May/June 2019 Marine Fabricator - 13

CUSTOM PROJECTS
OFFER FABRICATORS
A NUMBER OF
ADVANTAGES, SUCH
AS INTERESTING
WORK, A BROADER
CUSTOMER BASE AND
A REPUTATION AS A
CAN-DO COMPANY.
BUT PLANNING AND
PRICING ARE KEY TO
MAKING IT WORK.
By Pamela Mills-Senn

W

hen Eric Walton and
Devlin McKee opened
Custom Canvas Alaska
LLC in Fairbanks 14
years ago, the partners
knew they had to offer custom canvas
work beyond the boat tops they started out
providing. After all, a marine fabrication
shop in Alaska faces some extreme
seasonal ups and downs, making project
diversification a survival necessity. Now,
in addition to the boat tops, the company
designs, fabricates and installs portable
fabric structures, awnings, vehicle grill
covers, insulated equipment covers and
other products involving fabric and/or
framework, says Walton.
"Our customer base ranges from walkins (perhaps in need of a zipper repair),
to boat owners (in need of a canvas top),
to purchasing agents (insulated grill
covers)," says Walton. "From residential
to commercial, we do our best to
understand our customers' needs and
come up with creative, satisfying, withinbudget solutions."
Custom Canvas does sell some small
retail items that it purchases from its partners, such as DOT® fasteners, cleaning/
care products, stainless steel ratchets and
other boat top hardware-basically items
not found in big box stores, says McKee.
And over the years the company has expanded the variety of hardware, fittings
and fabrics it carries, which has allowed
the partners to offer their custom clients
more design flexibility and options. Sometimes a project will inspire an addition to
the inventory.
For example, recently Custom Canvas
fielded a request for a travel/storage bag for
heat trunks and vent fittings. The bag-
constructed with Cooley's L1023 DEP
urethane yellow fabric, "very expensive,"

says Walton, which resists many chemicals and has a cold-crack of minus 65 F-
needed to be roomy enough to make loading and unloading the items easy. At the
same time, the customer wanted a tighter
bundle since the filled bag was going to
be flown to fairly remote locations, says
Walton, adding they decided compression
straps were the solution. But buckles were
a concern.
"SR2 (side release) buckles would work,
except the bag was going to be used in
minus 40 F or colder and in a very rough
environment," he recalls. "There was a
fear of these buckles breaking. We now
inventory metal airline seat buckles.They're
extremely durable and can be easily
operated while wearing heavy mittens."
Walton says the customer was so
pleased with the outcome that he ordered
12 more bags, turning a break-even project into a profitable one for the company.
Custom considerations
There are plenty of benefits that come with
doing custom work, the primary one being
building a stronger business less prone to
financial mood swings. At the same time,
careful assessment before agreeing to a
custom project is required, or what began
as an opportunity could become a huge
headache, siphoning money from the
bottom line in the process.
Consider Marine Tech LLC. Located
in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, the
company only does custom work, says
Sandy Sturner, managing director.
During the bustling Caribbean on-season,
Marine Tech keeps busy serving mainly
the mega-yacht market but will work on
any boat. Projects include all boat canvas,
upholstery and interior/exterior, with the
exception of sails. The company keeps
things going during the off-season by
www.marinefabricatormag.com | 13
http://www.marinefabricatormag.com
May/June 2019 Marine Fabricator

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