Pontoon Boat Gifts for Someone Who Already Has Every Cupholder | Bluegrass Gifts

The Boat Has Everything, and It Spends Winter Under a Cover

Shopping for pontoon boat gifts goes sideways fast, because the boat is already outfitted. Every seat has a cupholder, there are three coolers for a boat that holds twelve, and a foam float shaped like a pizza slice lives under the back bench. Then, some weekend in October, the whole rig goes under a cover until the dogwoods bloom.

The best pontoon boat gifts either replace something the boat wears out every summer, like dock lines or sun-faded seat cushions, or they honor what the boat is really for: the lake place and the family on it. If a gift only works from May to September, it spends half its life in storage with the boat.

For the second kind, we make one: our Personalized Lake House Sign, a carved pontoon boat gift for the lake house wall. The sample carves THE CARTER FAMILY over LAKE HOUSE, with a pair of crossed oars between the two words and SIT BACK, RELAX, UNPLUG along the bottom. Your family’s name goes on top, and the bottom line is yours.

Most gift guides for pontoon owners are gear catalogs, which works if you know exactly what is missing. Most people don’t, and the owner has opinions on every piece of gear down to the knot on the bow line. What they will not buy for themselves is the thing that says the lake place is theirs.

Pontoon Boat Gifts Should Pass Three Questions Before You Wrap Them

A pontoon is the family boat. It hauls the grandparents, three cousins, a dog and a cooler out to the cove at a speed nobody has to hold their hat for. So a good pontoon gift is for that whole crowd, not just the one who backs the trailer down the ramp.

The pontoon gift test. Ask these three about anything before you buy it:

• Does it ride on the boat? Then it lives under the cover from October to spring, in a storage compartment that is already full, when it isn’t left on the dock or borrowed by a brother-in-law. That is not a reason to skip it, just a reason to know exactly which one they want.
• Does it work in January? The season is short and the off-season is long. A gift they see at home on a gray Tuesday gets more use than one they see on twenty Saturdays.
• Does it have their name on it? Half the pontoons on the lake carry the same cooler and the same foam mat. Almost none carry anything that says whose boat, whose dock and whose people.

Score it like this: no on the first question and yes on the other two is the gift they keep. Most of the boating aisle scores the other way around, yes, no, no. That is fine for a stocking. It is not much of a Christmas.

◆ From the Workshop: Before a design goes to the machine we check it stroke by stroke, because a line thinner than about a tenth of an inch carves shallow and sands away. The same design is carved at all three sizes, so on the 16-inch board the oars are about half the size they are on the 30-inch, and every stroke, the oar shafts included, has to be drawn heavy enough to hold up there. The oars come out of the same pass as the letters, from the same board, so nothing is glued on, and like the letters they stay bare wood against the finish.

The Usual Pontoon Boat Gifts, Run Through the Test

None of what follows is a bad gift. Most of it just asks you to know the boat better than you probably do.

Dock and deck gear. Dock lines, fenders, a telescoping boat hook, a mat for the swim ladder. These wear out for real: lines fray and fenders split after a few summers rubbing the same dock. They ride on the boat, do nothing in January and carry nobody’s name, but if you have seen the state of the bow line, a new set is a kindness. Find out the length and thickness first.

Coolers and comfort. Floating coolers, insulated tumblers, a foam mat for the cove, new seat cushions, a shade extension for the back deck. The most fun pile to shop and the hardest to get right, because a pontoon family usually owns three of each. Look at what is sun-faded and cracked on the boat right now and replace that, not whatever is shiny in the aisle.

Safety gear. Life jackets sized for the newest grandbaby, a throwable cushion, a first-aid kit in a dry box, a good flashlight for the ride home after dark. Useful and kind, but the owner will want to check every label and every fit, so buy it with them, not for them.

The off-season. A fitted cover, moisture absorbers, a winterizing kit. Practical and dull. They pass the January question only in the sense that they work while nobody is looking.

That leaves the third question, which nothing in the boating aisle answers. If you are weighing a family keepsake against one more piece of gear, we wrote a whole piece on what makes personalized family gifts actually get kept.

The Family Name, the Crossed Oars, and the Wall It Belongs On

Here is the sign, plainly. The family name you type goes across the top in spaced capitals, up to 14 characters. LAKE HOUSE sits in the middle with the crossed oars carved between the words like a boathouse crest, or, by the style option, a pair of oars standing tall at each end. The bottom line is yours, up to 28 characters. You watch the lines appear on the board as you type, and a real person reads every order before anything meets the saw, spelling checked against what you typed.

Bottom lines for a pontoon family, all short enough for the box:

• SIT BACK, RELAX, UNPLUG: the sample, and hard to improve on
• SAME LAKE SINCE 1987: for the family on its third boat
• NO WAKE ZONE SINCE 2004: for a house where the afternoon nap is protected
• SANDBAR BY NOON: the whole Saturday plan in three words
• TOWELS ON THE RAIL, PLEASE: a house rule, carved, so nobody can say they weren’t told
• SHOES OFF, NAPS EXPECTED: for the screened porch
• CAPTAIN GRANDPA, CREW OF 11: when the grandparents own the boat and the crew keeps growing
• FIRST SEASON ON THE WATER: for a new boat or a new place
• WHERE THE PHONES GO QUIET: for the family that drives up to unplug
• COFFEE ON THE DOCK AT SIX: for the one who is up before the lake is

Pick the size by the wall. The Large 30" x 7.25" ($80) goes over the mantel or on the screened porch, where the whole crew walks past it on the way to the dock. The Medium 24" x 5.5" ($55) keeps order in the bunk room or the hallway of beds. The Small 16" x 3.5", at $30.00, is the one for back home, where it keeps the lake on their mind all winter. For the finish, Worn Navy looks like the water at dusk, Weathered Gray like a dock that has seen some summers, and Dark Walnut or Ebony makes the bare-wood letters and oars stand out the most.

We are a small Kentucky shop with 5,000+ customer reviews, and we carve these signs on a CNC machine in our shop, on one face of a solid board: pine for the stain finishes, poplar for the paints. Each one ships free in the U.S. with a sawtooth hanger installed, and our post on how to hang a wood sign covers the rest. If the family has a lake place and a home place, any two signs earn up to 20% off at checkout: the Large over the mantel, the Small back home.

Who Should Skip the Sign and Buy the Rope

The sign is the wrong gift for some pontoon people. Better to know that before you type a name in.

The day-trip family. If the boat lives on a trailer and the lake is a two-hour drive with no house at the end of it, a sign that says LAKE HOUSE is wishful thinking. Buy the piece of gear they talked about all summer.

The river people. LAKE HOUSE is part of the carved design, not a line you type. For CABIN, BEACH HOUSE or RIVER CAMP, the listing has a custom request link, and we carve it as its own sign at the same price.

The renters. If the lake place is a different rental every July, wait. The year they close on a place of their own, the sign will mean twice as much.

The owner with a list. Some new owners keep a running list on their phone of what the boat still needs. If you can get a look at it, buy from it, and save the sign for the birthday.

For everybody else, the family name is the one thing the boat cannot give them. If the lake house design is not quite the fit but the idea is, the rest of our personalized signs work the same way: you type the words, watch them on the board, and a person reads them before the carve.

The cover is going on the boat soon enough either way. Type the family name into our Personalized Lake House Sign for the family that piles onto the pontoon, try both oar styles on the board, and pick the wall. It is the one pontoon gift that will still be hanging when the boat comes out of storage in the spring.

Frequently Asked Questions

What to get a boat owner for Christmas?

For Christmas, get a boat owner something that still works in December, when the boat is covered and put away for the winter, and that carries the family’s name, because most boat owners buy their own gear and have firm opinions about every rope, cushion and cooler on board. Our Personalized Lake House Sign carves your family name over LAKE HOUSE with crossed oars and hangs at the lake house or back home all winter. It starts at $30.00 and ships free in the U.S.

What to get a new boat owner?

Get a new boat owner something that marks the start of the family’s years on the water, such as the family name carved on a board for the lake place or the den back home, and leave the gear to them, since a new owner usually has a list and a reason for every item on it. Our Personalized Lake House Sign takes a bottom line of up to 28 characters, so FIRST SEASON ON THE WATER fits. A real person reads every order and checks the spelling before anything is carved.

What can you change on the lake house sign?

You set two lines on the lake house sign, the family name across the top in up to 14 characters and the bottom line in up to 28, while LAKE HOUSE and the oars are part of the carved design, and the style option chooses crossed oars between the words or a pair standing at each end. You also pick the size, from the Small 16" x 3.5" at $30.00 to the Large 30" x 7.25" at $80, and one of 20 hand-applied stain and paint finishes. The carved letters and oars stay bare wood against the finish.