ANCHORING

By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President One of the questions I get asked most often these days sounds deceptively simple: “What are you hearing?” This question surfaces at industry events, from dealers and manufacturers who are just checking in, and from lenders, suppliers and consultants trying to make sense of the current market. The way they ask the question may vary, but they all seem to be searching for the same thing: a signal. And understandably so. The current environment has

ANCHORING: The 9 Leadership Disciplines That Redefine Dealership Success provides a roadmap for navigating the changing realities of marine retail. MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. — The Marine Retailers Association of the Americas (MRAA) announced today the publication of ANCHORING: The 9 Leadership Disciplines That Redefine Dealership Success, a new book authored by MRAA President Matt Gruhn. Drawing on nearly three decades in the marine industry and 15 years leading MRAA, Gruhn chal

By Matt Gruhn Leadership data doesn’t live only in spreadsheets. Yes, data as you’ve always understood it — numbers — still matters. We often think of our data as our financials or the number of units sold. But context matters just as much when it comes to the new era of data. When leaders treat customer information, behavioral consistency, and follow-through as data, visibility expands — and leadership becomes clearer. That type of data lives in: How customers describe their

By Matt Gruhn Your dealership needs intentional upgrades, not a full remodel. Here are five places you can start: Reimagine your entrance. Add a branded welcome zone. Highlight something that sets you apart. Remember that customers are looking for your showroom to emulate the brand lifestyle they are choosing to step into. How can you bring that to life? Create a story wall. Display customer photos, delivery stories, or your dealership’s history. Customers are looking to buil

By Matt Gruhn As the retail world shifts, one thing is clear: Today’s consumers want a feeling. An experience. Not just a product. This is exactly why, in automotive dealerships, showrooms are being redesigned into branded experience centers. Spaces that immerse customers in lifestyle, story, and emotion. Some call them “brand temples.” Others call them “immersive spaces.” Whatever you want to call it, the trend is unmistakable: Consumers expect your physical space to reflect

By Matt Gruhn In the research I conducted as part of the writing process for ANCHORING. The 9 Leadership Disciplines That Redefine Dealership Success, I identified four critical touchpoints that emerged as coaching priorities that you, as a dealership leader, must consistently reinforce. Coaching, in the broader sense, does not mean that your job is to fix everything at once. Coaching means focusing on the moments that matter most to your businesses success, the ones that sha

By Matt Gruhn The best dealership leaders coach their people to adopt the right habits — the kind that create trust, loyalty, and long-term success. Those outcomes are the result of consistent leadership, clear expectations, and a culture of accountability. They’re what coaching makes possible. There are five habits that high-trust dealership teams cultivate to deliver those outcomes. They are performance differentiators, and those dealerships that excel in closing high-consi

By Matt Gruhn Like any leadership discipline, personalization shows up most clearly in the systems leaders have built, the behaviors they reinforce, and the standards they set across their organization. Strong leaders periodically step back and examine how well their organization delivers personalized experiences. They do that through a lens and leadership framework like the one that follows, to help them design relevance at scale. 1. DATA: How well do you remember the cust

By Matt Gruhn As outlined in ANCHORING: The 9 Leadership Disciplines That Redefine Dealership Success, Trust Catalysts are the actions, systems, and disciplines that communicate reliability, relevance, and care. They may be invisible to the customer, but their effects are immediate and powerful. The book introduces several common Trust Catalysts, including clarity, speed, transparency, consistency, warmth, relevance, and proof. These are foundational because they appear repea

By Matt Gruhn For decades, dealers have been taught that trust is built through relationships. And it is. The problem with today’s customer is that they often decide whether they trust you before the relationship ever begins. Before they submit a lead. Before they shake your hand. Before your sales team has the opportunity to demonstrate its expertise. Long before any of that happens, they are evaluating your dealership through a series of digital touchpoints. They are scan

Why today’s challenges demand industrywide thinking and shared direction. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President There are moments in business when it feels as though pressure builds on you from every direction. You feel it in slower sales cycles, in tighter margins, and in conversations with customers who are asking tougher questions, expecting more clarity, and taking longer to make decisions. You feel it in your team, as they work to keep up with rising expectations while navig

By Matt Gruhn, MRAA I am afraid that you are falling behind, and more so that you are putting your business at risk by not engaging with AI. I am staring at MRAA’s latest Marine Retailer Pulse Report. Flip past the sentiment charts, the retail trends, the inventory pages, all telling a familiar story of soft demand, fragile confidence and high inventory levels. I arrive at a page with a simple question: “How would you describe your dealership’s approach to AI use?” The resp

The mental load of dealership ownership and the call to lead deliberately. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President There are very few people who truly understand what it means to carry a dealership home with you every night. I’m not talking about the laptop, spreadsheets, inventory reports or the payroll. I’m talking about the mental weight of owning the business. The weight of knowing that millions of dollars in inventory sit at risk every single day. Payroll decisions that affect

Why This Is Hard — and Why We Can’t Avoid It Anymore By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President Let’s start with an uncomfortable truth: today’s consumers are demanding pricing transparency — and the boating industry isn’t there yet. This isn’t because dealers are trying to hide anything. And it’s not because manufacturers don’t understand what’s happening. The pricing system we operate within was just never designed for today’s buyer, today’s technology, or today’s expectations. In f

By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President Every December, the industry starts guessing what the next year will bring. Boat show success or second-guess? Interest rate hikes or a market rebound? Rising consumer demand or faltering confidence? AI that helps you sell more boats—or AI that outpaces your ability to keep up? The truth? No one knows. What I do know, however, is that the dealers who succeed next year won’t be the ones waiting for the market to change. They’ll be the ones who t

Why the speed of AI is the biggest competitive threat — and opportunity — dealers face. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President The challenge I have in writing this column, as I sit here in the mountains of Montana in late September, is that by the time you read it, my words will already be out of date. The imperative I have in writing this is that if you don’t get this message, your dealership risks being out of date, too. Short and simple: Don’t blink, because AI won’t wait for y

By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President Today’s boat buyer looks nothing like yesterday’s. They are more cautious with their spending, more selective in what they’ll buy, more digitally savvy than any previous generation of shoppers, and as industry statistics show, they are fewer in number. Economic obstacles such as inflation, interest rates, tariffs, and general unease complicate willingness to make discretionary purchases. Pair those realities with dealership sales teams who are

The importance of the work you do today in setting yourself up for success tomorrow. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President As you begin to strategize inventory, staffing, and marketing plans for the 2026 model year, it may be tempting to focus only on the immediate pain of soft retail demand, tighter credit, eroding margins, and the rising cost of carrying boats that have already sat for too long on your floorplan. Yet history is clear in demonstrating that slow markets create th

How to attack the converging forces that are holding you and your business back. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President “I haven’t sold a new boat since December.” That’s the raw, unfiltered voice of a dealer from MRAA’s June 2025 Pulse Report — and it’s not an isolated story. Across North America, dealers are sharing similar frustrations. Aged inventory stacking up. Interest payments ballooning. Leads going cold. Promotions not working. Service departments stressed and staff mora

How manufacturers can keep a better pulse on retail realities. By Matt Gruhn, MRAA President In a competitive boating market this summer, a dealer I spoke with told me he feels fortunate. His inventory is in a solid position. His manufacturer worked closely with him throughout the spring to make sure he had the right mix and volume for the season ahead — not just for sales targets, but for what the market could actually support. It wasn’t always easy. They had some tough co