On board with Steve and Randy Beth Breitman
HOME FLORIDA AND NEW JERSEY
BUSINESSES SEBCO LAUNDRY SYSTEMS, SEB REALTY, STEVE BREITMAN INVESTMENTS, RANDY B REALTY
FAMILY THREE SONS, ONE DAUGHTER
CURRENT YACHT 38-METRE RANDY BETH
My first experience of yachting was the cargo ship,” says Randy Beth Breitman, deadpan. Up go my eyebrows. Husband Steve’s grin broadens at the memory. She continues: “It was the middle of the night and we were sleeping...” Steve jumps in. “We heard one whistle on the horn. Then another, and another. When the fifth one went, it was, ‘Get up, get up!’ We ran out on deck to make sure the ship wasn’t coming in our direction, and there it was – just 100 yards away!”
This was Randy Beth’s first time offshore, some 15 years ago, before she and Steve married. They were out on Steve’s Sea Ray 680 – the flagship of the American boatbuilder and a sharp-lined beast capable of hitting 30 knots at full throttle. The cargo ship encounter ended safely, but it was not the only excitement of the passage. “We did the trip from Savannah bringing the boat north to New Jersey,” says Randy Beth. “There were a lot of firsts – first cargo ship, first lock and also Cape Fear. The captain grounded the boat and Steve had to back us off.”
To round out the voyage, the captain brought the boat a little too close to the warships of the US Navy’s Fleet Forces Command that jostle along four miles of wharves at Norfolk, Virginia. “The PT boats came out to see what we were doing – with machine guns mounted,” says Steve. “My wife was standing on the back in a bathing suit decorated with the American flag, so they soon left us alone. But then 10 minutes later, another launch came past, wanting to see what the first boat had told them about!”
“Looking at the radar, the land was getting further away - the compass was sending us out into the Atlantic Ocean”
Such an eventful passage could have sounded the death knell for even a long-standing love of yachts, but for a first timer? “I got my sea-legs that trip and fell in love with boating,” says Randy Beth. “I grew up at the Jersey shore, so I’ve always loved the ocean. Getting my sea legs was something else.” As for Steve, his induction to yachting 20 years earlier was not dissimilar – also involving a cargo ship but this time in his newly bought 47-foot Atlantic motor yacht. “I was chief cook and bottle washer – anything that needed fixing, I did it,” he remembers.
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
He took an “experienced” friend along for his first long trip from New Jersey down to Florida and quickly discovered that not all was as it seemed. “In those days there was no GPS for position finding, just something called Loran-C,” says Steve. “Looking at the radar, the land was getting further and further away – the compass was sending us out into the Atlantic Ocean. I thought, ‘Something’s wrong here!’”
St Barths became a favourite destination || PETER PHIPP - TRAVELSHOTS.COM / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
St Barths became a favourite destination || PETER PHIPP - TRAVELSHOTS.COM / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
Steve seized the initiative and turned parallel to the coast, very sensibly reasoning that this would take them south towards Florida. That night they reached Annapolis and found someone to recalibrate the faulty compass. “At our next stop, we arrived around 11.30pm and I was impressed with my ability to tie up to the dock, do all the knots. Then about 2.30am I heard all these creaking noises. The tide was going out really fast and we had to get an axe to chop the lines. I wasn’t familiar with six-foot tides!”
Buys the Atlantic 47
Buys the Sea Ray 680
Steve’s sons, Randy and Seth, join SEBCO
Steve and Randy Beth meet
The next day, they set off into the teeth of a gale and found the going offshore rough. They radioed a cargo ship heading the same way and got permission to follow the vessel, staying 180 metres off her stern to avoid prop wash. “We put together about 15 life jackets and made a circle so that we had something to hang onto if we had to leave the boat,” says Steve. “I was very adventurous, so it didn’t make any difference to me.”
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
Adventurous at sea, and adventurous in business as well. At around this time in the early 1980s, Steve was seeing exponential growth in a company he founded putting washing machines and dryers in the communal areas of apartment blocks. It had all begun with a chance encounter over dinner a few years earlier. “I was always looking out for an opportunity, and someone asked me about my next business idea. Just like that, I said: ‘I’m going to open laundromats’.”
“Our Pershing looked like a bullet out of a James Bond movie, with a rooster tail 60 feet in the air”
The laundromats never happened, but the dinner guest invited Steve to his office and offered him the lease of a laundry room in two of his blocks for a combined rent of $300 (£225) per year. “I collected $4,000 in profit from each building,” says Steve. “So I sent him two cheques – double what he asked me for. I was so grateful.”
The apartment owner called Steve in to tell him that he should fire his bookkeeper for overpaying but ended up being blown away by the gesture. “He gave me every single laundry contract he had – I signed 26 in total. Then he sat me down and called everyone he knew in real estate. For the next two and a half years, I was busy writing new business every single week.”
These days, SEBCO operates in nine states, running around 100,000 laundry machines that Steve now orders directly from the manufacturer to a custom design. His two sons have joined the executive team, and he himself spends more time focusing on real estate and other investments. But he hasn’t forgotten how it started. “I learned a great deal about human nature,” he says. “I’m very open, and believe that if you treat people well, they will reciprocate.”
The laundromats never happened, but the dinner guest invited Steve to his office and offered him the lease of a laundry room in two of his blocks for a combined rent of $300 (£225) per year. “I collected $4,000 in profit from each building,” says Steve. “So I sent him two cheques – double what he asked me for. I was so grateful.”
The apartment owner called Steve in to tell him that he should fire his bookkeeper for overpaying but ended up being blown away by the gesture.
“Our Pershing looked like a bullet out of a James Bond movie, with a rooster tail 60 feet in the air”
“He gave me every single laundry contract he had – I signed 26 in total. Then he sat me down and called everyone he knew in real estate. For the next two and a half years, I was busy writing new business every single week.”
These days, SEBCO operates in nine states, running around 100,000 laundry machines that Steve now orders directly from the manufacturer to a custom design. His two sons have joined the executive team, and he himself spends more time focusing on real estate and other investments. But he hasn’t forgotten how it started. “I learned a great deal about human nature,” he says. “I’m very open, and believe that if you treat people well, they will reciprocate.”
As the dollars started to roll in, Steve upgraded the Atlantic, splashing out for a Sea Ray 56 instead. But it didn’t last long. “I bought it on July 1 and took it out on July 4 [Independence Day] with about 20 friends on the boat,” he says. “Everybody’s having a great time – partying, eating and listening to music, and I’m hanging on the wheel like a taxi driver. I realised, ‘This isn’t going to work,’ so I traded it in and bought a 680 with a crew cabin out back. Then I hired a captain so I could spend my time with our guests.”
Chalking it all up to experience, Steve and Randy Beth have continued their yachting journey together. Their next step was a Pershing 90 with a top speed of 50 knots courtesy of twin 2,435-horsepower MTUs hooked up to surfacepiercing drives. “It looked like a bullet out of a James Bond movie, with a rooster tail 60 feet in the air,” says Steve. “If we wanted to go for a weekend, we’d leave Jersey late Thursday afternoon and by the evening we could be on Long Island or Nantucket.”
The Custom Line 120’s flybridge || ALBERTO COCCHI
The Custom Line 120’s flybridge || ALBERTO COCCHI
Steve has two sons and a daughter and Randy Beth has a son and there was always time for the family on the boat. “It felt like something special. We found that peace on board, but also had friends join us for nice parties and gatherings. But the best time is us together experiencing different islands.”
Still splitting their time between New Jersey, and Florida, the family moved with the Pershing, exploring Long Island and the Keys. But there they ran up against the boat’s limits. “We decided we wanted to be able to travel a bit further – to the Caribbean – and the range on the Pershing was limited to about 400 nautical miles,” says Steve.
Business was booming at SEBCO and Randy Beth’s real estate brokerage was prospering (if you have a spare $11 million, she’ll gladly sell you two luxury condos in the Turks & Caicos), so the couple decided to trade up. They stayed within the Ferretti stable, buying a recently built Custom Line 120, naturally enough named Randy Beth.
With a semi-displacement GRP hull, the boat was still fast for its size – hitting 25 knots with the throttle down, but cruising at an easy 22 knots. “We liked that it had three Seakeeper stabilisers and fins with that extra range of more than 1,000 miles, giving us a lot of flexibility to cruise the islands,” says Steve. “We’ve taken the boat to the Bahamas, Eleuthera, down to St Barths and on to other islands,” adds Randy Beth.
“Every island that we’ve navigated to, we’ve felt very much at home. Everyone becomes like your yachting family”
Steve again: “We like to spend three or four weeks at a time on the boat, then fly back home while the crew moves to the next destination. We tow a 40-foot Intrepid behind us. It’s really a lot of fun and Randy Beth loves to drive it.”
For Randy Beth, the extra range has broadened their world. “I love St Barths and feel at home – we have made a lot of friends there. We’d have lunch on the Intrepid, go to Nikki Beach, the planes would be flying over us. Every island that we’ve navigated to, we’ve felt very much at home. Everyone becomes like your yachting family.”
|| ALBERTO COCCHI
|| ALBERTO COCCHI
Now, besides the four children there are five grandchildren and so the yacht needs to get bigger again. The Custom Line is on the market for a shade under $12 million and the search is on for a 60-metre. “We’re looking at Abeking, Lürssen and Feadship for a resale boat,” says Steve. “It’ll have a steel hull and give a very stable ride.”
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
|| COURTESY OF OWNER
With greater size comes greater range, and he is eyeing up the Mediterranean for a season or two. “That’s really the big thing. More comfort to be able to do things.” There’s something endearing about the way this couple finishes the other’s sentences, leaping in and out of each other’s stories.
They also golf together and shoot handguns on a range – Randy Beth rolls her eyes as Steve enthuses about letting rip with 50 rounds on a semiautomatic. “We’re together 365 days of the year,” he says. “We just click.
First published in the May 2026 issue of BOAT International. Get this magazine sent straight to your door, or subscribe and never miss an issue.
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