I realize that becuase their is a forum, many feel free to post anything. You might want to approach the company direct, in a less antagonistic fashion though.

Prices for everything have gone up. If you have a slow moving product, to stay in business they have to cover those costs across less boats. A move like offering an 11K mast obviously states they are not terribly interested in supporting this boat. Open bashing and they could just as easily pack up the 20 molds and then where would the "class" be?

Cat sailors are famous for being cheap. For the most part, we do not belong to yacht clubs and are nomads. We do not spend any money on our boats or our racing and this is a huge reason why the beach cats get ostracized from the rest of the sailing community. The only racing boats selling (except with some die hard H16 guys) are for the most part complicated performance boats. The I20, F18, F16 etc. These all have a lot of hardware, and are not particularly simple to produce. The expectations of what comes on a boat and its finsh has also risen considerably since I first started sailing. The numbers being sold have also dropped considerably.

Add all this up and you have a cosly product, and an attitude that reads as if we all want to go out and be competitive on our 2-4 K boat. There are a lot of great old H16's still in barns around the country, but this seams to just perpetuate the impression that a newer, more complicated, Hi-tech boat will be inexpensive as well.

Mike brings up the Melges class, go and price out a new one of those. A new set of sails for them is considerably more than even the new Performance pricing. Go look at a new 20 sport boat like the SB3, and you will be dropping close to 40K to make it to the start line.