The hangover afterwards or all is well?

Do you know the feeling of buyer’s remorse? Soon after you make a decision to make an investment, you regret it. Whether it’s a cell phone, a car or a vessel. A later model from a competitor, a test report, a supposedly low price or you finally become aware of the consequences of the decision. It is as normal as a hangover after a night of drinking.

Cognitive dissonance is what we call in marketing. Professional companies do something about it. They stay in contact, send welcome packages or bind the customer in some way so that he does not start to doubt and continues to feel good.

It’s now almost two years since we signed the purchase contract for our Leopard and in less than four months the handover will finally be in Cape Town.

So what about our Buyer’s remorse?

When we decided to buy the Leopard, we had a very useful overview of the market and we had intensively inspected the brands in question. At that time there was nothing better for our needs. Even days after signing the contract we had no buyer’s remorse.

In the two waiting years the manufacturers were busy presenting new or revised models. I followed the latest developments and also saw many of the new ships. Beneteau`s Excess, Lagoons 46, Foutain Pajots 45, Nautitec, but also Outremer, Slyder and Aventura. The fact that the election for “Cat of the Year” presented no results this time, does not speak for the new vessels. None of these new models – nor any of the old ones – has caused our decision to waver. We have zero buyer’s remorse, even two years after signing.

We are still convinced that the Leopard is the right cat for us. And this is solely due to the ship and the shipyard. Leopard Marketing is certainly not suspected of cleverly manipulating buyers. After all, the Leopard Management does nothing to avoid buyer’s remorse. You don’t even get an Owners Welcome Package – unlike the competitors, who drive up quite differently, up to World rallies. That’s something I find remarkable in an investment worth a house. We are fortunate to have a very committed and friendly sales manager Christoph, who really puts himself into it and compensates for a lot.

Probably Leopard is the only cat supplier with a zero Euro marketing budget. They are practically the antipode to Beneteau, who advertised their Excess models with a lot of advertising – but the ship does not seem to convince only me.

Against (not really) arising doubts also the pleasant feedback of other Leopard owners helps. There is Sisu, for example, who reported extensively about her Leopard 45 in their Youtube Channel. After one year on board, Captain Frik’s conclusion is very positive, which of course makes us very happy. The list of shortcomings is manageable and shorter by meters than everything we had on our previous vessels. The Facebook Leopard 45 Owners Group also talks about manageable problems. No vessel is perfect. But the Leopard’s response and troubleshooting is often praised. As an owner, you’d rather take that than good marketing.

I will continue to be more of an owner than a marketing person. / Holger Binz