Owner started in 1984
Todd Allmand, owner of the company, started building boats in 1984 for John Allmand Boats, which his father founded in Miami, Fla., in 1965.
Location, location, location
Allmand says he enjoys living in this part of the country much better than Florida, and moved here because the costs of shipping his finished boats are significantly cheaper.
Specializing in water taxis
These are the kind that seat 35 or 49 tour-takers. builds boats as large as 38 feet long by 12 feet wide. It also can build a variety of other vessels, including speedboats and yachts, with hulls of fiberglass or aluminum.
What do they cost?
The taxis sell in the $200,000-$270,000 range.
As for a business benefit in Hamilton ...
“Cincinnati’s the hub of the United States” for transportation, he said. “When we were in Miami, we wanted to send a boat to New York? It’s $4,000. You want to send a boat to California? It’s $9,000.”
“In Cincinnati, it’s $3,000 to send it to Miami, it’s about $2,500 to send it to New York, and it’s about $4,000 to send it to California.”
About the building
After Allmand bought the 10,000-square-foot building at 1000 Forest Ave. and an adjacent residential property on Forest for a combined $175,000, the city informed him he couldn’t use the residential land for commercial purposes until its zoning was changed.
Now that the zoning was changed to industrial, the company will pave the former residential property and put up a pole barn or similar building on it. They also have to widen a garage door in the existing building to get boats through it.
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