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X-Yachts Great Britain
Meet the team
Debbie Weldon
Managing Director
After her studies in Business, Debbie began her career with BMW in Ireland, where she was quickly recognised as a key team player and was promoted year on year. Being young and ambitious, Debbie then decided to emigrate to the US, where once again her talents became apparent in both the construction and hospitality sectors. Debbie looks fondly on her time in New York, in particular being an integral part of a team procuring scaffolding contracts throughout New York, with her personal favourite contract being for the famous Rockerfeller Christmas tree in New York!
Debbie then returned to Ireland, and immediately joined the then new X-Yachts team, with its bases in Dublin and Southampton. Her timing was perfect, as we were about to exhibit at the very first London Boat Show at the new Excel Centre in January 2004. To date, Debbie has now since organised and run some 30 boat shows in the UK.
After joining us at X-Yachts in 2004, Debbie true to form, once again began to flourish in her new role and very quickly got to grips with the nature of the business, from sales and service, to customer relations, she also fully immersed herself in the business management and accounting functions. Recently in 2021, it was a very natural step for Debbie to take on the role of Managing Director for both X-Yachts in the UK and Ireland. In essence it was just formalising a role she has carried out for many years!
Despite her busy and demanding role, Debbie is very much a peoples person… “I love nothing more than meeting customers, new and existing, whether at Boat Shows, our offices, or at our bi-annual X-Yachts Solent Cup Regatta. It’s fabulous to catch up with everyone and we really have the best customers, many who want to share their passion for X-Yachts, and go as far to make themselves available to assist us at various boat shows, so isn’t this just a unique business to be part of, we help facilitate peoples sailing dreams, and they then help us…..amazing”.
Stuart Abernethy
General Manager
Stuart grew up in a village just west of Glasgow, and spent the majority of his summers and weekends sailing on family yachts on the West Coast of Scotland. This was originally an 1887 G.L. Watson designed gaff rigged cutter “Beroe”, with no winches or technology which would have been a challenge for his father! Following on from that, he sailed on a Carter 33 “Victric”, the new family yacht, which allowed him to participate in much of the local racing, in which they were very successful with family and friends crewing.
Having completed his schooling, he went on to study "Naval Architecture and Offshore Engineering" at Strathclyde University in Glasgow, graduating in 2000. He then decided to obtain a Yacht Master Offshore Qualification in the warmer climes of Australia. Once qualified, and having liked a warmer climate than Scotland, the South Coast of England was the next logical base - “The Home of Yachting”. He joined a local charter company, managing some 30 different yachts of various sizes and brands for three years. It was during this time that he joined the race crew aboard an X-Yacht X-332 called “Peanut”. While participating at the X-Yachts Gold Cup in Hamble during the summer of 2003, he got to know some of the team at X-Yachts, this then resulted in him officially joining the team in 2005.
As a qualified Yacht Master, he spent the first two years doing X-Yacht sea deliveries for the company, between Denmark, UK and Ireland, then was part of the service team for a further 2 years. Since 2009, his focus has been on facilitating new and pre-owned sales.
We say facilitating, because “selling” a yacht is not a practical role, unlike life’s necessities, a yachts is not a “necessity”, it’s a dream that a buyer wants to fulfill, and his role is to understand the requirements of that persons dream, and explore if an X-Yacht can feature in that dream. Importantly, it’s also about “why” we do things the way we do in X-Yachts design and manufacturing. “With my background in design engineering, this allows me to understand and believe in the why of X-Yachts. Therefore, I am very fortunate to be able to supply a product I absolutely believe in. No Salesmanship is required, only understanding a buyers requirement, and then imparting my understanding and belief to allow that buyer make an informed decision so they get the right tool to make their dream a reality”.
Julien Renault
Head of Service GB & IRE
Julien grew up in North Britany where he was never very far from the water either day cruising with his family around the islands near Dinard, racing nationally on the Bénéteau First Class 8 or volunteering with Les Glénans sailing school in Ile de Bréhat as technical support for the summer.
Julien moved to England in 2006 with X-Yachts GB as a work experience to start with, but stayed on since then, where he gained his experience by training for a summer at the X-Yachts factory in Denmark, servicing most X-Yachts over the years but also by taking part in many regattas with our X-Yachts owners (Fastnet Race / Middle sea race / King’s cup / Cowes week / Round the island race etc).
Julien now heads up the servicing team where we look after around 35 X-Yachts over the winter to make sure your X-Yacht is always looking her best with the attention to details necessary which make an X so special.
Darren Beacroft
Lead Service Engineer
Darren is from Nottinghamshire and has spent a good part of his career in Formula 1 as a race technician and engineer. He has travelled the world working for F1 teams; Jordan, Williams, Honda and Brawn and was Jenson Button’s lead mechanic for 5 years. Darren has always had a love for the sea which has now led him to sailing, gaining his Yachtmaster certification in 2020. After two seasons working as sailing yacht flotilla Skipper and Engineer in Greece and buying his own yacht, he is now transferring his considerable skill set working for the X-Yachts team.
Nick Mason
Service Support
Nick joined our team in 2017, initially as a Yacht Service Technician. Prior to that, Nick had worked on flotilla yachts between St. Tropez and Marseille. He then achieved his Yacht Master Offshore Ticket on the Solent in 2016, while also participating in Solent yacht racing.
To further his qualifications and understanding of yachts, when Nick joined us in 2017 he decided to undertake a boat building course at Southampton City College, which he currently continues to attend part time.
It was clear to us that Nick not only had valuable technical skills, but also a pleasant “can do” attitude in assisting our customers, so Nick now enjoys a unique and diverse role, continuing to expand his qualifications along with an element of technical work on our yachts, but also more importantly, Nick now works as part of our team, dealing directly with customers on technical matters and parts supply.
X-Yachts (GB) Ltd.
2 Huntsman Road
Hamble Point Marina
Hamble
Hampshire
SO31 4NB
UK
VAT Number: GB 804 981 614
Montag - Freitag
9:00 am - 5:30 pm
Samstag
10:00 am - 3:30 pm
Sonntag
By Appointment