May 28 2020.
BRP.. the owner of the Evinrude brand decided yesterday not to build any more outboards. (for now)
In my opinion BRP should have stopped building Evinrude outboards a few years ago..!!
Here is why..the top man in charge Jose Boisjoli is still there after 19 years.I guess Mr. Boisjoli don’t understand the marine power business and that’s no problem if you hire the right people to run the Evinrude division.
Well..did he do so…the answer is pretty easy…NO.
2014 BRP asked me to be an Ambassador for the Evinrude brand. I was honored and was extremely excited..The G2 was introduced and BRP was promising too let the world know how great the cleanest piston outboard was by lots of advertising / promoting of the new clean 2 stroke.(did never happen)
Pretty soon I run in to plenty of issues as an Ambassador.
People and dealers from all over America and the world was contacting me about for them important stuff. In a very nice way I informed the BRP top management what was going on out there.
Well..they did not really want my input.
You could tell by miles BRP did not know how to marketing the new G2 outboard. Both Mercury and the Yamaha leaders was much smarter and cut Evinrude out from all the large boat factories.
Not sure how many times I told BRP we need bigger and more powerful Evinrude Outboards..and a much better Marketing Director.
I guess the man in charge at Evinrude Engineering was only interested in developing smaller outboards when the market where all the money are was asking for bigger more powerful outboards.
Long story short..BRP could not do what the market asked for and took the Evinrude sign down yesterday. To blame it on the Coronavirus is ridiculous.
The only way for Evinrude to come alive again is with a new powerful owner.
Forget Penske..he is 80 years old..I was hoping for a deal with Volvo Penta 3 years ago when Volvo Penta purchased 7 Marine.
Not sure about Volvo Penta today..Its very hard to find a new owner for the Evinrude brand..One ting is for sure..marine dealers and Evinrude supporters have lost all the trust in BRP..
BRP..don’t even try to come back in a year or so.
Just sell the Evinrude brand to someone else and get out of the boat building business also..
I know..the BRP/See-Doo is still popular but a completely different animal from outboards.
To build and sell tons of outboards you need to know the marine power business.
Sorry if I made any one upset but this is my take on all this.
PS..Not sure why I even care about this anymore..
