The Sea Tow Foundation and its Boating Safety Advisory Council today announced six winners of their National Boating Industry Safety Awards, which recognize the best boating safety work in the for-profit section of the boating industry. . Sponsored for the second year by KICKER Marine Audio, the top six winners of the competition were revealed at a special award recognition segment held during National Dealer Week of the Marine Retailers Association of the Americas.

The Top Marine Manufacturer Award has been awarded for the third consecutive year to Sea Ray Boats.

Sea Tow Foundation Executive Director Gail R. Kulp said: “Winning this top category for three years in a row is a tremendous reflection of Sea Ray’s long-term commitment to safe boating and caring. the general well-being of boaters, ”she said. “Their entry this year revealed a strong emphasis on video messaging incorporating celebrity recommendations on a wide range of safety topics, coupled with an integrated global marketing campaign that spanned multiple marketing channels. “

Another third year winner is MarineMax which has won the award for best marine retailer multiple times with more than three locations.

“MarineMax used multiple outreach methods including face-to-face opportunities in their locations, as well as print flyers, social media, email newsletters, YouTube, podcasts and their website,” Kulp said . “Everything was well produced, professional and easy to digest. They also promoted National Safe Boating Week widely and focused their messages on the importance of wearing a life jacket and designating a sober skipper.

The Emerald Coast Marine Group of Niceville, Florida and Orange Beach, Ala in the Top Marine Retailer category with one to three locations, achieved the highest points in this year’s competition.

Advertising

“The Emerald Coast Marine Group has created an integrated campaign featuring a broad social media initiative that includes a mix of online boating educational resources as well as a new series of in-house produced boating safety videos that show a lot can be accomplished with limited resources, ”said Kulp. “The dealership bears the costs and promotes in-person boating safety courses in partnership with the USCG Auxiliary. They regularly promote safe boating in their monthly newsletter and widely promote National Safe Boating Week with a personalized video featuring each member of the dealership team wearing life jackets.

Lafferty Media Partners, LLC won the Top Marine Media Award, which produced contract work for the US Power Squadrons, now known as America’s Boating Club.

“The Top Marine Media Award recognizes the outstanding efforts of the media to educate and promote boating safety to their audiences,” said Kulp. “Lafferty Media Partners has developed and launched a new US boating channel that offers a growing library of personalized boating safety videos featuring highly relevant content, including content specific to the pandemic that has helped boaters in these times. difficult. They have also created a personalized website and YouTube channel with links to all the videos, making it easy for boaters to log in and find the information they want and need.

The Top Marine Marketing and Boating Safety Outreach Award was won by Kenton Smith Marketing who launched a public relations campaign for his client, the Water Sports Foundation.

Kenton Smith’s marketing team created personalized content for the all-new National Boating Safety Media Resource Center, a one-stop-shop online for journalists looking for content, images, videos and expert resources. about boating safety, ”said Kulp. Kenton Smith produced a series of highly targeted press releases that garnered over 601 million media impressions and 490 articles over a five-month period, while the media center attracted 8,500 site visits over the course of the same period. The team has conducted live interviews on the Weather Channel and dozens of television channels, as well as coverage in USA Today, Men’s Journal, Yahoo Finance, and hundreds of national and regional media outlets.

Garmin International won the Top Gear & Equipment Award.

“Garmin is a true leader in boating safety, as evidenced by its significant investments in the Navionics app, g3 mapping, inReach satellite communication capability, as well as AIS, GPS and VHS systems. This is in addition to the strong social media campaign she ran during National Safe Boating Week which aimed to educate the wave of new boaters who have joined the boating community over the past two years on enhanced situational awareness and boating safety initiatives that really impressed the judges, “said Kulp.

“This year’s competition reflects a strong and growing commitment from the for-profit segment of the marine industry to actively promote and defend boating safety,” she added. “Our judges were overwhelmed by the quality of the submissions

and the excellent contributions of many companies who are committed to making waterways safer for all.

“The Sea Tow Foundation appreciates the efforts of our board members to judge this year’s competition, as well as the continued support of our title sponsor KICKER Marine Audio in making this year’s competition possible,” she said. .