The Official Beneteau History

1965- 1972, First range

January 1965: our first Paris boat show. For André, his wife Mimie, and myself, it was highly stressful. No other boat looked like ours and, not used to the capital, we felt like we did not belong.
Yet, only a few hours after the opening, three business men introduced themselves, claiming that our boats were what their customers were looking for and that no other builder wanted to build them.

One of them asked for Morbihan, the other Finistère, and the third the Côtes du Nord (now Côtes d’Armor). In all, their orders represented several months of work for our teams.
After two minutes discussing distribution with my husband, the choice was made. We would distribute our boats through this network, which except for Jeanneau, no one else did.

During these seven years, we would balance out our accounts; subsidize the end of fishing, while we found new jobs for our ship’s carpenters one by one. We would also listen to our customers and invest only in new products, following their desire to buy slightly bigger boats. This is how, alongside the Guppy, the Flétan, Capelan, Cabochard, Galion, Forban, Kerlouan, Baroudeur and Ombrine were born: a full range from 3.60 m to 5.80 m, in a typically national segment at the time.

My brother André was at his drawing table, our father supervised the prototypes in particular, the young ones grew up and the family was happy again!

1972, First investment

1972 would be a great year! With financial stability just about recovered, we were going to invest, first in the workforce, but also in our first plant, which was modest but really designed with semi-industrial production in mind.
We wanted to develop the recreational fishing boat. Our customers had learned to sail and they wanted larger boats, comfort on board, and to see the sea from the saloon. 

There is nothing harder than beginning a new range. My brother André listened to us and I can still see him, after months of thought, when we were visiting a boat show in Germany, drawing an innovative boat on a paper napkin in the restaurant and saying “there’s your boat!” This would be the Evasion 32, followed by the later Evasion 37 and Evasion 28 versions.

We then built a new plant in Commequiers, especially designed to manufacture what we thought, at the time, to be the largest production boat sizes that the sailing market would require. At the same time, for the motorboats, the Ombrine would give birth to the Antares range, always designed by André, whose great passion was line fishing.

On the family side of things, we would also see our younger brother Yvon enter the company. He would be fascinated by production all his life and become one of our best specialists.

1976, A decisive year

Back then, we had a considerable market share in the recreational fishing boat segment; thousands of customers sailed them, but some of them left us because they wanted to sail faster. François, a great regatta racer, dreamed of creating a high-performing sailing yacht. André wanted to draw it, but we knew that in this area there were architects with different experience. How do you bring someone to understand that, for the first time, a BENETEAU boat could be drawn by an architect from outside? Luck was with us. We were offered the moulds of L’impensable, the boat designed to win the Half Ton Cup and which kept its promise. 

We would redesign the sail plan, keel, interior layout, and shape of the coachroof with André Mauric, and it would be called the First. Nobody was expecting this. We showed the First at the Paris Boat Show and it was a revelation.
It would become a legendary class. This was the boat that would really open the way for export.

1980, Expansion

The yard’s motorboating team entrusted Cees Van Der Velden 2 with perfecting a catamaran with which he won the “PARIS 6 hours” flying BENETEAU colours. I can still see the faces of our builder colleagues and friends at the time. How could we, inexperienced ‘sailors’, win this race with a motorboat ?

This was not a problem, close on its heels the Flyer range was born and the first models were shown at the Paris Boat Show.

In yachting, it was the great Admiral’s Cup period and, among others, with our wonderful partner Corum, managed by Jean-René Banwart, we tried out new hulls and identified the best architects in the world. There would be the First Evolution, Lady B, and First Lady, all prototypes that would help us progress and later enable us to provide our customers with the best production boats.

1981-1986, Prosperous years

This decade would be decisive. Of course, from the 1970s, we were investing in export insofar as our resources would permit, setting up a network of dealers and importers, in particular in European countries, with the exception of the United States, where we opened a subsidiary in Annapolis, in 1976.
The aim of this was to establish our brand, but especially to understand the American consumer’s tastes by being present on site.

Birth of the Oceanis

The basis for reflection on a Cruiser would be the Idylle, perfected by our friends Moorings. François Chalain would choose Philippe Briand 3 and, in a few months, they would create the Oceanis 350 and then the 430. The wager paid off, and success was instant. The production lines would fill up again.

Revival of the First

How could we revive it? We needed help! When François was dining one evening at Costes café with Odile, his wife, feeling good in these surroundings, he thought of Philippe Starck. I met Starck in Paris and he did not hide the fact that boats were not his speciality.
So he suggested we leave him a 35 foot boat in his garden at Montfort-l’Amaury, saying that he would be happy to spend a few nights on board and that only after this experience, in all probability, would he be able to answer us

Although his approach was unusual, we met his request with a First 35, the first boat designed with two rear cabins, fruit of the collaboration between François Chalain and Jean Berret. And so we waited… The least I can say is that, when he reported back it, was a breath of fresh air !1!

1989, Figaro year

Always mindful of promoting sailing, this would be the year of the first Figaro Class. 1 The Figaro race – formerly the Course de l’Aurore – traditionally raced on prototypes was to convert to one-designs.

We could not be absent from this race, which we had been following since the First was marketed, a race which Michel Malinovsky won the day the boat was produced, bringing it such a great reputation.

The project presented by Beneteau and Jean-Marie Finot would win the competition. We would thus have the privilege of building these one-designs, but also of participating with the Figaro in the birth of a wonderful incubator of young sailors, who would then move on to offshore sailing, securing the reputation of French sailors in competition sailing. 

1990, Creativity

As the first world economic crisis to hit the sailing industry was looming, we continued our creative research on the First. A meeting at the Paris Boat Show with a loyal Italian customer would draw our attention. This customer, a great designer with Pininfarina, told us he “could no longer dream” since all boats looked alike. He talked of shapes that had changed, particularly in the car industry, and found our decks too angular. 

I must say that the Pininfarina family was wonderful. Sergio knew full well that our resources were comparable to those of his car industry clients, but he would make his services available to us and together our teams would create flexible decks. Once again, I was there for one of those virtually religious moments when, bit by bit, Mr Ramacciotti’s red tape transformed the deck matrix of the future First 45. 

1991-2001, Standing together in crisis, remembering and growing

In 1991, in the context of a general economic crisis, competitors all over the world found themselves on equal terms. How do you manage a crisis when you have no markers? Some would manage it mathematically, but leaving their companies leaderless, some would manage things on a more human scale, braving criticism and scepticism, others would not cope at all. 

We succeeded in surmounting this ordeal, since we stood together. We trusted our staff and knowing their common sense, we knew we could count on them. No matter how difficult these phases, they are a time for questioning, raising awareness, and reorganization.

In 1992, we carried out our first external growth transaction. Apart from the development of marinas and their facilities and an unquestionable tourist boom in the French Overseas territories, various tax relief laws enabled the creation of small new yards in France. This was how CNB was created in Bordeaux.

In 1994, O’Hara was our first diversification. This idea was not mine and it was visionary. We would implement it with some loyal friends from the company and it would be called O’Hara.
Our motivation was to diversify to soften the successive social shocks due to market downturns in the sailing industry. In fact, inspired by the old south in America, we would create a small mobile home which would revolutionize the world of camping. Later, our Vendée rival, IRM, joined us and we would manufacture up to 14,000 houses a year.

In 1995, Jeanneau  was our second area of external growth. A chance to make peace with our long-time great challenger would be the high point in our history and probably that of the French sailing industry too.

These two days over, this union meant a lot to me. It was the coming together of two Vendée families and two companies faced with the same problems and which immediately spoke the same language.
They were two teams who, the day before, felt they were each better than the other.
They would discover that they each had their pros and cons.
So we would decide to focus on each team’s pros and leave the cons to the side. Together, we experienced the very strong market recovery and together, enriched by the contribution of new and experienced men, we changed scale.

2003-2014, Ensuring continuity, beyond the fate of men

It was during the crisis that the scale of the business developed. BENETEAU Boatyard became BENETEAU Group. Then came the question of where we would locate our headquarters. It would be at St-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, facing the harbor entrance, when we bought the restaurant, Les Embruns. It was the place where so much of our business had been done and where, facing the piers, our father took us as children to witness the launch of his last trawler, not hesitating to criticize his own work, before leading us off to his office, where he would change his plan for the next boat.

2004.Everything was going well. Our development was spectacular. We were building new factories and renovating the existing production plants with the Béri design office under the leadership of Yvon Bénéteau. We were increasing our market share, but we were no longer a small family-run company. As for me, forty years had flown by, life had taught me much about the problems connected with succession and my responsibility would be to anticipate the future, particularly in this area.

This brought me to initiate and oh so important yet difficult phase. This would be to set up a real governing body for the Group to ensure its continuity in the future, beyond the fate of men. It is our duty towards our employees, customers, and suppliers, as well as non-family member shareholders who have put their faith in us.

This governing body would be comprised of a Board of Directors, mostly family members, as well as a Managing Director, up until now, from the family. We would adopt a method of governance comprised of a Supervisory Board – extended to people outside and skilled in very specific areas – as well as an operational board of directors.

2008, group BENETEAU incorporates the Italian company Monte Carlo Yachts and appoints Carla Demaria at its chair. Monte Carlo Yachts must completely renew the perception of luxury in yachting by focussing on its basic features: timelessness, intrinsic quality, the value of standing apart. On 23 July 2010, 18 months after this new boatyard is officially created, the first MCY is shown to the international press for the first time, in Venice. The elegant 23 m flybridge yacht is authentic, innovative and noble. It reinstates strong values. Apart from the boat, an important new brand of the Beneteau Group emerges from the shadows on that day.

BENETEAU conducted a new external growth operation in 2014. In 2014, as part of the Group’s development strategy in the Motorboat market in North America, BENETEAU acquires Rec Boat Holding LLC, holding four prominent brands : Four Winns, Glastron, Wellcraft and Scarab.

I shall end here by expressing my recognition and that of my family to all the executives I was unable to refer to, present or not, and to our loyal and talented employees, as well as dealers and customers throughout the world, all of whom have become friends, whether they are from BENETEAU, Jeanneau, Prestige, CNB, Lagoon, O’Hara, I.R.M, BH and, now, Four Winns, Glastron, Wellcraft, Scarab & Monte Carlo Yacht.