World Cat hosts Emerald Coast owners event to showcase life on the water

World Cat’s Emerald Coast owners event put the brand’s community pitch in its most practical setting yet: on the water, at anchor, with owners gathered for a one-day beach raft-up at Fort McRee on June 13. Sunrise Marine hosted the outing, inviting World Cat owners to meet for food, fun, and time together as part of the World Cat family.

That format matters because it gives the brand more than a showroom moment. Current owners get a reason to stay active in the community, while prospective buyers and dealer partners get to see the boats in the same conditions they are built for. World Cat’s June calendar also included D&R Boat World’s Grand Opening & Demo Day on June 12-13, along with other Cat’n Around events, including an owners gathering at Ocracoke scheduled for August 13-16. Taken together, the dates show a deliberate pattern: World Cat is using events to keep its boats visible in coastal boating circles and to build loyalty through use, not just ownership.

That approach fits the product story World Cat has been telling for years. The company says its boats deliver a better ride, a faster planing hull, longer range, and more space and storage. It also says its hulls are designed for a smoother ride, better stability, and shallower draft. For cat owners, those are not abstract talking points. They are the details that shape whether a boat feels confident in a short hop to a sandbar, a long run offshore, or a day spent rafted up with other owners.

World Cat says it is the world’s largest maker of power catamarans, with more than 80,000 satisfied customers around the globe. Its history traces back more than a quarter century to Glacier Bay boats in the Pacific Northwest, and the company says its current boats are built in a 140,000-square-foot facility in Tarboro, North Carolina. That scale helps explain why owner events like the Fort McRee gathering carry weight: they keep a large customer base connected to the brand in a setting where the boats can speak for themselves.

The location added another layer. The National Park Service says Fort McRee helped defend Pensacola Bay and Naval Air Station Pensacola’s harbor defenses alongside Fort Barrancas and Fort Pickens as part of an 1820s coastal-defense system. That made the Emerald Coast raft-up feel especially fitting, with a modern boating community meeting in a place long tied to the region’s maritime history.