# Business idea: Indoor Sailing. Near Chicago

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/business-idea-indoor-sailing-near-chicago/551931>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [August 29, 2010, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/business-idea-indoor-sailing-near-chicago/551931 "2010-08-29T23:59:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\
**Post date:** [August 31, 2010, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/business-idea-indoor-sailing-near-chicago/551931/21 "2010-08-31T02:31:55Z")

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> [@Oakminster](#):
>
> People that can afford to sail in wintertime can also afford air fare to places where wintertime means 75 degrees during a bad cold snap.
> 
> Seriously—you think you can handle 6 boats at a time. How much do you think people will pay to sail around your indoor pond? $50/hour maybe? If you’re open and booked full for the equivalent of an 8 hour day, you’re grossing $2400/day. Figuring in your costs…I’m not seeing a way to make a decent living there.

That’s a good point. Maybe it would have to work on the model used by some country clubs–i.e., not-for-profit with a huge buy-in and monthly fees, whether a member uses it or not. This would obviously make it geared toward a different clientele and may make it more difficult to use for schools, etc.

Also, if you look at that last picture, I think you’ll see that way more than six boats could get in there at once.

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**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\
**Post date:** [August 31, 2010, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/business-idea-indoor-sailing-near-chicago/551931/22 "2010-08-31T02:45:42Z")

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I used to sail Lasers when I was a kid on a small lake. Part of the thrill was seeing how fast you could push it before the wind changed and you got screwed. It’s not obvious to me how you would be able to simulate that in a large indoor space. If you were just running a course, it would soon get really mechanical. You’d probably also want some sort of water movement. A half mile squared is a lot of water to keep going.

In principle I’d be intrigued enough to try it, though not at an enormous annual buy-in unless I got a few hours to play up front.

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**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\
**Post date:** [February 14, 2013, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/business-idea-indoor-sailing-near-chicago/551931/24 "2013-02-14T08:00:47Z")

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Reported.

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