Background on Kim & Eric

Eric’s father Jack was a shipwright, highly regarded in his profession as one of the best. His influence and training impacted greatly on Eric and it was he who would, together with Eric, build our second boat, a catamaran – Caribbean Cat – upon which we would sail across the Atlantic to South America.

Our first boat had been a Trimaran, a 35ft Piver Lodestar. Little did we know upon purchasing her that she was far too small for our family, two adults and three small daughters, and it was decided to sell her after a sailing trip from Durban to Cape Town and back.

The next boat was the one that Eric and Jack built.  The Amateur  Yachting Research Society’s idea of the ideal catamaran. Based on the Wharram catamaran’s  ‘V’-shaped hulls, poor Caribbean Cat slammed her way across the Atlantic via South America, the Amazon to the Caribbean islands. In spite of all her slamming, when was sold she came up with a clean bill of health thanks to Eric and Jack’s resilience in over-building her.

After that was ‘Wahini’ the most wonderful and loved of all our vessels. 56ft in length, she was our own design and was a real streamlined beauty. How the girls and I adored her, and how we hated it when two years down the line, after sailing up the Atlantic, spending time in the Canary islands and Madeira and then through on to Gibraltar and the entire coast of Spain, the Balearic Islands and Italy and Greece, we sold her in Turkey. We’d experienced the most wonderful people and places during our long cruise on her and we were sad to see her go.

It wasn’t long when ‘Aquila’ our 64ft Catamaran of once again our own design was born. Before we could take flight on her to experience more wonders of the world, we were made an offer we couldn’t refuse, and she was sold.

We went on to building our largest catamaran, ‘American Enterprise’ all of 76ft in length, complete with Jacuzzi on the upper deck and film star like accommodations below including a master cabin with his and hers marble bath and basins. Eight cabins, all en-suite and with an enormous lounge and dining room, her attributes drew gasps from spectators everywhere we went. After cruising for six years throughout the Mediterranean, she crossed the Atlantic once more and headed for the West Indies. Two years on after chartering in the Caribbean Islands, we sold her to an outfit based in Chile’ chartering to the Galapagos Islands.

Scaling down on size somewhat, our next and most important step towards building yachts for the open market was to launch into building the 42ft Kelsall catamarans.  We sold this business and moved on to design and build the Royal Cape catamarans specifically for the Caribbean charter market. With six cabins, all en-suite in a 45ft vessel, these were wonderfully accommodating for their purpose and are still being built and exhibited at shows today, albeit having had a few changes made by the new manufacturers.

After selling the company, we travelled the world in search of a much smaller, yet accommodating catamaran that would be within the grasp of those in the entry level bracket. We came upon the Australian designed Wilderness cat. Concluding negotiations with the designer, Jeff Schionning, we renamed this cat the Wildcat and began building in earnest under the name of Charter Cats. We had found a niche market and after showing the Wildcat at our first Miami Strictly Sail Boat Show and selling eight boats, we knew we had a winner.  Her sailing abilities were outstanding, but the Americans who became our most significant buyers, loved the interiors. We, in turn, loved their input at all the boat shows we attended and took cognisance of their needs. As the boat improved through the years, and with all the willing advice gleaned from the shows, the Wildcat developed into the Mk1 to Mk11 and finally, like a butterfly shedding its cocoon, the Jaguar Catamaran came into being.

Life was extraordinarily great. We moved into power cats next. Again we approached Jeff Schionning and he came up with the 45ft Prowler Power Cat. A vessel with such magnitude and style, there was nothing in the market to touch her.  One of the first power cats to enter the market, she stole the show and the orders flowed into our little company which had by now increased in size to such an extent that our factory had to be expanded to five times its original size. We went from strength to strength.

Throughout the years of designing and building boats our main business was one of yacht broking. Since our return from the Caribbean, this seemed the most natural choice. However, once the boat building began taking on gigantic proportions, we had given both our yacht broking businesses to two of our daughters. International Yacht Brokers in Durban to Ange’ and International Yacht Brokers Cape to Nicole, our youngest daughter. 

We had the tiger by the tail and our operation expanded from 30 to 350 people in a very short space of time. After years of exhibiting at the many boat shows all over America, and beginning to feel the need to retire, Eric and I decided to bring our youngest daughter and her husband into the business. Slowly we began to take a back seat and give more control to them. They became directors and there were no limits to our success. Together, as a family, we were strong.

Or so we thought.

Little did we know what the impact of being too generous and trusting would be. Over a four year period from when they joined us, our most trusted daughter and her husband, unbeknown to us, chose to be less than honest in their business dealings within the company. We had been made two very good cash offers to buy our business, but had elected to sell it to our daughter and son-in-law instead. The transaction called for a deposit and the balance to be paid over the long term out of the proceeds of the company. This was never to be.  Instead they set up an operation designed to swindle us out of everything we had. When we discovered what they were doing, money had long since gone out of the back door, and the company was in trouble.  We were in trouble. Several of our clients would be in trouble too.

With both us now in our sixties, this was a bitter pill to swallow. How could we have been so trusting? How could we have been so duped? And by our own flesh and blood. This account of our rise and fall is not to absolve ourselves from blame. We know now although we had all the checks and balances in place which included auditors, that this is not enough when faced with a cunning and determined adversary. Fortunate enough to be surrounded by other family members, friends, clients and most of all a legal team who have faith in us and in whose debt we are for their enterprising efforts in keeping us in business, we have had to start all over again.  Without all these people we would have nothing and many more people would have been hurt in the process.

To all of these people we say “Thank you”. To those who would like more information we ask that you contact us. We are pursuing the matter in court to recover R5mil confirmed stolen and a further possible amount of twice that as found in the Forensic Report by the liquidator’s Auditors. We trust that one day we will be able to make right the wrongs that were inflicted upon us, our suppliers and clients.

Kim & Eric Schoeman.

Ex Charter Cats