Groupe Beneteau is pulling out of American boatbuilding. The French group will halt production at its Cadillac, Michigan factory in the third quarter of 2026 and put the site up for sale along with three of its US brands.
What Beneteau is doing
The decision was taken at a Supervisory Board meeting on 11 June 2026 and announced publicly four days later. Groupe Beneteau will stop production at the Cadillac plant during the third quarter and divest the facility together with Four Winns, Glastron and Scarab Jet.
The plant is operated by Rec Boat Holdings, Beneteau's US manufacturing subsidiary. No buyer has been named. The company says it is already looking for buyers and calls this a sale of the brands and the site, not a straight shutdown.
The Cadillac factory has employed local residents for more than fifty years. Four Winns was founded there by the Winn family in 1975, and Beneteau acquired the Rec Boat Holdings group in 2014.
The human cost
The move affects 232 employees. They were informed on Monday, 15 June 2026, after which managers began individual meetings on severance, benefits, retirement and support options. Production is expected to wind down through August 2026.
This is the part that lands hardest in Cadillac, a small Michigan town where the plant has been a fixture for two generations.
The numbers behind the exit
The financial case is blunt. The three American brands ran up roughly €30 million in cumulative operating losses across the 2024 and 2025 financial years, and accounted for less than 5% of group revenue in 2025.
Output collapsed over the same window:
boats built in 2022
boats built in 2025
orders in 2026 vs prior year
Why now
Beneteau ties the decision to a market it cannot control. It points to a slowdown linked to the Middle East conflict that escalated in March 2026, and to continued weakness in the bowrider and jet-boat segments. Activity, the group says, remains below anticipated recovery levels despite continued investment.
Bruno Thivoyon, Chairman of the Executive Board:“These choices result from a market environment durably affected by a geopolitical context beyond our control.
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Yannick Madiot, General Manager of the Dayboating Business Unit, struck a more personal note, calling the decision rational but difficult, and acknowledging "what it represents for each member of the Cadillac site team."
A retreat to Europe
Cadillac is just one of Beneteau's sixteen production facilities, and closing it leaves the group's manufacturing footprint almost entirely in Europe. The plan now centres on seven strategic brands: Beneteau, Jeanneau, Prestige, Lagoon, Excess, Wellcraft and Delphia.
The company insists the exit does not change its position in the US market or its growth expectations for the fiscal year. Existing customers are not left stranded either: Beneteau says after-sales service and spare-parts supply will continue until the divestiture is finalised.
For the American production-boat market, the withdrawal of one of the world's largest leisure-boat groups thins out an already pressured segment. Bowriders and jet boats have been soft for several seasons, and a buyer for the Cadillac brands is far from guaranteed.
What happens to Four Winns, Glastron and Scarab now depends on whether a buyer steps forward. All three carry recognisable American heritage, but heritage alone has not been enough to keep the line running.
Photo: Groupe Beneteau's plant in Cadillac, Michigan (Rec Boat Holdings). Source: Google Street View.
