Sail it yourself first

Yachting is becoming more and more popular every year. In order to show how everything is arranged in it, we asked 5 questions to representatives of major yacht online services, who gained on their platforms best fleet operators from all over the world and help to put their boats on charter. First answered our questions Anne de Vries from Tubbber.

What is the main difference of your platform from the others?

We have two platforms: first is Tubbber, it works like Airbnb for boats. It connects boat owners with clients directly, and we only regulate their connection and financial ratio. The second platform works like an old-school agency, but slowly we go to the situation when there is no more contact between the clients and us.

We want to work only as a service. When a guest loses anchor somewhere in the sea, they often cannot reach the base-manager, cause that’s a family company, only one person is working on technical support, and he already has 50 calls, his wife is asking him when he’ll come home… And that’s the common problem in the industry, cause 80% are family companies. Although many of them are changing and giving support more attention.

What is the main thing about yachting business?

Mostly you can only hope that there won’t be any problems with your charter, but it’s good to know to whom you should go if the problem appears. Yacht charter business is 99% about trust and knowing the best charter companies and their owners.

Do you have to be yachtsman be in charge of a platform like Tubbber?

I started sailing pretty late, when I was almost 30. And when you ensure people in some kind of service you must provide backup. And our company has it, cause everybody in the office knows the do's and don'ts about sailing. Even our programmers learn more than the average client about sailing because we obligate all our people to go at least one-week sailing every year. It’s free, and they can choose any place they want. Some of them come back with sea sick and say: “Oh my God, I’ll never go sailing again” but most of them love it.

What do you recommend to start-up companies?

For small companies, we advise making check-in as short as they can, because it’s better to put people immediately on the boat and have more time for explanations. Tell the truth: if you have a defect on your boat then tell them about it. Don’t think that it sounds like your boat is not good enough, and it’s better than if your client finds out in the open sea.

Which destinations are most popular in 2017 for yacht rent?

Today top 2 destinations for sailing are Croatia and Greece, and as for me, Greece is more comfortable for renting a yacht. Food is great, and people are friendly. Croatians are a bit stubborn and closed to their clients. They often act like: “We have good weather already, what do you need more” and in Greece even when people make bad food or something is wrong with service they act so nicely that I always leave tips.