices - not everyone wants granite work tops and three types of exotic wood inlay. But if the boats look clean and fresh inside and out, that would increase their appeal.Are you the ones whose fleet includes a real trad with a vintage engine in a centre engine room, or am I confusing you with someone else?

 

We spoke to a family of Middlewich hirers last year who were waiting for their boat to be readied - very unhappy as they had arrived on time and their boat was no where near ready.

 

They were first time hirers and it was not a good first impression and they had no intention of hiring with you again as a result.

 

My impression of your boats is the boats look tatty and uncared for and as a result I would be reluctant to hire from you.

 

You did ask.....

[Athy]

I have had a look at the Middlewich site and I see that I do them an injustice: they have several trads with boatman's cabins (don't know what engines they have!). Certainly, as MJG says, a prompt, punctual get-away is important - first impressions etc.

I can think of one Midlands hire fleet whose boats are probably basic and certainly externally rather tatty, as well as being fairly ugly, but one sees them up and down the Oxford all the time during the season, so the demand must be there.

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

Basic good, jaded bad. There is a market for basic hire boats at popular prices - not everyone wants granite work tops and three types of exotic wood inlay. But if the boats look clean and fresh inside and out, that would increase their appeal.Are you the ones whose fleet includes a real trad with a vintage engine in a centre engine room, or am I confusing you with someone else?

YES

The fleet has a few stunning traditional boats, beautiful chugging engines in the engine room like a warm beating heart. These have been badly marketed though, for next season these will all be tidied up, make sure they’re solidly reliable and probably grouped into a traditional fleet so people can easily understand that these are the heritage boats. What do you folks think of that idea?

[classicstove]

Whether they are heritage boats or not, people who hire/rent expect a clean with everything working when they are away for a week

 

An external repaint with a traditional sign writing would be a very good start and you can protect the value of the expensive sign writing by over coating with varnish to protect against the bushes/trees that the hirers love to seem to put hire against

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

We spoke to a family of Middlewich hirers last year who were waiting for their boat to be readied - very unhappy as they had arrived on time and their boat was no where near ready.

 

They were first time hirers and it was not a good first impression and they had no intention of hiring with you again as a result.

 

My impression of your boats is the boats look tatty and uncared for and as a result I would be reluctant to hire from you.

 

You did ask.....

Yes I did and thanks for your comments.

 

I have heard this too. This will not be happening on my watch. To be fair to the team that were there they struggled against the odds a bit to get the boats out. I cant say much because of the contractual legal stuff but the right staff and processes will be in place in future.

[Athy]

They are described on the web site but one has to look carefully; not much is made of how distinctive they are. They could be more prominent in your advertising material - although I have heard of someone else who offers s ingle such trad boat for hire, I think that yours must be the only ones which are part of a hire fleet.

What type of "beating hearts" do they have?

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

Whether they are heritage boats or not, people who hire/rent expect a clean with everything working when they are away for a week

 

An external repaint with a traditional sign writing would be a very good start and you can protect the value of the expensive sign writing by over coating with varnish to protect against the bushes/trees that the hirers love to seem to put hire against

I Agree....we'll do that.

[dor]

Reputation locally is one of poor reliability, poorly prepared boats and often not very clean. One recently was sent out with a nearly-full pumpout tank.

 

It can only get better!

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

Reputation locally is one of poor reliability, poorly prepared boats and often not very clean. One recently was sent out with a nearly-full pumpout tank.

 

It can only get better!

unforgiveable

[Albion]

YES

The fleet has a few stunning traditional boats, beautiful chugging engines in the engine room like a warm beating heart. These have been badly marketed though, for next season these will all be tidied up, make sure they’re solidly reliable and probably grouped into a traditional fleet so people can easily understand that these are the heritage boats. What do you folks think of that idea?

 

I agree with Athy. There will still be a market for a clean, tidy, up-together basic boat at the right price but, as tastes and expectations change, that will be a diminishing market IMO.

 

It is just the same with new private boats. At one time you had veneered ply and wooden work surfaces now the market has tended towards exotic timbers and granite surfaces with masses of electrical gizmos. I don't think that this move would have happened if the market didn't drive it.

 

Where MN got it wrong, particularly towards the end was getting a reputation for ONLY doing tired, basic, ageing boats. If you have a bottom-end fleet kept separate from a better fleet then I think the older boats will serve that market well. Where you have to make a distinction though is that you have two sorts of customer for that fleet:-

1. I just want a cheap boat, don't care what it looks like but it must be cheap. This type won't really care whether it has a nice trad engine in an engine room or not as long as it goes.

2. I want a traddy characterful boat with a trad engine and I'm prepared to accept that it won't have all the mod cons because I like that type of craft and there aren't many other places I can get a similar craft from.

These two sorts of customer will treat the craft entirely different from each other and you will have to decide whether you are prepared to serve both types or only type 2.

 

To break from the past though, particularly if you retain the name Middlewich Narrowboats, I think you should have some better boats marketed well in a different 'class' from the inherited boats. This works OK in a fleet at the port where I keep my boat in France and I don't see why it shouldn't work in the UK.

Roger

[Athy]

I agree with Athy. There will still be a market for a clean, tidy, up-together basic boat at the right price but, as tastes and expectations change, that will be a diminishing market IMO.

 

Thanks Roger, though my O differs from your O in one respect. I do not believe that this section of the market will diminish. Are most people getting richer? You may have noticed that many of them are not, so a product, be it washing powder or holiday hire boat, which is perceived to offer Value For Money will appeal to lots of those who haven't had a pay rise for two years! Keep the cheapies (but empty their holding tanks).

Chuggy, third time lucky: what engines do your "heritage" boats have?

[CHUGALONG HIRE COMPANY]

Thanks Roger, though my O differs from your O in one respect. I do not believe that this section of the market will diminish. Are most people getting richer? You may have noticed that many of them are not, so a product, be it washing powder or holiday hire boat, which is perceived to offer Value For Money will appeal to lots of those who haven't had a pay rise for two years! Keep the cheapies (but empty their holding tanks).

Chuggy, third time lucky: what engines do your "heritage" boats have?

3 cylinder Listers.

[Albion]

Thanks Roger, though my O differs from your O in one respect. I do not believe that this section of the market will diminish. Are most people getting richer? You may have noticed that many of them are not, so a product, be it washing powder or holiday hire boat, which is perceived to offer Value For Money will appeal to lots of those who haven't had a pay rise for two years! Keep the cheapies (but empty their holding tanks).

Chuggy, third time lucky: what engines do your "heritage" boats have?

 

Athy you may well have a point in the present financial mess, and the present mess may extend the life of those boats in the cheap-end market, but I honestly wonder if everything returned to the boom days again whether the basic boat market would gradually fade away as affluence/disposable income returned.

 

Could I try and illustrate my point? In the boom before the crunch the market in organic foods was booming. As the crunch has hit that market hasn't IMO maintained that growth and people are tending to buy 'own-brand' and 'price buster economy' products at the supermarket. When/if the boom times return I am prepared to bet that organic premium priced products will boom again. That's how I see the boat hire market reacting too.

Roger

[rjasmith]

We did the Cheshire ring on Maple (trad stern with back cabin + Epping, Lister SR3 in the engine 'ole) back in about 2001 I think. I suppose the fit out looked a little tired even back then and there was a worrying moment when the engine started cutting out somewhere up the Macclesfield. But a few turns on the speedwheel and it picked up again (probably a small bit of dirt or water in the fuel which seemed to clear - no need for a call out we thought and it didn't happen again. Also I seem to remember that the canvas air cooling duct fell off but we just put it back on ourselves!

 

I think the whole fleet has Lister SR's doesn't it (or maybe just the trad ones).

 

We really enjoyed our trip and the whole idea was to get experience of using a back cabin and trad engine controls. We even lit the Epping as it was October!

 

We did another trip a few years later on Braidbar's Giffnock and that was something else altogether. Gardner 3LW and fabulous fit out but quite a bit more expensive I think.

 

Both hires served their purpose in giving us some experience of a replica trad boat.

 

Haven't been since but if the Middlewich fleet are still fitted out as they were ten years ago then I'd say it must be time for a bit of a face lift!

 

Richard

Edited December 3, 2011 by rjasmith

[Athy]

Thanks, Chuggy - SR3's sound great (though not quiet), perhaps a sound clip on your web site would appeal to the chaps amongst the potential hirers?

Roger, your point is well made - but

a) Do you see "boom" conditions returning any time soon?, and

I'm sure that many potential hirers are put off by the high cost of many hire boat holidays; the Midlewich site does grade the boats but you have to read carefully to discover that B stands for budget. I think the wording of the description of what "budget" means could be revamped too and given more prominence. Joe Public, who is deciding whether to chug along a ditch or to jet off to Torremolinos for his hard-earned week's hol, needs to be reminded that these boats are affordable.

 

EDIT: try as I may, when I type a letter b followed by a bracket it comes out as that bluddy silly yellow face. Sorry.

Edited December 3, 2011 by Athy

[Guest]

I have to say I agree with the principal that there is nothing wrong with a basically equipped hire boat.

 

We only ever looked for cleanliness and a well presented boat, to expect a really powerful inverter, granite work tops and a Belfast sink and the like is unreasonable in a hire boat.

 

By far the best boats we hired from was Ashby Boat company.

 

They had everything we needed the boats were spotless and very well presented and they were ready on time.

 

The internal decor and fittings would not be we would be something we would choose to have on a boat we would aspire to own necessarily but they were obviously fitted out for durability and thus easy to keep looking smart.

 

Personally I'd be tempted to ditch the trad boats and focus on what hire companies do best. The trad boat we saw at Middlewich last August as we passed through looked very very sad and neglected indeed.

 

IIRC correctly Richard from canalboatescapes found your average hirer didn't really cope well with a boat better suited to a careful knowledgeable owner.

 

Keep it simple. know your market.

[Albion]

Roger, your point is well made - but

a) Do you see "boom" conditions returning any time soon?

 

Err, no, sadly not. Certainly not given the recent pronouncements from all and sundry and with the turmoil in the Euro countries.

"We're all dooooooomed Cap'n Mainwaring, we're all dooooooomed!"

Roger