Inside Deep Impact’s ‘New’ Factory Home

Covering almost 100,000-square feet in Opa-Locka, Fla., the production facility for Deep Impact Custom Boats is a tall, long and expansive space. And yet you can drive right by it—several times, in fact, as I did yesterday—if you’re not paying close attention. The place has no signage, and it’s surrounded by other massive production facilities.

After unveiling the new 439 center console in the Fort Lauderdale Boat Show this fall, Mark Fischer and friends will campaign it in the Florida Powerboat Club Key West Poker Run.

“We don’t need signs—we’re not a dealership,” Mark Fischer, the owner of the high-performance center-sole company since 2014, reminded me, and smiled. “We don’t sell factory direct.

“Plantation Boat Mart in Key Largo is our dealer,” he added. “They handle all sales.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean Deep Impact headquarters doesn’t have office space—it does. But for the moment, at least, the area used for storing softs-scape for the 36- to 49-foot center consoles the company offers and showcasing images of them in action on the walls.

Eugene Uriarte (left) and Mark Fischer have worked together since Fischer purchased the company in 2014.

The rest of the place is all business. Led by marine industry veteran and longtime Deep Impact general/production manager Eugene Uriarte, the company moved into its current digs almost two years ago. Some 70-plus men and women work there full-time, according to Uriarte

And yet until yesterday, no one from the media world had toured the “new” facility. It all started with an invitation from Fischer following our recent six-day Bahamas adventure in the first six-outboard Deep Impact 499.

The view up Deep Impact’s production line is a long one.

Like most modern boat-building facilities, production flows from one end of the plant to the other, starting with lamination and finishing with final inspection.

“Our goals is to push two boats a month out those doors,” Fischer said and nodded toward one end of the factory.

Fischer freely describes the company’s products as “heavier” than those of most of its competitors. Throughout our walk through the plant, he and Uriarte pointed out the brawny stringer systems in all the center consoles in various stages of construction. The Deep Impact stopped by a hardtop under construction for a 499 model, and they made note of its sub-structure of welded, two-inch diameter schedule-40 aluminum.

The company employs approximately 70 workers at the Opa-Locka facility.

“It kind of looks like a roll-cage, huh?” Fischer quipped, then pointed to a 399 center console construction. “See that? That’s a fiberglass inner-liner for the console. That’s how we build them—that’s one of the many things we do so these boats and handle true offshore water.”

Deep Impact currently has its third 49-foot center console in production—the first two are at this weekend’s Rockin The Harbor Poker Run in Baltimore. The company also is building its first 43-footer, which like the 49-footer can accommodate six outboard engines. Five outboards, however, will power hull No. 1.

“It is the only 43 that can accommodate six outboards,” Fischer said. “And they fit in one straight row, the same way they do on the 49. You don’t have engines sticking out to the sides, which makes it hard to maintain water pressure. But we’re starting with five outboards on the first one, just like we did with the 499, to establish a baseline.”

Scenes from the Deep Impact factory.

“None of our models are ‘short,’” he continued. “Our 399 is 40 feet long, our 43 is 43 feet, our 499 is 49 feet.”

The first Deep Impact 439 will be unveiled at the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show this fall. Fischer, his wife, Eileen, a couple of their friends and I will stretch its sea-legs during the Florida Powerboat Club Key West Poker Run that follows the Fort Lauderdale showcase. The plan also calls for a six-outboard 439—for the purposes of comparison to the 499—to run in the 2026 Florida Powerboat Club Bahamas Poker Run.

“I am looking forward to seeing how they compare in the rough water,” Fisher said.

Funny thing about that? So am I.