SHOW REPORTS
Words by Mark Orr, Sebastien Barthez and Jenny Williams
Reflections on the Cannes, 
Southampton and 
La Rochelle Boat Shows
Cannes kicked off the boat show season for Multihull Review and offered the warmth of
the Mediterranean and the chance to see if there was a wind of optimism starting to blow
through the industry. In many ways there was.
hilst not exclusively for large boats they seemed to dominate and the industry needs to be wary of
W
the pontoons. The Galathea 65 and its rival the Lagoon 620, the deterring those whose hard earned
Outremer 49, Privilege 515 were all introduced and at the other cash will be wisely spent helping it to
of the scale the Lady Hawke 33 made its debut. recover from the credit crunch. Despite
incentives from show organisers to
They were all well received even if the pontoons were not as busy as hitherto get more multihulls there in the end
and business was done. The Sig 45 looked impressive but might be a little too the Lagoon 620 was the star turn with
extreme to be successful in these tougher times. The Diamante 55 was quite the 421 and 400 joining her. Brisk
striking but maybe too daring for what can be a conservative market. In many activity turned into orders. FP had the
respects at Cannes the established brands did well, the newcomers made an Lipari 41 and this attracted a lot of
entry but everyone started to think about buying again and about time too. interest and some orders. Across the
pontoon the Catana 41 completed this
Southampton was next up. I am English but travel to too many other shows quartet of mid range boats. Whilst not
to be a fan of this one – it offers too little back the community from which intentional, each exhibitor benefited
it takes a lot and is in need of a makeover. Smaller than for many years the as their presence enabled visitors to
show appears dominated by powerboats and large yachts. There is a little define the type of boat they wanted –
the average visitor can afford with some boats no longer accessible unless an performance or cruiser or something
appointment has been made prior to the show. Dreams are not made of this in between. The Dragonfly 28 made its
26  MULTIHULL REVIEW : OCTOBER 2009
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