Category: Yachting Culture

With Courtesy of Erica Lay & The Mallorca Bulletin. #26/0063. Erica Lay is owner of EL CREW International Yacht Crew.

Spring in Mallorca doesn’t ease in gently when it comes to the Superyacht Industry. It kicks the door down.

One minute Palma’s shipyards are in full winter mode – and that’s not quiet, despite what anyone who doesn’t work in yachting might think. It’s a full-blown hive of activity. Enormous yachts up on the hard covered in scaffolding and plastic wrap getting paint jobs, grinders screaming, teak decks being re-caulked, engines being taken to bits, generators getting replaced, new rigs going in, new sails arriving, interior refits, galley upgrades… contractors and crew juggling seventeen jobs at once and surviving almost entirely on caffeine and mild panic.

Then the sun comes out… and everything speeds up.

Boats that have been cocooned for months are suddenly unwrapped like very expensive Christmas presents. Fresh paint gleaming, stainless polished to within an inch of its life, teak looking suspiciously perfect. 

Meanwhile, all the yachts which were winterised and kept quietly ticking over in the marinas start to wake up, like Sleeping Beauty after a particularly splendid slumber. 

For a brief, glorious window, everything seems pristine.

Give it a week.

Because as the yachts emerge from their winter chrysalises… so do the crew.

Palma in spring turns into a live-action job hunt, and it can be savage. Dockwalkers everywhere. CVs clutched like golden tickets, trying to look casual while very much not being casual. There’s always one in full whites (ambitious), one wildly overdressed for 8am, and one who has clearly underestimated just how much walking is involved and is now rethinking their life choices and footwear somewhere between STP and Club de Mar.

The cafés fill up fast. You’ve got returning experienced crew swapping winter stories like they’ve come back from war, and green crew trying to decode what “just keep showing your face” actually means in practice, making one coffee last three hours. 

Meanwhile, onboard… Spring is when captains are having a quiet crisis.

That creeping realisation that recruitment for the looming summer Med season was meant to be sorted weeks ago has well and truly landed. Now it’s an inbox full of CVs, a couple of key gaps, and guests arriving far sooner than feels reasonable. Cue the frantic scrolling, the “we’ll just trial them and see” hires, and a sudden appreciation for anyone who can tie a decent fender knot without Googling it first. And that’s usually when I come into my own, as a superyacht recruiter of nearly twenty years, this is The Most Wonderful Time of The Year (yes ok, I sang that). Captains? Call me. Let me take the strain. 

Whilst the bridge desk floods under the captain’s tears of frustration, down on deck, it’s controlled chaos.

The job list is endless, the pressure is on, and just as someone finally gets stuck into something important… another dockwalker appears. And then, inevitably, there’s Gary.

Many yachts have a Gary. Lovely guy. Solid worker. Absolutely incapable of just taking a CV from a dockwalker and moving on. What should be a five-second interaction turns into a full breakdown of Gary’s “journey,” his three previous boats, a full CV review, and a story that definitely does not need to be told right now.

Somewhere behind him, the deck team is mid caulking, someone’s holding a power tool, a can of varnish got knocked over and Gary’s still chatting. This is when the First Materesorts to placing a basket on the passerelle labelled “CVs here please” alongside a note that might as well read:  Please do not engage Gary. He has no self-control and we are on a deadline.

And then – just as the mayhem peaks – along comes the Palma International Boat Show.

This is it. The unofficial but very real start of the Mediterranean season. Palma sharpens up, the docks fill with immaculate yachts, red trousers, bare ankles, and suddenly everyone is exactly where they’re meant to be. Meetings, deals, reunions, a little bit of gossip… and a lot of people pretending they’re not already slightly exhausted.

From here, it’s game on. Boats leave, ready or not, charters begin, and Mallorca slides effortlessly into full summer mode.

But this bit – this slightly frantic, sun-soaked, slightly unhinged build-up known as Spring – this is where the magic is.

It’s hopeful. It’s chaotic. It’s full of opportunity.

And somehow, despite the panic, the pressure, and the Garys… it all comes together.

Just in time.

With Courtesy of Erica Lay & The Mallorca Bulletin. #26/0056. Erica Lay is owner of EL CREW International Yacht Crew.

Day in the Life: Confessions of a Superyacht Recruiter

By Erica Lay, owner of EL CREW CO Superyacht Recruitment agency and author of Superyacht Life: How to Start, Succeed, & Stay Sane – available now on Amazon.

It seems the Day in the Life series was quite well received and I have been asked for more – mostly from the members of the yachting community who operate shore based and behind the scenes… so stay tuned for more! Today? Well today I’m giving you a sneaky little peek into the routine of a recruiter. Which I guess I know a fair bit about… 

06:00 – Coffee & Existential Dread
The phone pings before the kettle’s even boiled. A captain in the Caribbean wants a new deckhand-slash-engineer-slash-chef-slash-stew “who can drive a tender, fix the aircon, cook a steak, and preferably has a golden retriever’s temperament.” I check the time zone. It’s 01:00 his time. Either the aircon’s broken again, or he’s having a breakdown. Possibly both.

07:00 – Inbox Roulette
Enter office clutching bucket of coffee with both hands. Power up computer. 187 new emails. Half are crew applying for roles that don’t exist, a quarter are clients who “urgently need” a crew member (but haven’t decided what salary, start date, or what qualification/experience they need yet), and the rest are out-of-office replies from people who will neverreturn. I start inhaling caffeine. Lots of it.

08:30 – CV Triage
Scroll through a stack of new CVs. Spot three with no surnames, one with “manifesting a deckhand role” as the career objective, and a particularly strong contender whose email address is partygirlforever@something.com. Delete. Immediately. Somewhere out there, a genuinely great candidate has formatted their CV in Comic Sans and I can feel it.

09:30 – Captain Call No.1
He wants a stew “who can also mix a decent margarita. For me.” I nod. Service skills, cocktail game, emotional support human… got it. Another perfectly normal Tuesday.

10:45 – Crisis Management
One chief stew calls in tears because her new hire (not through me) has ghosted her mid-season. Another just found out their new deckhand can’t swim. Yes, really. Also, no, not hired through me. I send consoling words, then immediately update my database: “DOES NOT SWIM.” Add extra bold.

12:30 – Lunch Break (ish)
Attempt to eat a sandwich while proofreading a CV where someone claims to have “fluent” French. In reality, they once ordered a croissant unaided. Decide it’s easier to skip lunch than sanity.

14:00 – Reference Roulette
Call a reference for a chef candidate. The voice on the other end sighs deeply and says, “How honest do you want me to be?” I brace myself. The next ten minutes are a mix of admiration, trauma, and recipes for revenge. I hang up and write: “Brilliant but volatile. Keep near fire extinguisher.”

15:30 – The Optimist Files
Interview a bright, eager greenie who says, “I don’t mind starting at the bottom.” I smile and gently explain that the bottom is wetter, smellier, and pays less than they think. They nod enthusiastically. Bless them.

17:00 – Client Debrief
Another captain calls. “Do you have anyone with strong deck experience, excellent service skills, advanced medical training, a master’s in psychology, and preferably doesn’t talk too much?” I tell him I’ll check Hogwarts.

18:30 – Database Deep Dive
Search for candidates. Lose three hours and half my will to live. Discover six people I placed years ago are now captains. Feel ancient.

20:00 – Wine & WhatsApps
Finally close the office door, pour a glass of rosé, and immediately get a WhatsApp from a junior stew asking if she should “follow up her follow-up.” I tell her to go for a walk, not a war.

22:00 – Midnight Manifestations
Lie in bed, mentally sorting candidates. Think about the ones who’ve made it, the ones who quit, and the ones still trying. Remember why I love this job. Because somewhere out there, the right crew will find the right boat. And when they do, it’s magic.

Then my phone pings. It’s the captain from earlier. He’s changed the job spec. Again.

26/0051. By Chef Grecia Vargas.

The Silent Role of a Chef On Board: Who Takes Care of Those Who Care?

By Grecia Vargas

Reflections from the galley on the invisible care that sustains life on board a superyacht.

Dear industry,

I write this with genuine affection.

To acknowledge what this world has given me — the moments, the lessons, the intensity of it all.

Yachting is a fascinating environment.

You learn every day.

You live in confined spaces with people who were once strangers.

You maintain a positive mindset, no matter the circumstances.

You focus on detail.

You deliver high standards.

You work long hours.

You manage exhaustion.

Meals go out on time.

Everything stays clean and in order.

You remain professional.

You smile — even while cruising at 9.4 knots somewhere along the Mediterranean coast.

This is life on board.

A constant balance between attitude and professionalism.

In my case, that balance lives in the galley.

The role of a chef is central.

It is also exposed and demanding.

When guests come on board, expectations are clear:

Impeccable food.

Personalised.

Consistent.

No room for error.

But there is another side to this.

The crew.

They become your family for the season.

You live together.

Work together.

Push through together.

Their performance defines the experience.

Safety. Comfort. Enjoyment.

Everything depends on how well the team functions.

This is not a small responsibility.

The entire operation rests on one mission:

To create an unforgettable experience.

So the question is:

What does that success really depend on?

The answer is simple.

And often overlooked.

The human body has limits.

It needs sleep.

Food.

Recovery.

Stability.

Remove these, and performance breaks down.

Yet this profession demands the opposite.

Less sleep.

Interrupted rest.

Constant alertness.

Irregular meals.

No real rhythm.

Balance is fragile.

This is where the silent role of the chef begins.

During the peak of the season, there is no pause.

The crew must perform, every day.

Food becomes more than food.

It becomes fuel.

Recovery.

Support.

Through nutrition, the chef tries to compensate for the physical and mental strain placed on the team.

This often goes unnoticed.

Or is simply accepted as part of the job.

Something to deal with later.

“At the end of the season.”

But the reality is clear:

The galley does not just feed people.

The galley sustains the vessel.

Behind every smooth operation, there are people.

And those people need care.

Like an orchestra needs tuned instruments,

a crew needs to be maintained.

So the question returns:

Who takes care of those who care?

From the galley, the answer is quiet but constant.

Every meal is more than a task.

It is an act of support.

Three times a day, the crew is restored.

Energy is rebuilt.

Effort is acknowledged.

The galley becomes something close to sacred.

A place where wellbeing is sustained.

Because behind every perfect service,

every seamless voyage,

every unforgettable summer —

there is a human team making it happen.

And we, the chefs,

keep that system alive.

Quietly.

Plate by plate.

With Courtesy of Erica Lay & The Mallorca Bulletin. #26/0046. Erica Lay is owner of EL CREW International Yacht Crew.

Day in the Life: Paper Seas — Diary of a Yacht Manager

By Erica Lay, Superyacht Crew Agent and Author of Superyacht Life: How to Start, Succeed, & Stay Sane. Out now on Amazon.

06:30 – Wake, Panic, Repeat
Wake up, check phone, immediately regret it. Twelve emails marked urgent arrived overnight. None actually are. One’s a crew member asking if his Wi-Fi allowance covers Netflix, another’s a captain forwarding a ten-page spreadsheet with no context, and one’s a yacht owner wondering if VAT is “optional.”

07:15 – Coffee & Crisis
Boot up the laptop. My inbox looks like a live crime scene. Crew contracts, insurance renewals, flag-state inspections, MLC compliance — all due yesterday. I make a list, then immediately lose it under another pile of lists.

08:00 – Budget Ballet
Open Excel. Discover someone spent €2,400 on “miscellaneous supplies.” I dig deeper. It’s candles. Scented. “For ambience,” says the purser. I breathe deeply and remind myself that prison orange isn’t my colour.

09:30 – Call with the Captain
He’s in the Med, I’m in Mallorca, and the Wi-Fi sounds like it’s routed through Mars. “Can you hear me?” he asks. No. I can’t. Not his words, not his excuses, not the sound of my youth slipping away. We discuss fuel budgets, provisioning, and crew turnover. He ends with, “Don’t worry, I’ll handle it.” That’s the most worrying sentence in the industry.

10:45 – Insurance Insanity
Broker calls. The owner wants to add “two experimental water toys” to the policy. They’re basically floating jet engines with Bluetooth. The insurer says no. The owner says “but Elon has one.” I email everyone a polite, professional “we’ll review coverage options,” while muttering, “we absolutely will not.”

12:00 – Lunch (Theoretically)
Half a sandwich, eaten one-handed while drafting an email about an incident report that somehow includes the phrase “slippery sushi.” A chef slipped, a guest laughed, and now there’s a medical bill in Monaco and a lawsuit in motion. Pass the antacids.

13:15 – Crew Drama Hour
Chief stew wants to fire her second stew for “bad vibes.” Engineer wants a pay rise “to reflect his value.” The captain wants to swap both out “for morale.” I suggest team-building. They suggest I walk the plank.

14:30 – Compliance Purgatory
Open an email from the flag state. It’s 14 pages of regulation updates written in legalese and spite. I forward it to the captain with the words, “For awareness,” which is yacht-management code for I’m not reading this either.

15:45 – Owner Check-In
Video call with the owner, who’s sitting on his terrace in the Bahamas, cocktail in hand. “How’s my boat?” he asks. I glance at the report showing an engine alarm, a damaged tender prop, and a missing deck cushion. “She’s in great shape,” I say. “Just routine maintenance.” He smiles. I smile. We both lie beautifully.

17:00 – Accountant Acrobatics
Reconcile invoices. One crew member submitted a €600 charge for “crew motivation.” It’s tequila. I question it. He says, “It lifted spirits.” Hard to argue with that logic. I approve half. For science.

18:30 – The Paper Tsunami
Finish one report, start another. Compliance logs, budget forecasts, meeting notes — all due before the next full moon, apparently. My screen time is obscene, my caffeine intake criminal, and my left eye has started twitching Morse code.

19:45 – The Twilight Texts
Just as I’m packing up, the captain messages: “Small issue with the generator, but we’re managing.” Small issuetranslates to “half the yacht is dark, and someone’s crying.” I pour another coffee and reopen the spreadsheet.

21:00 – False Finish Line
Close laptop. Feel fleeting satisfaction. Phone pings: WhatsApp group chat, “URGENT – FIRE DRILL REPORT.” The drill was today. They set off the wrong alarm. Again. One stew fainted, one guest complained, and the dog’s still traumatised. I reply with: “Noted, thank you,” which in yacht management language means “I hate all of you equally.”

22:15 – Rosé & Reflection
Pour wine. Sit on the balcony. Watch the lights of the marina twinkling below. Every yacht out there runs because someone like me spends their days neck-deep in spreadsheets, bureaucracy, and diplomacy. We’re the invisible life support of floating empires.

Then the phone pings again. Another “quick question.” There’s no such thing as quick. Not in this job.

I sigh, sip, and type back with my best fake cheer: “Of course – happy to help!”

Because in yacht management, you don’t retire – you just eventually merge with your inbox.

By Chef Raffie. #26/0040.

An Open Letter to Restaurant Chefs Who Think Yachting Is Easy

Dear Restaurant Chef,

I’ve seen your Instagram.

Beautiful plates.
Microgreens placed with surgical tweezers.
Sauces swirled with the confidence of someone who has a dishwasher, a pastry chef, and a prep cook hiding just off camera.

Bravo.

Now allow me to introduce you to the luxury wellness retreat known as the superyacht galley.

A place where culinary dreams meet marine engineering, sleep deprivation, and the opinion of people who can’t tell the difference between cilantro and parsley.

First, your brigade disappears

Remember your brigade?

Your sous chef.
Your pastry chef.
Your prep cook.
Your dishwasher.

They’re gone.

Not on break.

Not late.

Gone.

On a yacht, you are now:

Chef
Sous chef
Pastry chef
Baker
Butcher
Fishmonger
Nutritionist
Purchasing department
Inventory control
Dishwasher
Sanitation officer

All inside a galley roughly the size of a walk-in closet with anger issues.

And the floor moves Constantly.

Enter the Chief Stewardess: Director of Global Culinary Strategy

Now the real magic begins.

The Chief Stewardess walks into the galley.

Three months ago she was selling scented candles at a duty-free shop in Gatwick or was a bartender in a dive bar somewhere in the hood.

But after watching half a season of Top Chef, she is now Vice President of Guest Culinary Expectations.

And God forbid you get a weekend off as a compassionate gesture from the owner for working 90 days straight without days off! Rest assured that on your return you’ll find the galley totally rearrange by guess who? The chief stew because according to her nothing can’t be found in the right place!

She says:

“Chef… the guests want something light tonight.”

You ask what “light” means.

She answers:

“Maybe lobster… but like… healthy.”

Ah yes.

The legendary keto detox paleo lobster cleanse.

A cornerstone of modern nutrition.
But what she’s really telling you is that she is the one who wants the F&@5$3 lobster

The Deckhand Culinary Consultant

Just when you recover from the lobster conversation, a deckhand appears.

He has been polishing stainless steel for six hours and is therefore spiritually prepared to offer culinary guidance.

He leans into the galley and says:

“Chef… have you thought about tacos?”

Thank you, Professor.

Thirty years cooking in three continents and I never considered tacos.

The entire culinary world will hear about this breakthrough.

Then comes the Captain.

The Captain recently watched a YouTube video titled:

“5 Easy Michelin Star Tricks Anyone Can Do At Home.”

So naturally he stops by the galley to say:

“Chef, I saw this guy reverse-searing a steak with a blowtorch… maybe we try that tonight?”

Of course, Captain.

Let me just blowtorch a Wagyu ribeye while the boat is rolling like a drunken metronome.

What could possibly go wrong?

The Guest Diet Matrix

Dinner preferences arrive.

Guest #1: vegan
Guest #2: gluten-free
Guest #3: keto
Guest #4: “vegan except seafood”
Guest #5: allergic to garlic
Guest #6: allergic to onions
Guest #7: doesn’t like fish that tastes like fish
Guest #8: only eats organic food flown from Italy

But remember…

“Keep it simple, Chef.”

Meanwhile… crew food

While preparing a seven-course tasting menu…

you also cook for 10 crew.

And crew are the most honest critics in gastronomy.

A deckhand will taste your food while smearing his arroz con pollo with ketchup and say:

“Chef… the chicken is a bit dry.”

Thank you, Anthony Bourdain of the swim platform.

Your critique has been noted and forwarded to the International Bureau of Poultry Moisture Control.

Provisioning reality

Restaurant chefs call a supplier.
Yacht chefs call three islands, two fishermen, and a guy named Miguel with a cooler.

Half the ingredients arrive.
The other half are “coming tomorrow”.
Tomorrow means maybe Thursday.
Thursday means God knows.

Midnight service
Finally, the day ends.
You clean the galley.
You lie down.
You close your eyes.
Then the radio crackles:

“Chef… guest cabin two would like a grilled cheese.”

At 2:13 am.

Because obviously the pinnacle of maritime luxury is nocturnal grilled dairy sandwiches.

The truth nobody tells restaurant chefs

Restaurant kitchens measure technique.

Yacht kitchens measure sanity.

Technique is important.

But try plating scallops while the boat is pitching 15 degrees and the Chief Stew is asking if the foam can be replaced by a lighter sauce!

That, my friend, is advanced gastronomy.

Final thoughts

So yes, dear restaurant chef.

Working on a yacht is incredibly easy.

All you need is:

• culinary mastery
• mechanical balance
• psychological resilience
• insomnia tolerance
• and the ability to smile politely when the deckhand suggests tacos again.

Nothing complicated.

Just another day in paradise.

Signed,

A Yacht Chef Who Finally Understands Why Pirates Drank So Much Rum.

With Courtesy of Erica Lay & The Mallorca Bulletin. #26/0039. Erica Lay is owner of EL CREW International Yacht Crew.

Day in the Life: Hull Yeah – Diary of a Shipyard Project Manager

By Erica Lay, owner of EL CREW CO Superyacht Recruitment agency and author of Superyacht Life: How to Start, Succeed, & Stay Sane – available now on Amazon.

06:15 – Coffee & Consequences

Arrive at the yard to the sound of grinders, shouting, and someone swearing in Spanish about scaffolding. The air smells like paint, metal, and the faint tang of despair. First job: locate the foreman. He’s vanished again, probably “getting parts,” which is shipyard code for “breakfast beer.” I walk past three guys staring into an access hatch like it’s a portal to hell. It probably is.

07:00 – The Daily Download

Tool-belt meeting with engineers, painters, electricians, and one carpenter who still doesn’t believe in deadlines. I ask for updates. Everyone says “nearly done.” That phrase now triggers mild nausea. Someone tries to show me a drawing on a crumpled bit of paper that looks like it’s been through the washing machine. I nod as if it makes sense.

08:30 – Captain Calls Begin

Captain #1 wants to know if his yacht can splash next Friday. I tell him yes, if we invent time travel. Captain #2 wants to add a jacuzzi. Captain #3 has lost his will to live. I promise all three that everything’s “on track,” which, technically, it is – just not their track. One of them sighs so hard my phone vibrates.

09:45 – Paint Panic

The paint team is fighting with the electricians again. Overspray versus open junction boxes. I mediate like the UN, armed with coffee and sarcasm. “Let’s all remember,” I say, “we’re on the same team.” They stare at me like I’ve just suggested group therapy. A painter storms off muttering about respect; an electrician shrugs and says, “Welcome to my life.”

11:00 – The Mystery Leak

Someone reports a leak in the engine room. It’s condensation. Or seawater. Or possibly tears. Send an engineer down there with a torch and hope for the best. He comes back up shaking his head and muttering something about “gremlins.” Add it to the list.

12:15 – Lunch (aka Emails and Aspirin)

Try to eat a sandwich while answering thirty emails marked urgent. Only two are. The rest are updates like “client’s dog arriving Tuesday – needs dedicated AC vent.” Another message asks if the yacht can be made “more Feng Shui.” I take a painkiller and carry on.

13:00 – Owner’s Rep Visit

Cue panic. Crew start polishing things that don’t exist yet. The rep arrives wearing white trousers and judgment. I lead him around the yard using the sacred phrases: “as per spec,” “awaiting approval,” and “nearly there.” He leaves smiling. I need a drink. The chief engineer needs four.

15:00 – Delivery Doubt

Suppliers call to say the part we needed “yesterday” will arrive “maybe Thursday.” No mention of which Thursday. I hang up, take a deep breath, and email the captain a cheerful update about “minor delays.” Then I breathe into a paper bag.

16:30 – Scaffold Symphony

Painters blasting music, welders welding like they’re in a firework display, sparks flying past a pallet of solvent. Health & Safety would have a coronary. I take photos for documentation, mainly so I can prove I wasn’t hallucinating later. Then a forklift reverses directly into a ladder. Nobody dies. Miracles do happen.

17:45 – The Budget Ballet

Open spreadsheet. We are slightly over budget. “Slightly” meaning: catastrophic. Spend twenty minutes moving numbers around like a magician rearranging cards before admitting defeat and calling accounting. They laugh. I don’t.

18:30 – Client Update

Video call with the owner. He wants to see progress. I position the camera carefully to show only the freshly painted bits, not the chaos behind me. He says it looks amazing. I agree. Then a grinder starts up mid-sentence. I fake a bad signal and hang up.

19:30 – Sunset and Sanity

Walk the yard as the day winds down. It actually looks beautiful in the orange light; gleaming hulls, scaffoldingsilhouetted against the sky. For a brief moment, the chaos feels worth it. Then I trip over an air hose and remember where I am.

20:15 – One Last Crisis

Security radios: “Boss, there’s smoke in the paint tent.” Sprint over. It’s a welder reheating his dinner with a heat gun. I tell him to get a microwave before he kills us all. He nods like I’m the unreasonable one.

21:00 – Home(ish)

Leave the yard, phone already buzzing with tomorrow’s problems. I drive away humming the shipyard anthem: “It’ll be done next week.”
Because in this job, the deadline’s always moving, the dust never settles, and the coffee machine is the only thing that truly runs on schedule.

#26/0027. By Chef Raffie.

A Friendly Reminder to Land-Based Chefs Thinking About “Going Yachting”

Every summer the same story begins again, around this time the same migration begins.
Restaurant chefs see a few Instagram chefs start posting sunsets.
Influencers show lobster Thermidor, wagyu sliders on the sundeck and stewardesses pouring champagne in slow motion.

Crew agencies promise “amazing opportunities.”
And suddenly half the restaurant industry thinks yachting is a floating Michelin restaurant with dolphins.

So allow an old galley pirate (32 years in the industry) to offer a small reality check before you pack your knives.

First, a technical detail many “job offers” seem to forget.

According to MLC regulations, vessels over 500GT and/or with more than 10 crew must have a certified Ship’s Cook responsible for crew meals.
So when you see offers like:
50m yacht
Solo chef
14 crew
12 guests or
50m yacht
Solo chef
11 crew
12 guests

That’s not a job.
That’s a psychological experiment and a cry for help disguise as employment.

If the crew including you is 10+, politely decline and remind them you follow MLC rules. If they want to hire an army of Generation Z interior crew while one chef feeds the entire NATO fleet, that’s their business — not yours.
“But the industry is booming!”

Yes… and no.

Mega yachts over 100m are indeed being built every year. Shipyards in Holland are busy, bookings are strong, and billionaires are still ordering floating palaces that look like apartments buildings with propellers. But here’s the detail nobody mentions

But for every 100m yacht, there are 50 boats under 40m — and that’s where most crew actually work.
And that’s where the circus begins.

Captains with management skills roughly equivalent to a nightclub bouncer and leadership expertise of a parking attendant.

Owners who can afford the yacht purchase, but not the yacht operation.
Management companies run by people who have never lived on board a vessel but somehow control every decision from an office chair. They monitor the budget like the Spanish Inquisition….

Things the Instagram posts will never tell you

They don’t tell you:

• The owner basically lives on board six months a year.
• The boat is chartering back-to-back while pretending it’s “private.”
• The yacht goes into maintenance exactly when the guests arrive.
• The captain’s girlfriend mysteriously becomes Chief Stew / Warden of the Interior Department.
  She could be the Captain’s girlfriend or wife.
  Which means the interior department is now run like a maximum-security correctional facility with champagne glasses, where smiling incorrectly during service is considered a disciplinary offense.

The Tip Cookie Jar

Ah yes… the famous charter tips.
Sometimes the management company holds them until the end of the season just in case you go crazy or reach a point of critical exhaustion and decide to jump ship in the middle of the season.
Sometimes they “adjust” them.
Sometimes they disappear into what I like to call:
The Bermuda Triangle of Accounting.

Strangely enough, the money always vanishes somewhere between the broker, management company, and “administrative processing.”

The Freelance Circus
Because many owners don’t actually want to pay full-time crew anymore, a new phenomenon has appeared:

The Freelance Economy of Yachting.

Freelance chefs.
Freelance chief stews.
Freelance engineers.

Why?

Because owners love the idea of having a yacht without paying for it when it’s not being used and because the yacht must exist for Instagram and the payroll must apparently be run like a budget hostel.

And then come the snake oil salesmen…
Now we have courses promising:

“Become a Yacht Chef in 5 weeks!”
“Earn six figures at sea tax free!”
“Live the dream!”

Apparently all you need is:

• A chef jacket
• A certificate
• And a strong Wi-Fi signal for your Instagram.

What they don’t tell you is that cooking on a yacht means:

Cooking in a galley the size of a walk-in closet
Provisioning like a logistics officer in a war zone
And plating Michelin-level food while the boat rolls like a washing machine.

Final Advice from an Old Galley Pirate

Yachting can be amazing.

You’ll see the world.
You’ll meet fascinating people.
You’ll cook incredible food.

But remember this:
What you see on Instagram is marketing.
What you experience onboard is reality.
And those two things…
are often very different oceans.
So before you accept that “solo chef for 14 crew and 12 guests” position…
take a deep breath…
read the contract…
and remember:
Sometimes the real luxury in yachting is simply having enough crew to survive the season.

Fair winds, young chefs.

And read the contract before you pack your knives.
I wish everybody a great weekend!

Chef Raffie

by Chef Tom Voigt. #26/0024.

The Epic Odyssey of Your Lost Résumé:
A Descent into the Fires of Job-Hunting Purgatory
By Tom Voigt
Ever wondered what actually happens to your beautifully polished résumé (yes, that résumé — the one some ex-yachtie “CV guru” charged you for, basically stitching together a Word or PDF file between watch shifts and calling it professional) the moment you smash that “Send” button?
Let me paint you a picture. A big one.
Imagine a massive field full of grain silos—except they’re not filled with corn. No. They’re filled with résumés. Yours, mine, everybody’s. All packed in there, waiting to “shine”… or, more realistically, waiting to develop a healthy layer of dust. These silos are the black holes of our professional dreams, sucking every hope into quiet oblivion.
And speaking of outer space—sometimes sending your résumé feels exactly like launching it toward Mars. You know it’s floating out there somewhere, drifting through the cosmic void, but good luck getting it back. NASA has a better chance of finding alien life than you have of getting a reply from your “dream job.”
If résumés ever do make it back to Earth, they fall like biblical rain over a single job posting—thousands of them crashing down in a blizzard of desperate ambition. Somewhere in that storm, your tiny résumé is just trying not to drown. It’s like playing “Where’s Waldo?” but with higher stakes and absolutely zero cute illustrations.
And those résumés that get filtered out?
Picture a giant celestial toilet flushing them into the HR underworld—your hopes, your dreams, swirling away into the eternal septic tank of corporate recruitment. Farewell, sweet résumé. We barely knew you.

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Crew agents and recruiters — our industry’s gatekeepers (or gate-blockers?)
Now let’s talk about crew agents and recruiters—the people supposedly guiding our “career paths.”
Are they overwhelmed, undertrained, or just cruising on autopilot? Hard to say. Half the time they’re sipping coffee in existential silence, staring at their screens like they’re trapped in a slow-motion horror film, pretending to process the daily avalanche of CVs—paper, pixels, whatever gets hurled at them before lunch.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Most of them don’t really read CVs.
Not properly. Not deeply.
It’s basically speed-dating with résumés.
Maybe it’s a machine with the empathy of a toaster scanning everything for keywords and tossing out half the field. Or maybe—on a brave day—a real human glances at your life story, squints, sighs dramatically, and wonders why they ever joined recruitment in the first place.
And let’s be honest:
Matching candidates should be like scouting elite football players.
You’re not just looking for someone who can kick a ball—
you’re looking for the one player who sees the field, shifts the game, and wins the match.
But here’s what actually happens:
The “scout” doesn’t notice the talent.
The recruiter skims past the one skill the client is practically begging for.
And plop—your CV drops straight into the cosmic toilet bowl of missed opportunities.
Talent lost. Time wasted.
All because nobody read the damn thing properly.

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Welcome to the comedy club of job platforms
And then there’s the pure comedy of job platform requirements.
Some agents still demand:
“Upload your CV in Word only — PDF not accepted.”
Really? In 2025?
Imagine a solid candidate who designs a clean, modern CV in Canva.
Looks great.
Professional.
Polished.
Except—oops—Canva doesn’t export in Word.
So the platform rejects the file.
The agent can’t process the application.
And the yacht never even gets the chance to hire the candidate.
A career dead on arrival…
not because they weren’t qualified, but because they didn’t have a .docx file from 2009.
Sad, isn’t it?

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And when replies do come in…
Either they show up never,
or they arrive so late you’d think your résumé stopped for a cappuccino on the moon.
By the time someone actually emails you back,
you’ve forgotten you even applied and you’re already on Plan Z: professional cat-sitting.
And then we get the magical mismatched job offers.
Why do men get job ads written clearly for women, and vice versa?
Did the recruiter screw up?
Or is AI just running an elaborate cosmic prank on all of us?
And honestly—do these jobs even exist?
Or is the whole ecosystem just a giant data-harvesting trap, feeding our résumés right back into those silos in the sky?

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The final truth
So next time you hit “Send,” remember this:
Your résumé is about to embark on an odyssey more epic than anything Odysseus ever survived—just with a much lower chance of a happy ending.
(Like most of my observations, this comes from decades of conversations with colleagues about all the strange wonders of the yacht industry.)

by Chef Tom Voigt. #26/0023.

The Anglosphere Pipeline
How Hiring Culture Shapes the Modern Superyacht Crew (1990–2026)

A factual review of fleet growth, labour structure and nationality dynamics in the modern yacht industry
The international superyacht industry has undergone a profound structural transformation over the past three decades. What was still a comparatively niche sector in the early 1990s has evolved into a globalised, highly professionalised industry employing tens of thousands of crew members across several thousand vessels.
With growth came complexity. With complexity came filtering mechanisms. And with filtering mechanisms came recurring debates about nationality, language and access to opportunity.
This report does not seek to accuse or dramatise. It seeks to clarify what can be factually supported, what can reasonably be inferred, and what remains anecdotal.

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1. Fleet Expansion and Structural Change (1990–2026)
   The scale of the industry today is fundamentally different from that of the 1990s. According to technical industry data referenced by RINAUTIC, the global superyacht fleet reached approximately 5,092 vessels by the end of 2019, representing more than a sixfold increase compared with the mid-1980s baseline. This expansion reflects long-term growth rather than a short-lived bubble.
   Post-pandemic momentum accelerated this trend further. BOAT International reported that the global superyacht order book reached historic highs in 2023, marking one of the strongest new-build cycles in the industry’s history. Although the order book has since stabilised, it remains elevated compared with pre-2020 levels.
   With fleet expansion comes increased crew demand. Industry sources such as SuperyachtNews, citing estimates from The Superyacht Agency, suggest that the number of active superyacht crew globally lies in the range of 60,000 to 70,000 individuals, although precise figures remain difficult to establish due to rotation, relief crew and short-term contracts. It is important to emphasise that no centralised global census of yacht crew exists.
   The absence of comprehensive statistical transparency is a structural characteristic of the industry and must be considered when analysing nationality representation.

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2. What We Actually Know About Crew Nationalities
   There is no official longitudinal dataset documenting nationality composition of superyacht crew from 1990 to 2026. However, certain surveys provide insight into recurring patterns.
   ISWAN – The Welfare of Superyacht Crew (2018)
   The International Seafarers’ Welfare and Assistance Network (ISWAN) conducted a substantial survey of superyacht crew in 2018. Among the most represented nationalities within the respondent sample were British, American, South African, Australian and New Zealander crew members.
   It is crucial to clarify that this survey does not represent the entire global workforce, nor does it claim to. However, it does indicate a visible and recurring presence of crew from English-speaking countries and South Africa within the active yacht community.
   ISWAN – YachtCrewHelp Annual Review (2022)
   In ISWAN’s 2022 YachtCrewHelp report, which analyses usage of its confidential helpline service, 27.2% of identified nationalities among service users were British, while just over 10% were South African. Crew from at least 42 nationalities accessed the service.
   Again, this is not a workforce census. It measures helpline engagement rather than total employment distribution. Nevertheless, it confirms that British and South African crew are highly visible and engaged within the yacht ecosystem.
   Industry Estimates Concerning South African Crew
   Several industry publications, including reporting referenced by Marine Industry News in connection with Superyacht Cape Town, have cited estimates suggesting that South African nationals may account for up to 30% of the global superyacht crew workforce. These figures are described as estimates rather than verified statistical totals, and should be treated accordingly. They reflect recurring industry perception rather than audited demographic data.

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3. Language as Structural Advantage
   English has become the operational language aboard most internationally active superyachts. This development is not ideological but practical. Charter operations, multinational guest groups, regulatory documentation and global mobility all favour English as the default working language.
   In practical terms, this reality creates an advantage for native or near-native English speakers during recruitment processes. Communication reliability under pressure is a legitimate operational concern for captains and management companies. When shortlisting candidates, recruiters frequently prioritise linguistic certainty.
   This structural factor does not require explicit discrimination to generate unequal outcomes. It operates as a functional filter.

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4. Visa Access and Passport Mobility
   Another documented mechanism influencing recruitment decisions is passport strength and visa flexibility. Interviews and analyses referenced in maritime academic work, including studies published via Theseus (Finnish maritime academic repository), highlight that owner preferences, visa requirements and ease of international travel can influence nationality selection.
   Crew members holding passports that allow smoother access to the United States, Schengen Area or Caribbean regions may be perceived as administratively less complex hires. In a fast-moving charter environment, operational efficiency frequently outweighs philosophical neutrality.
   This dynamic again reflects structural pragmatism rather than overt bias. However, its outcome can resemble nationality preference.

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5. Recruitment Agencies and Shortlisting Practices
   Modern superyacht recruitment is heavily agency-driven. Compared to the 1990s, when dock-walking and direct captain hiring were more common, today’s system relies on databases, CV filtering and curated shortlists.
   Industry platforms such as YPI CREW, cited via coverage in Yachting Pages, have openly acknowledged that qualified crew may occasionally be overlooked due to nationality-based preferences expressed by owners or management. The terminology used within the industry often refers to “owner preference,” “cultural fit,” or “communication standards.”
   These phrases are not inherently discriminatory. However, they can function as soft filters in candidate selection.
   The process is rarely malicious. It is often risk-averse.
   Captains and heads of department tend to hire from networks they trust. Once a national cluster establishes itself within a role segment, referrals frequently circulate within that same network. This network replication effect is observable across multiple nationalities, not exclusively among South Africans, Britons or Australians.

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6. The French Riviera Paradox
   A frequently raised question concerns the apparent underrepresentation of French yacht chefs in yachts based in Antibes, Nice or Monaco.
   Geographic location does not automatically determine crew nationality. Many yachts home-ported in Southern France are flagged elsewhere, owned by non-French principals and operated under English-speaking command structures. Job advertisements for Antibes-based roles frequently list fluent English as mandatory, with French described as beneficial but not essential.
   This does not demonstrate systematic exclusion of French professionals. However, it illustrates that local culinary heritage does not necessarily translate into hiring dominance.
   The Riviera is geographically French. Operationally, it is international.

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7. Then and Now: 1990 Compared to 2026
   In the 1990s, the industry was smaller, less standardised and less database-driven. Hiring often occurred through direct reputation, maritime background or personal introduction. Crews were smaller, and formalised recruitment agencies were less dominant.
   By 2026, the sector operates with:

• significantly larger vessels and crews
• increased charter turnover
• greater owner influence in hiring decisions
• formal recruitment databases and digital shortlisting
• globalised career mobility
  Professionalisation has improved efficiency, safety and service standards. At the same time, it has institutionalised filtering systems that were previously informal.
  Efficiency and homogeneity often travel together.

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8. Is There Evidence of Systematic Nationality Discrimination?
   There is no comprehensive dataset proving that a single nationality dominates or controls the industry. However, there is documented acknowledgement that nationality can influence hiring decisions in certain contexts, as reflected in recruiter commentary and survey findings.
   The distinction is important.
   Systemic mechanisms such as language dominance, visa convenience and network replication can produce patterns without requiring coordinated exclusion.
   The industry’s international identity remains genuine. Yet international does not necessarily mean proportionally representative.

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Conclusion
Between 1990 and 2026, the superyacht industry expanded dramatically in fleet size, crew demand and operational complexity. Surveys from ISWAN demonstrate a recurring visibility of British, South African and other English-speaking nationalities within crew populations, while industry commentary acknowledges that nationality can influence hiring outcomes in certain circumstances.
Structural factors—language, passports, owner preferences and agency-driven recruitment—collectively shape workforce composition. These mechanisms are practical, sometimes commercially justified, and rarely malicious. Nevertheless, they create observable patterns.
The industry prides itself on being global.
It is indeed global in geography.
Whether it is equally global in opportunity remains a question shaped less by intent and more by structure.
And in a sector built on precision, structure tends to matter.