From necessity, Scott Sjogren is a life-long entrepreneur. From sheer drive and personal determination, he is a successful one. His “racing gene” followed a similar development path and helped fuel the fire that burned white-hot, making him one of the most widely-respected and highly successful individuals in the high-performance boating industry today.
It began at age 7, as the child of a single mom, young Scott started shoveling snow and mowing lawns to save enough money to buy his first bicycle. Soon after, he began racing his humble Huffy against neighborhood kids who rode more prestigious Schwinns. He also began winning. It wasn’t long before Scott was doing minor repairs and performance enhancements to his friends’ bicycles to fund his new-found passion. “My mechanical skills developed out of necessity. I had no money and had to fix everything myself to get through life,” he says.
By age 12, Scott was encouraged to stop by the local BMX race track, where he and his “beat-up old Huffy” began winning races and gaining a reputation. He also drew the attention of and won his first sponsor, the local R.J. Frisbee company. In a very short time, he got his first Schwinn bicycle by winning a spot with the prominent Team Schwinn and riding his way to becoming two-time track champion in his age class.
Scott learned the importance and dynamics of building a successful team through Schwinn and while playing hockey, soccer and participating in martial arts. He also learned the importance of hard work as a summer employee of a landscaping and maintenance business.
When he arrived at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Scott started his own landscaping company his sophomore year to help fund his education. By time he graduated with his Public Relations and Safety degree four years later, Scott employed eight buddies and was earning a salary most recent college graduates could only envy.
In the “off-season” he worked part-time for a local marina/snowmobile shop, quickly learning the machines and then starting his second business, repairing snowmobiles for insurance companies. Using his new-found knowledge and succumbing to his competitive nature, Scott began drag racing snowmobiles on both grass and ice, culminating in winning the national Budweiser Shootout Ice Drags twice in seven years.
The “real” world
Always looking for the next challenge, upon graduation, Scott talked his way into a job with Dow Pharmaceuticals designing skin care protocols for a new burn patient treatment, negotiating a salary equal to his landscaping profits, an unheard of for an inexperienced new hire. He gave two fraternity brothers the landscaping business, which closed three months later.
After three years with Dow, and ready for another challenge, Scott became a manufacturers’ representative for The Hammond Group selling hunting and fishing equipment – from lures to electronics – and eventually designing merchandise lay-outs and displays for stores like Target and Gander Mountain while working his way up to Vice President.
During this time, for relaxation and to scratch the ever-present “need for speed,” Scott began boating and was befriended by marine industry entrepreneur Mike Livorsi. Recognizing Scott’s inherent talent, ability and competitive spirit, Livorsi suggested boat racing.
So, in 1998, Scott again entered the world of racing, this time on unfrozen water in APBA Offshore Class B, running a twin engine, open cockpit Fountain to a national championship title, a feat he repeated in 1999 with teammate Jeff Haylett. For the next ten years, on and off, Sjogren would take to the water as a racer, team owner or both. He won a Super Vee Unlimited Class National Championship with Wyatt Fountain, son of the boat manufacturing icon, Reggie Fountain, in 2007; and a World Championship as team owner in 2008.
The entrepreneurial spirit that had driven his early life came to the fore again in 2002, when Scott decided it was time again to do something on his own. The love of fast, mechanical things led him to purchase a troubled Polaris dealership in Janesville, Wisconsin, selling snowmobiles, personal water craft and ATVs under the Shogren Motorsports banner. Applying one of his two primary business philosophies: “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got,” Scott expanded and grew the business to include motorcycles and product lines from Yamaha, Suzuki and Dinli. That same year he opened Auto Sound in Palatine, Illinois, installing high-end audio systems for consumers and car dealerships.
However, commuting 180 miles a day and growing two companies quickly took its toll on the young business and family man so Scott began looking to consolidate his holdings into one enterprise, closer to home that could feed his many interests and professional personalities. When he learned that Fountain Powerboats was seeking a mid-West dealer, he pursued the opportunity as he had everything in his life: with a vengeance.
For six months Scott tried to win over Wyatt Fountain, who was in charge of dealer development. But the young Fountain had no interest in signing a dealership that did not exist with an owner whose marine industry experience consisted of selling personal water craft, which only made Scott try that much harder.
“I knew Reggie [Fountain] was all about the sizzle,” Sjogren recalls. “So I borrowed a friend’s airplane and flew him from Mercury Racing to Chicago. I took him to a beautiful dinner at another friend’s restaurant, and then took him to a third friend’s building, a 28,000 square foot indoor show room. I got his attention.” In the spring of 2009, it nearly doubled in physical size to 55,000 square feet.
Pier 57
During its first six months in business (the last six months of the Fountain fiscal year) Pier 57 was number two in Fountain sales, garnering the “Rookie of the Year” dealer title. The $80,000 loan used to start the company was paid off in the same time frame. During the next six years, Pier 57 captured the title of “World’s Largest Fountain Dealer” each year.
In six years, Pier 57 has purchased more than $40 million in new Fountain boats, but more importantly, Sjogren suggests, there are only four Fountains remaining in current inventory, “sell-through is far more important than sell-in,” he states emphatically. “In our best year – 2007 – we sold 125 new and used performance boats. In 2006 we sold 96, 2008, 97; and through November of 2009 we’ve sold more than 100. So we are selling, roughly, 100 performance boats a year – and doing it in a very tough economy.”
The reasons for his success are varied, Sjogren says, but boil down to his second philosophy of business: “Do the things you need to do when you need to do them and you can do the things you want to do when you want to do them.”
“I have always reinvested dollars back into the business. As a result, we can take a trade-in where many other dealers -- or even manufacturers – cannot,” he says, “We are selling 100 boats a year in tough economic times not because the market is growing, but because we are taking sales from the competition.” This flexibility gives Pier 57 the ability to “be creative” in putting a deal together, taking unconventional trade-ins like collector cars and other high-end “toys.”
Noting that his business is made up almost entirely of repeat customers and direct customer referrals, Sjogren credits his reputation for high ethical standards (in a segment of an industry not necessarily known for that), “I do what I say I’m going to do; every time.”
The phenomenal and rapid success of Pier 57 has been achieved from an unassuming, boxy-looking warehouse style building more than five miles from Lake Michigan. Step inside, however, and the contrast is striking. A modern, stylish reception area and offices greet the customer displaying the trophies and awards won by the dealership and the race teams. Flat screen TVs show dramatic footage of Fountain boats in action. Through a set of double-hung, glassed French doors is the largest indoor showroom for new and used boats “bar none”.
A converted loading dock serves as a dedicated detailing area, where every boat, new or used, is meticulously cleaned and prepped. A second converted dock is used for service and is fully plumbed and vented so the Pier 57 team can safely start the engines and take a new boat owner through all of the mechanical workings of the boat when open water is unavailable, even in the nastiest weather. While most dealerships, regardless of size, have clung to life during the economic downturn through their service departments, Pier 57 not only services boats it sells, . A modest inventory of select parts geared toward getting customers back on the water quickly is kept on-hand.
“We came in against all odds,” Sjogren explains. “We are off the beaten path and nowhere near the water, but we have created a destination that is a boater’s dream. If you’re here, it is because you are serious about buying a boat. We don’t have the a lot walk-in fiberglass-kickers who are killing time before a doctor’s appointment. The buyer can look at our entire new and used inventory in comfort, regardless of the weather outside and our boats are always clean”.
Full Speed Ahead
Shogren begins 2012 with a
new venture merging with David Woods/Pier57.
This new merger is a very exciting time for our company carrying premium brands such as Cigarette, MTI, Checkmate, MYCO & Mercury.
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