The Thrill Of Brazil

I’ve always marveled at just how friendly boaters are, regardless of where my travels have taken me. In my decades at the helm of this publication I’ve been fortunate to have met a lot of truly amazing people in the boating industry. Yet it still astonishes me how in just one week I went from formal handshakes and smiles (while fighting a language barrier) with complete strangers at an airport greeting, to sincere hugs and tears of appreciation to my new life-long friends as we left the home of the VCAT Pontoon owners.

This March Harris Publishing president Jason Harris and I were graciously invited to visit São Paulo in Brazil to see for ourselves the evolution of this pontoon manufacturer. The red carpet treatment we received was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced before.

VCAT owners Benedito Prado Neto (Master Viewer) and Valéria De Fusco Pereira (CEO) are two of the most genuine and kindest people you’ll ever meet, along with their business partner Marcos Ferreira (Industrial Viewer) who together made sure our South America trip was as productive as it was truly memorable.

After completely starting from scratch as a brand-new pontoon manufacturing business to the point where they had to make some of the machines and equipment they needed themselves just to get started, it’s hard not to be rooting for their success. Nothing about their amazing journey has been easy, which helps make their story such a good one.

When Neto and Valéria first started thinking about getting into the boat manufacturing business in their home country, pontoon boats were as foreign as a bottle of Mountain Dew to the majority of the population of Brazil. Yet nearly 15 years later, VCAT appears to have single-handedly introduced high-end luxury pontoons to the people of Brazil.

I was both humbled and surprised when I learned our magazine played a role in Neto and Valéria first getting started. The couple picked up a copy of Pontoon & Deck Boat magazine off a newsstand while visiting Florida and had a feeling pontoon boats could be just as popular in their country as they are in ours. Carl Morahan, owner of Fiesta Marine in Hudson, Fla., took them out on the water in one of his pontoon boats and this officially fanned the flames and was the final motivator for this couple to move forward.

All these years later, Valéria recalls the feeling she had that if she could just get our magazine to come to Brazil and see their boats they would have the validation that they had officially made it. While enjoying the afternoon on the water with the amazing VCAT team, the teary-eyed CEO shared this with me and was filled with joy knowing I was sitting on one of her pontoons like she had once dreamed of years earlier.

Their passion for the pontoon industry is mirrored by the nearly one hundred employees who make up the workforce with a determination to build the best pontoon boats possible. As we toured the massive 90,000-square-foot facility we were constantly greeted by friendly faces who were working hard to ensure each boat lived up to the high expectations the owners have set for their employees.

Looking back on my first trip to Brazil, I left with great memories and a new appreciation for the pontoon industry. During my time in their country I was introduced to new foods, a new culture, but more importantly to new friends. Neto, Valéria, Marcos and the rest of the VCAT team are truly hard-working people who have brought high-end luxury pontoons to Brazil. You can call them pioneers, pathfinders, trailblazers or even innovators. I simply refer to them as friends.

Brady L. Kay,
Pontoon & Deck Boat Editor