Alan & Cynthia Battle – Working As A Team
BY VAL SCHOGER; PHOTOS BY VAL SCHOGER
Alan and Cynthia Battle are the new owners of one of Bay County’s oldest marine dealerships, Rivercraft Marine in Callaway. They bought the marine dealership in June 2014 and renamed it Battle’s Rivercraft Marine. They have a wealth of experience working together as they operated their own marina on Logan Martin Lake in Alabama.
PCL: Please describe your line of work and how you work together.
Alan: We are certified dealers for Suzuki and Evinrude engines. We have certified technicians to work on marine engines and we sell new and used boats. From freshwater boaters to bay and saltwater boaters, we have customers with different needs. Our new boat lines are mainly for freshwater and saltwater fishing and recreation. We sell Barracuda Bay Boats, Epic Bay Boats, Encore Bentley Pontoon Boats, and Alumacraft Boats.
Cynthia: We provide marine service and repair work and we repower boats. Each of us has a specific role in the business based on their talents. Alan is much more outgoing than I am and he does all the people-related work. He deals with the customers and the employees – two technicians, a sales manager, and a parts manager. I do the paperwork and bookkeeping – my work is the wallflower-type work (laughing) – but it is my strength. What we have in common is our great work ethics.
PCL: How did you meet?
Cynthia: We met in Birmingham, Alabama due to our mutual interest in downhill skiing.
PCL: But there is no snow in Birmingham.
Alan: I am past president of the Birmingham Ski Club which had 1200 members at the time we met. I helped plan ten trips per year for the members of the club and one of the trips would be abroad.
PCL: When did you start working together?
Alan: We started working together one month after getting married in November 1995. We bought our marina on Logan Martin Lake and have been working together since January 1996.
PCL: What prompted you to relocate to Panama City?
Alan: I traveled to Florida frequently for my Alabama-based marine business and have established good working relations with marine businesses all along the Emerald Coast. We were former customers of Rivercraft Marine. When the former owners decided to sell the business, they saw me as a good potential buyer.
Cynthia: We always have had plans to retire in Florida and we first owned a place in Laguna Beach. Then we bought a house in Bay Point in 2010 but did not get to spend a lot of time here due to the marina business in Alabama. With the opportunity to buy this business, we saw our chance to live here permanently.
PCL: Does working together have its downsides and does it get difficult at times?
Cynthia: We have been working together for so long, we are a great team. The only downside is that we will get so busy that sometimes during the work day I do not even get a chance to talk to Alan. I will sometimes write myself a note to remind myself to ask him a question in the evening at home.
PCL: Do you have any special plans or traditions for Valentine’s Day?
Alan: We both love to travel and, with our shared passion for skiing, we look forward to travelling to the Dolomites (mountain range) in northeastern Italy once a year for an extended vacation. Each vacation we take is a ski vacation.
Cynthia: The business allows us to take time off in the winter months and, while we would usually spend the entire month of January and a part February traveling, this year we will cut our trip short to take care of the new business. In past years, after skiing, we travelled to different European cities on Valentine’s Day. We were in Verona one year and visited the place that is believed to have inspired Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. We saw the statute of Juliet and the famous balcony.
Alan: Another year we went to Paris, France and visited one of the “love lock” bridges. Couples will write their names on a padlock and together they will lock it onto one of the bridges, symbolically locking their hearts together. They then throw the key into the Seine River as a symbol of their undying love. There are two bridges that are covered in padlocks.
Cynthia: I was also amazed with all the balloons during Valentine’s Day in Paris. The entire city was decorated with red and pink balloons.
PCL: Do you have advice for other couples on how to successfully work together?
Alan: We love each other and are patient with each other. As long as we are both focused on treating the customers right and making them happy, half the battle is won.
[box type=”shadow” ]Battle’s Rivercraft Marine is located at 7429 E. Highway 22
Panama City, FL 32404
850-871-2920.
Find out more at www.rivercraftmarine.com.
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