At first glance, the two waterfront facilities appear similar. Both have a utilitarian weathered dock and provide a sheltered launch for small craft heading for open water. Each offers piercing sunsets for those heading home after a day of fishing.
Yet the way the two places — St. Simons Boat and Fishing Club and Savannah’s Coffee Bluff Marina — operate couldn’t be more different.
The marina nestled along the Little Ogeechee River on the south end of Chatham County doesn’t have memberships. Its private operator in 2023 posted $336,000 in revenue, largely from dock and launch fees, fuel and retail purchases from public customers. Instead of using taxpayer funds to subsidize operations like St Simons, it sends a percentage of annual revenue back to the city — and relies on its own insurance policy.
The facility now known as Coffee Bluff Marina wasn’t always a commercial success. But Savannah’s decision in 2008 to demand better stewardship of a treasured public asset could be a model for Glynn County. Earlier this summer, county commissioners voted to spend $5 million for repairs necessary to make the St Simons marina safe, but they didn’t demand more oversight of the boat club that has flouted terms of its lease and has a reputation for catering to its 240 members over the public at large. In its 2023 fiscal year, the St. Simons Marina reported $34,347 in revenue, most of which came from boat storage offered exclusively to its members.
With the right investment and business sense, a waterfront facility should be a money spinner because the scarcity of such spots makes them attractive to the public in addition to boat owners, said Marvin Metzger, the longtime operator of Coffee Bluff Marina who retired in 2021.
“You have to get someone who’s going to run it and understand it’s not just a local thing, you’re opening this up to all the taxpayers. The biggest thing is building that customer base,” said Metzger. He offered this piece of advice for his colleagues in Glynn: “You have to change the culture from what I’m hearing is going on down there at St Simons.”
Bringing the change
Back in 2008, Savannah viewed the property at the end of Coffee Bluff Rd as a potential problem, according to Joe Shearouse, former head of the city’s Leisure Services Bureau. A developer’s plan to build townhouses had tanked amid the financial crisis. The city, with the support of residents in Savannah’s southside neighborhoods, spent $1.5 million to purchase the land and create a public marina.
Since the marina was always seen as a public asset rather than a private club, Shearouse said that the public was generally receptive to the city investing money into it. The first challenge was finding a company to operate it.
“We tried to operate it ourselves for a while, but nobody in the city on staff had really any experience with operating a marina,” said Shearouse.
The city issued a tender and chose a local resident, Ray Golden, and his wife for the four-year contract.
Immediately, it became clear that repairs were needed. The marina was outdated and lacked essential amenities for generating revenue, such as boat storage.
Shearouse helped set aside $1 million for a marina overhaul in city recreation improvement funds for the district that Coffee Bluff is located in. The district’s city alderman lobbied hard for the upgrades.
By 2015, the city rebid the contract to run the marina, amid concern that the operator was not marketing the facilities. By then, Savannah had spent close to $5 million to make it a state-of-the-art marina.
Metzger, who at the time had recently retired from International Paper but wasn’t ready to stop working, won the contract which stipulated annual rent for the space and a profit-sharing agreement with the city. The lease also required the operator to be fully insured, and Metzger got his policy from Bernard Williams Insurance & Financial in Savannah.
At the same time, the city required monthly reports of revenue, expenses and traffic at the marina.
“We knew what we were responsible for, and basically, the operator was responsible for everything. Certain things were in warranty, which we took care of. We had no problem with that, but soon after we made the initial investment there, we didn’t budget anything for operational costs because we didn’t have any,” said Shearouse.
A new direction brings transformation
Metzger didn’t have a background in marina operations, but he was an experienced businessman. As part of the bid for the marina lease, he had worked up a business plan for operations as well as expansion of services.
“I think the reason I got the job is because of my past business knowledge. I wasn’t just a charter fishing captain or something. I understood business, and I understood what it takes to be profitable,” Metzger said.
When he first took over, Metzger had two employees, along with him and his wife. Together, they rebuilt the book of clients, which had dried up due to three years of intensive construction and renovations. The Coffee Bluff Marina has one hoist but can accommodate vessels up to 75 feet.
“The business was non-existent. We had a store that was empty. We had a lot that was completely empty, and we had all the docks that were basically empty. So I had to come in, and the first thing was to get the information out,” he said. “I created a website. So we did that, and we started using Facebook, and we did everything we could to start letting people know we’re open again.”
People began coming, but Metzger still needed to innovate to attract them to his operation, as opposed to private marinas. He opened a bait store, built bait boxes for live shrimp, launched a charter fishing boat and filled the empty store with branded merchandise.
He also started public events on Thursdays to draw more crowds and create buzz about the place.
Metzger did not offer memberships. Dry and wet boat storage were available to anyone for a 30-day period. Eventually, a waitlist started to form. “I made it completely fair and equal to anybody who wanted to come up,” Metzger said.
It took 18 months for Metzger to see a profit, and since then, his returns on investment grew.
“There wasn’t one thing that was my best thing as far as the sales. I never got a lot of money for just one single thing. It was a lot of little things that always provided positive returns,” he said.
Metzger said that outside the city, adding shore power and fuel lines that extended into the river—both included in the original contract—there were no major improvements made by taxpayer money invested in the facility.
Metzger retired officially in 2021 from the marina and moved to South Carolina. It is now run by Michael Lill. Metzger spends his days farming.
In 2023 , the Coffee Bluff Marina brought in $336,226, according to its accountant. That performance earned the city approximately $8600 in earned revenue on top of the marina’s annual rent payment, which was approximately $24,000.
The profit-sharing agreement requires that the marina pay the city 10% of gross revenue above $250,000. That formula, as well as the rent amounts, changed in the second amended lease signed in 2024. The marina now owes the city 10% of revenue over $300,000 and will pay approximately $41,661 per year in rent when the lease ends in 2035.
A blueprint for way forward
On June 19 Glynn County commissioners voted unanimously to allocate $5 million of public funds to make repairs at St. Simons Marina, which has been managed by the St. Simons Boating and Fishing Club for the past 76 years.
The county has said that it will evaluate long-term options about the marina management in a year, after the repairs are completed.
In the past, the boating club, which is run by a current commissioner’s former campaign manager, has not been subject to a public bidding process for the marina operations, despite the fact that it has flouted lease obligations and been criticized for being exclusionary.
Metzger says offering services to the public, rather than to members, is something that savvy business people would see as the way forward.
“Everyone was welcome, no one was treated differently than anyone else,” he said about the Coffee Bluff operation. “Of course, with that being said, I had folks that regularly came down there, and if they needed anything, I would go out of my way to help them. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t help anyone brand new either, because I wanted new people.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.