Starting A Charter Fishing Company..looking for advice/tips!

[KShip21]

Can anyone give me some tips and advice for getting started? Maybe some things you came across which were unexpected when you were getting started? With gas being outrageous right now, this will probably not be realistic for a year or so at least, but a friend and I are beginning our reasearch now. We are located in Hilton Head SC, have been fishing here for years, and have decided to ditch the desk jobs (hopefully) to pursue a career we are more passionate about. Any advice you can give us would be great. Thanks!

Kyle

[Shadowcast]

Inshore or offshore? I would suggest doing as many seminars as possible and getting yourself a quality website.

[Capt Rick]

On the other hand,,,I don't like to take local people out on a charter, so I don't advertise locally.
I learned this the hard way. I showed one local guy one of my good spots and come to find out he had a boat and told all of his friends about it,,,needless to say,,there are no fish there now!

Get an LLC and also get set up to accept credit cards.
If you know any of the local guides,,tell them you will pay them for some of there over flow trips. If you do a good job they will come back,,,(To see YOU)

A good thing that Shadowcast said is to get a good web site and put your resume on it. It helps a lot! Advertise on the net.
This might help you a little.
http://home.att.net/~rlhiott/resume.htm

[floridadeckie]

what kind of charter are you looking to set up? will it be a fleet, and if so, how many boats will be involved? the advice will be different for an inshore guy, head boat, nearshore, or offshore guy. dont be looking to make alot of money from it, more often than not its just enough to live somewhat comfortably.

[kenzo12]

Kship21 , hows your business venture coming along?

[kapoc]

Look into everything and then look at it again. NMFS permits, local permits, Charter Insurance, advertising, ETC. What is your plan for like what happened this year when everythings price sky rocketed and people stopped traveling, Are you going to fish comm. to offset your income. Now the bad part unless you have a rather large savings you should probably hang on to the job for a bit till you develop a client base for times like now when trips are slow. A lot is going into this bis and at times not much comes out of it till your well and established. I'd be more than happy to tell you what i know if you have any questions just gimme a call the number is on the website. the good thing is your is a great place and the fising is NUTS there one of my good friends travels twice a year to fish down there.

[capjac]

kship21...90% of my new charters come from organic search on the internet. No pay per click. The key is a well optimized website for your area and keywords. We manage all of our own sites and have only a hosting fee as an annual expense. If done properly you will not need any additional advertising.
Capt. Jack Riley
Maverick Charters
www.maverickchartersltd.com

[islafl]

You should also consider source and cost of health insurance. Typically at an office job there is pretty good coverage and I do not know what the options are for a charter boat captain?

I do know back in the 70s charter boat captains were covered for health expensed under the US public health service. I would be interested if that is still the case.