Rising prices and uncertainty over Rachel Reeves’s tax plans means this year many superyacht buyers are just browsing
“W
hat would happen if red wine got on that?” It is a common enough question when perusing a carpet store. But, as it happens, the same query crops up when shopping for a yacht. “Oh, you’d never get it off that decking,” the other half of a young couple replies as they size up one of the £2m triple-decker yachts moored at the recent Southampton international boat show.
Top boat manufacturers descended on the port city from across Europe to show off bigger, better and bolder yachts than ever before, as well as lines of smaller sailing and motor boats. But the show, once a must-attend of the season alongside exhibitions in Cannes and Monaco, has shrunk by about 30% this year, according to some vendors’ estimates.
Some of the changes were part of an effort to cut the show’s costs, but it is not difficult to see why it might be smaller this year: flags advertising advice on inheritance tax and pensions blow in the wind, and chatter about the government’s budget this month swirls around the pontoons amid fears that higher taxes will curb wealthy buyers’ spending power.
