Dear Old Hoseasons

[DAVIDH]

Vaughan, thank you for that insight, which is of particular interest to me. A couple of things struck me though. First, having an option for 72 hours while waiting for the deposit to arrive, worried the heck out of me as an agent, as not being on credit, or having credit cards for instant payment, there was always the prospect of the postal system delivering the cheque later than that 72 hour window. Also, I can recall on a few occasion how the res staff would offer alternatives, near to what you had asked for. As an example, in the first year of the Calypso's being available to hire at FW Wilds, I took my pile of coins up to the telephone box, to ascertain that the date I wanted was already taken. I remember, before I had time to be disappointed, the clerk offered the same boat with King Line. It was so new, it didn't feature in the brochure! I'm talking Hoseasons here, but i guess the methods of operating were similar. To have that level of knowledge across all the products Hoseasons sell now Including canals and holiday homes, is expecting a lot I suspect. I don't expect the Broads as an area, would warrant a department of specialists. 

[Vaughan]

1 hour ago, DAVIDH said:

Vaughan, thank you for that insight, which is of particular interest to me. A couple of things struck me though. First, having an option for 72 hours while waiting for the deposit to arrive, worried the heck out of me as an agent, as not being on credit, or having credit cards for instant payment, there was always the prospect of the postal system delivering the cheque later than that 72 hour window. Also, I can recall on a few occasion how the res staff would offer alternatives, near to what you had asked for. As an example, in the first year of the Calypso's being available to hire at FW Wilds, I took my pile of coins up to the telephone box, to ascertain that the date I wanted was already taken. I remember, before I had time to be disappointed, the clerk offered the same boat with King Line. It was so new, it didn't feature in the brochure! I'm talking Hoseasons here, but i guess the methods of operating were similar. To have that level of knowledge across all the products Hoseasons sell now Including canals and holiday homes, is expecting a lot I suspect. I don't expect the Broads as an area, would warrant a department of specialists. 

David,

I think we have to remember that these were the days of "answers on a postcard please..."!  Most people who phoned for a reservation would have already asked for a Blakes brochure or got one automatically through the post if they had booked before.  So all they had to do was fill in the booking form on the back page and send it in with a cheque.  The 72 hours was simply to allow for delays in the post.  I can well remember the big queues at the kiosks on Blakes and Hoseasons stands at the Earls Court boat show, where people had taken a day out by train to see the show and book their boat for next year.  After January, the season was pretty well booked up.

 

This is a photo of the back of the 1959 Hearts Cruisers booking chart, where my father has done an analysis of when the bookings came in, starting with the end of August 1958 and also comparing them with previous years.

All those booked before Nov 1st would be repeat customers who had paid a deposit in the office at the end of their holiday, to book a boat for next year.  We can see that the rest have filled up by February, owing to the London Boat Show.  Hearts were running on a level of 60% regular customers in those days.

The Princess of Hearts was the newest boat then, only a year old.  She had already got 24 weeks booked by the end of August the previous year!  Notice also that the Four of Hearts bookings have been crossed out, as she got sunk by a coaster on the Yare in the spring of that year, so all her bookings had to be re-allocated by Blakes.

Last minute bookings were very rare indeed in those days, as you can see from these figures. There was also no question of offering any discounts.  The price was as it said in the brochure.

[Broads01]

What a fascinating historical insight, Vaughan, thank you.

[DAVIDH]

2 hours ago, Vaughan said:

This is a photo of the back of the 1959 Hearts Cruisers booking chart

Fair enough. I started in travel in 1970! 

[MauriceMynah]

15 hours ago, CambridgeCabby said:

The use of computers for everything seems to have virtually killed off the ability to perform mental arithmetics amongst the millenium generation

Their use hasn't done much for speelling either.  :-)

[vanessan]

1 hour ago, MauriceMynah said:

Their use hasn't done much for speelling either.  :-)

Or grammar!

[Coryton]

1 hour ago, vanessan said:

Or grammar!

Ah but computers have a solution to that too...

[vanessan]

2 hours ago, Coryton said:

Ah but computers have a solution to that too...

Except predictive text can go horribly wrong - and frequently does! 😵‍💫

[ExSurveyor]

1 hour ago, vanessan said:

Except predictive text can go horribly wrong - and frequently does! 😵‍💫

Try typing decking with predictive text on, particually on Whatsapp.

[Coryton]

On 28/08/2021 at 13:37, vanessan said:

Except predictive text can go horribly wrong - and frequently does! 😵‍💫

I think Grammerly is a bit more sophisticated than predictive texting.

I've never tried it though and like to think I don't need to.

 

[andyg]

So 5 days on and the image hasn't changed, surely silverline are aware of this. It must be quite frustrating for the business. A new boat would normally book very quickly and I doubt to many ppl want to book a narrow boat on the broads. On the other hand how would you stand if you booked this fully expecting it to be a narrow boat ??

[DAVIDH]

5 hours ago, andyg said:

On the other hand how would you stand if you booked this fully expecting it to be a narrow boat ??

The same thing happened with Tranquilla (or Tresoro as it was originally called)  from Richardsons. It was originally accompanied by an image of a Broadsman, and attracted a few bookings as such. They were all subsequently cancelled, so my guess is that someone at Hoseasons went through the bookings, and contacted the clients to tell them the discrepancy. That was over a period of a couple of weeks. It's OK, but it puts the customer out, and is extra unpaid work for Hoseasons. No photos of the boat exist on Silverline's website or their Facebook page, (it's for 2022 so probably isn't built yet) and I guess that's why the incorrect images have been used. As I said earlier, it would have been better to use blank placeholder or artist impression images for now. 

[andyg]

4 minutes ago, DAVIDH said:

The same thing happened with Tranquilla (or Tresoro as it was originally called)  from Richardsons. It was originally accompanied by an image of a Broadsman, and attracted a few bookings as such. They were all subsequently cancelled, so my guess is that someone at Hoseasons went through the bookings, and contacted the clients to tell them the discrepancy. That was over a period of a couple of weeks. It's OK, but it puts the customer out, and is extra unpaid work for Hoseasons. No photos of the boat exist on Silverline's website or their Facebook page, (it's for 2022 so probably isn't built yet) and I guess that's why the incorrect images have been used. As I said earlier, it would have been better to use blank placeholder or artist impression images for now. 

Absolutely David, I should imagine the new boat if not completed isn't far off being finished. Its only a few weeks now and they start lifting the fleet out for winter maintenance and will need the space in the shed.They don't really keep there fb page upto date like some yards do. 

[Mouldy]

3 hours ago, DAVIDH said:

The same thing happened with Tranquilla (or Tresoro as it was originally called)  from Richardsons. It was originally accompanied by an image of a Broadsman, and attracted a few bookings as such. They were all subsequently cancelled, so my guess is that someone at Hoseasons went through the bookings, and contacted the clients to tell them the discrepancy. That was over a period of a couple of weeks. It's OK, but it puts the customer out, and is extra unpaid work for Hoseasons. No photos of the boat exist on Silverline's website or their Facebook page, (it's for 2022 so probably isn't built yet) and I guess that's why the incorrect images have been used. As I said earlier, it would have been better to use blank placeholder or artist impression images for now. 

As I said previously, there was a mould for an Alpha 35 fly bridge similar to Solitaire, outside their shed last year.  It’s not there now, so I assume that it went in the shed when Solitaire was launched.  Surely Hoseasons could use those pictures (if that proves to be correct), as it will be very similar when completed and closer in appearance to the finished craft than a narrow boat.