FLIBS 2026 · Refit
Ask any captain how their last refit went and you’ll usually hear a number of months, followed by a longer number of months. This year the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show is putting that conversation on a stage of its own.
RefitX, a new refit conference from FLIBS, is previewing with three panels at the 2026 show on Wednesday, Oct. 28 and Thursday, Oct. 29, all in the Yacht Builders Tent at Bahia Mar Yachting Center. The full two-day RefitX conference follows on Oct. 27–28, 2027, opening FLIBS week.
The headline panel: bringing refits back to the U.S.A.
Thursday at 2 p.m., The American Refit Advantage: Bringing World-Class Yacht Transformations Back to the U.S.A. asks the question a lot of owners’ reps already ask privately. The U.S. has the designers, yards, trades and engineers to handle the most ambitious superyacht refits. So why do so many of the big, design-driven projects still go to Europe?
Superyacht designer Patrick Knowles (Patrick Knowles Designs, The Quintessential Yachtsman) leads a panel that covers the whole chain an owner has to trust before keeping the boat here:
- Jamie Benoit, naval architect, Murray & Associates
- George Whitehouse, Derecktor Shipyards
- Colin Lord, project manager
- Phil Purcell, MIASF and RefitX
- Michael Merritt, interior fabrication, Merritt Woodwork
Event details are on our listing: The American Refit Advantage, FLIBS 2026 panel.
All three RefitX sessions
What owners, captains and managers should listen for
These panels come with your show admission, and they’re full of people who quote, manage and build refits for a living. Go with questions. Here’s what we’d want answered.
At “The Perfect Refit” (Wed 3 p.m.)
- Where does scope creep actually start? Most overruns trace back to a work list that wasn’t locked before the yard period began.
- How big should the contingency be, and who signs off when it’s touched?
- Who owns procurement of long-lead items: the yard, the project manager or the boat?
- How should design changes be priced once work has started?
At “The Refit Boom” (Thu 11 a.m.)
- How far out are South Florida yard slots booking for the big haul-outs?
- Where is the labor shortage hitting hardest: paint, fabrication, systems, interiors?
- What permitting or infrastructure fixes would change how fast a yard can take on work?
At “The American Refit Advantage” (Thu 2 p.m.)
- What’s the real cost comparison once you count the crossing, crew time and owner access?
- What design-driven work can a U.S. team deliver today that owners still assume needs Europe?
- How do designers, yards and trades hand off so the owner’s rep has one picture of the project, not five?
Why refit is getting its own stage
Because that’s where the money in yachting lives after launch. Informa Prestige, which owns the Monaco Yacht Show, puts the global superyacht refit and maintenance market at $3 billion to $5 billion a year, growing 6% to 9% annually, with refit making up roughly 36% of earnings across the superyacht sector.
Fort Lauderdale already runs a huge share of that work through yards like Derecktor, Safe Harbor’s Lauderdale Marine Center and Bradford Marine, all on these panels. The open question is whether the region and the country can win more of the largest, most design-heavy projects.
Make Thursday a refit afternoon
Right after the 2 p.m. RefitX panel, the International Superyacht Alliance holds its own Destination Refit Panel at 3 p.m. on the second floor of the Bahia Mar Hotel, on global refit markets, tariffs, regulation and supply chains. Two takes on the same question, a short walk apart.
Book a 10-Minute Look
More for show week: every FLIBS 2026 party, last-minute contractors in Fort Lauderdale and 130 boat-show-ready tips.
Sources: FLIBS RefitX 2026 seminar page (titles, times, venue and speakers as listed Oct. 19, 2026); flibs.com/refitx (2027 dates); Marine Business, Aug. 4, 2026 (Informa Prestige market figures); International Superyacht Alliance announcement (Destination Refit Panel); panel flyer via Patrick Knowles Designs. Photos courtesy FLIBS / Informa Markets. Logos belong to their owners.