By Marcus Green
The Courier Journal

Barry Bridgewater removes seaming tape from the exterior of a Poke boat after a seam was formed on the interior of the boat at Phoenix Poke Boats in Berea, Ky. (Courier Journal photo) | ZOOM |

BEREA, Ky. - Lining the back pages of glossy publications, strips of eclectic advertisements hawk anything from walking sticks hewn from foreign trees to fleeces sewn from South American wool. They are an afterthought to many magazine readers.

But for a maker of small, handcrafted boats in this little city in the hills south of Lexington, the ads changed the way business was done.

From its founding in 1973, Phoenix Products Inc. had sold its line of kayaks through outdoor retailers, sporting-goods outlets and mom-and-pop stores. But that changed in the early 1980s.

"Dealers for whitewater kayaks were very unstable, small businesses. We had at one point four people in accounts receivable just trying to collect our money," said founder Tom Wilson, who owns the company with his wife, Peggy. "What we found is that most of our customers knew what they wanted. They didn't need to go to a dealer to buy it."

So the company went after a niche: readers of upscale magazines such as Smithsonian, the New Yorker and Atlantic Monthly. "We keep our eye out there for other magazines that will fit that kind of style," said Mark Burdette, sales manager for Phoenix Poke Boats Inc., which became a separate company in 1995.

That style is a penchant for something different. The signature Poke Boat vessels, whose teardrop design resembles a bloated kayak, are meticulously made and cost $600 to $2,500.

Things are done the old-fashioned way in the Phoenix Poke Boats plant in Berea, a town known for artisans. Workers inject a Fiberglas resin into molds for a boat's top and bottom, sand the edges and smooth out the cockpit before sealing the two parts together.

Today, 30 years after Wilson brought his boat-making knowledge to eastern Kentucky, the boats are made to order and shipped directly to customers, keeping production in step with demand and thus reducing inventory costs.

Making a boat takes about one month, and almost everything is done by hand. The factory can produce 100 boats a month.

"People ask us: Do we consider ourselves industry or craft?" Burdette said. "We consider ourselves craft."

The craftsmanship is evident in the Phoenix workshop. For Patrick Olson, a native of Side Lake, Minn., the work is an extension of a passion he chases on his own time: building fishing rods. "Anything small and miniature," he said. "I can make them look pretty good."

Wilson, who founded Phoenix Products Inc. in the early 1970s, tells customers that he's a boat builder, not a marketer.

A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Wilson started several kayak-making companies in the Boston area before moving to Kentucky. His business struggled, though; dealers' markups made Phoenix kayaks expensive.

"If we went through dealers, we would be selling a boat that would be way out of the price range of most of our customers," he said. "So during that changeover (to direct marketing and sales), what we also found is that there was a different boat that we designed mostly for older, more mature paddlers."

Enter the Poke Boat. The lightweight boats now account for 85 percent of Phoenix Poke Boat sales; kayaks make up the rest.

Some of the boats weigh as little as 14 pounds, light enough for a single person to load and unload easily. "This one is very popular with people who want to put the boat in the back of their vehicle," Burdette said.

Sales of the Poke Boats have grown steadily, but Wilson said the limiting factor is not demand or the economy - it's the owners. "We just really don't want it to grow any faster than it is. I like a small number of people and a small customer base. It's comfortable."