Ethics in Leadership

SkipperLiner officials: Business blend works

By STEVE CAHALAN/La Crosse Tribune

SkipperLiner Marine Group has several lines of business, and they work well together, President and CEO Noel Jordan said Tuesday.

“All of those things work together for us,” he said during the last installment of this academic year’s Brown Bag lunchtime discussion series at Viterbo University. He and son Todd, the company’s vice president of sales, spoke about their company, which started in 1971 and has built almost 1,000 boats.

SkipperLiner builds houseboats, yachts and commercial boats at its manufacturing plant on French Island. The complex also includes a marina, restaurant and meeting and event space. In the La Crosse area, it owns the South Bay and North Bay marinas and the La Crosse Queen and Island Girl excursion boats.

Nationwide, Jordan said, SkipperLiner has two harbor-view restaurants, two banquet facilities, four full-service marinas, four factory service centers, four regional training centers and six passenger boat operations. It has about 250 employees in five states.

One of the best known boats built by SkipperLiner is the paddlewheeler Liberty Belle at Walt Disney World in Florida.

SkipperLiner has tried to emulate Disney company practices and principles in the book “Good to Great,” Noel Jordan said.

SkipperLiner also has its own “Deliver the Dream” slogan in marketing its boats. “We work real hard on delivering the dream” to customers, Jordan said.

He also said it’s very important to have the right employee in the right job at any business, and to make any necessary personnel changes quickly.

“We’ve got people who are experts” in their fields, Jordan said.

Todd Jordan said many of SkipperLiner’s competitors build their boats outdoors, but SkipperLiner does its work indoors, which he said gives it an advantage in quality.

SkipperLiner usually builds three or four boats at a time, Noel Jordan said. The company also refurbishes boats, he said.

Story originally printed in the La Crosse Tribune or online at http://www.lacrossetribune.com

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