Walk the docks at any boat show, and you’ll hear the word “semi-custom” used to describe a number of boats. But go aboard and ask what the builder means by semi-custom, and you’ll get as many different answers as there are boats themselves.
“Even though they’re calling themselves semi-custom, it might be ordering a few options—color of your fabrics, maybe some electronics or equipment,” says Peter Truslow, managing director of Hunt Yachts. From there, he says, multiple versions of semi-custom exist.
“The next level is you might be able to choose between a few different interiors, whether that’s color, wood, materials or possibly one or two layouts. And then you get to Hunt, which is even more custom. Essentially, you can order the equipment that you want. We do have preferred equipment, but you can order the equipment, the layout, the species of wood, wall paneling, ceiling paneling—all of it is done custom.”
With so many ways to approach the idea of ordering a boat that’s a little or a lot more personalized, it can be hard for buyers to determine what semi-custom actually means in a builder’s sales pitch. It’s not that buyers are confused; it’s that the definition of semi-custom has expanded a lot in the past 20 years to mean all kinds of things.
Traditionally speaking, there are three types of build processes: production, semi-custom and fully custom. Production boats come off a factory line one after the next. Semi-custom adds personalization options to a production hull, while a fully custom boat refers to a unique, one-off design.
The semi-custom concept has even evolved to mean different things within different segments of boats. In the superyacht world, for instance, Dutch shipyards like Amels, with its Limited Editions series, and Heesen, with its Aluminum and Steel series, have proved since the early 2000s that owners prefer the shorter build times of a proven, production-type hull instead of a fully custom platform, but paired with the personalization of a more customized interior. And, even in that rarefied world, semi-custom has multiple meanings. Heesen, for instance, differentiates between what it calls series, smart custom and full custom builds, with various levels of personalization available.
In the universe of midrange cruising boats that are owner-operated or that have minimal crew, semi-custom usually refers to a hull and superstructure that are standardized on a production line, often with bulkheads and systems that cannot be moved, but with the boat’s owner able to personalize at least some parts of the boat in various ways.
The idea is similar to what’s been happening with superyachts: to marry the efficiency of the production line with an owner’s tastes, but on ever-smaller boats where owners want ever-increasing amounts of options.
“Before, it was: We’re going to build it this way, and that’s the way you’re going to take it,” says Jeff Donahue, vice president of sales at MJM Yachts. “Now, if you walk in and say you want to build an MJM 3, we ask what kind of vinyl you’d like. What color hull you’d like. Would you like a radar or a FLIR or both? Do you want a cooktop? Do you plan on grilling out? They can come in and build the boat to their specifications.”
Grand Banks CEO Mark Richards says that on his company’s boats, customers can even move bulkheads as part of the semi-custom build process. “We customize a lot—probably too much, to be honest with you,” Richards says. “I’ve built 60-footers with one cabin up front. Bulkheads, longitudinals, floors—if it fits in the space, we’ll do it.”
In fact, Richards says, Grand Banks just had a customer order a flagship GB85 where not one bulkhead, longitudinal or floor will be the same as on other GB85s. “It’s borderline custom,” he says. “It does add to the build time, but over 30 years of me doing this, we’ve developed an efficient process. The key is obviously in the planning. That’s where we’re very good, design and planning initially, and then you build it as efficiently as possible.”
At Silent Yachts, the 80 is easier to customize than the 62 because it’s a bigger and more expensive yacht, according to vice chairman of the board Steve Bell.
Generally speaking, he adds, Silent Yachts’ semi-custom process means “the ability to change the interior to whatever you want within the parameters of the fiberglass hull.” Customers can choose the number of staterooms, place the galley up or down, and outfit the yacht for different types of cruising.
“We had a guy last week who wanted a crew mess on a 62, and he wanted cabins that were identical on both sides because he and his wife sleep in different cabins. We can do that,” Bell told Soundings. “I’d say 30 percent of our boats have a high degree of interior customization.”
Silent Yachts, he says, builds 12 boats a year, which lets the shipyard do more customization than higher-volume production or semi-custom builders who turn out more hulls faster. Similar production-volume dynamics apply at Hunt Yachts, which produces about four boats a year, Truslow says.
As an example, Hull No. 1 of the Hunt 56 is now in build for a cruising couple in their 60s with a family of grown children who wanted versatility for sleeping spaces. “Most of the time, they will be cruising up and down the East Coast on their own, but sometimes there could be eight of them on board,” Truslow says. “They needed to make sure that settees could be convertible into bunks.”
Hull No. 2’s owners for the Hunt 56 are different, he says. They wanted a mini galley serving bar across from the main helm. “They’re more about entertaining and less about operating the boat,” he says. “They wanted more room for ice makers and serving areas.”
Donahue says that at MJM, which builds 45 to 50 boats a year, the company watches to see if a certain option or feature becomes popular, and then adds it to the list of choices. That way, owners can get what they want without bogging down the production line for the higher-volume company.
“I would say that I could hand you an order form, and I could have an order form, and if we’re in separate rooms, we’d probably come pretty close except for colors,” he says. “We give them a pretty good list. If somebody wants to do dark gray vinyl with a blue boot stripe and a white hull, we can let them come in and let them pick their color palette. They can pick their electronics, a coupe top or not, a grill or not, a Seakeeper or not. We have engine packages. That’s what we consider semi-custom.”
Bell says that in addition to volume of production, the size of each yacht is also a key factor in the amount of customization that Silent Yachts can do. If the brand offered boats smaller than 50 feet, he says, then the yard would have to rein in the level of customization it currently offers.
“It’s not like a boat over 50 feet. We just can’t do that and maintain our volume of manufacturing,” he says. “We can give you options, add-ons that don’t interfere with bulkheads or fuel tanks or things like that, and then colors.”
Conversely, on the Silent 80, owners can tailor the boat even more to the way they expect it to be used. One client, Bell says, “wanted a master on the top deck, but he was also looking to charter. Now, if you’ve got four people paying to charter that 80 for $100,000, which one gets the master? You want four equal cabins below. So we created an enclosed lounge on the skydeck for when it’s on charter, but when the owner is on board, it becomes the master suite. It’s brilliant. That’s a really good idea for customization.”
At Hunt Yachts, which builds models up to 76 feet, Truslow says the standard is a teak interior with flat paneling and a combination of off-white walls and ceilings. “We have certain layouts that would be our defaults,” he says. “But every single time, with Hunt Yachts, the layout and equipment list and wood species and cabinet details are custom.”
He adds that when a yard offers so many ways to personalize a yacht, there’s also occasionally a need to save customers from themselves. They may become enamored with a type of technology that’s impractical for the yacht, as an example.
“What we learned the hard way is that sometimes, customers left to their own devices make bad decisions or selections,” he says. “We feel that our job is to advise them when we think they’re making a mistake, but the customer gets what he wants.”
That’s what the whole mindset is behind the semi-custom philosophy as it exists today: giving the customers what they want, to the maximum extent possible.
“When we say we’re semi-custom, we’re way more on the custom end than any other builder that I know except a true custom builder,” Truslow says. “To me, a true custom build is [is created when the] whole boat, including hull and deck, are built just for you. It’s a one-off boat. That’s truly custom. On our boats, the hull is fixed. On our smaller boats, the deck is fixed. But almost anything else, we can change.”
July 2025
