Pete McCauley, Michael Short, and John Warren of Frostbox were facing a challenge. How could they effectively demonstrate their product — a patented, built-in refrigeration system for boat fishboxes — in a trade show exhibit hall where they couldn’t bring a boat? The solution, they decided, was to build a standalone display, essentially a working fishbox without the boat.
Knowing Where to Turn
With decades of experience in commercial and industrial air-conditioning and refrigeration, welding up a metal frame to hold a fiberglass fishbox was easy enough. But they wanted the display to look like part of a high-end saltwater boat — clean, white and nicely finished. For that, they needed outside help. Fortunately, being avid offshore anglers and longtime boat owners, they knew where to turn.
When McCauley’s Boston Whaler 420 Outrage suffered water damage to some interior wood cabinetry several years ago, he turned to Boat Outfitters for a Starboard replacement.
Likewise, when he upgraded his electronics, Boat Outfitters crafted a custom acrylic dash panel to accommodate the new displays. So the company seemed like an obvious choice to build a display from marine materials.
Building the Display
When the Frostbox crew called Boat Outfitters and described what they had in mind, they were connected with Project Manager Jason Strub, who was confident he could help. Because Frostbox is only a few miles from Boat Outfitters, the decision was made to transport the metal frame to Boat Outfitters and build the display around it.
“As soon as we showed up with the frame on a trailer,” says Warren, “Jason looked at it and said, ‘Okay, I get exactly what you’re trying to do.’”
Over the next several weeks, Boat Outfitters engineers and fabricators crafted a white acrylic cabinet with a King Starboard top to surround the metal frame and fiberglass box.
A clear acrylic lid was chosen to allow showgoers to see the contents of the box, and an acrylic “mini console” was added to the top of the display to mount two different control interfaces — the proprietary Frostbox screen and a Raymarine multi-function display.
The back of the cabinet was crafted from Starboard with louvered doors for access to the machinery and plumbing inside.
Finally, the Frostbox logo was laser-engraved into the acrylic lid.
The Frostbox System
With the cabinet for the display complete, it was returned to Frostbox for installation of the refrigeration system.
The patented system employs perimeter coils mounted around the walls of the fishbox to keep ice frozen longer — indefinitely in most cases.
It differs from similar fishbox cooling systems in several ways, says Frostbox, including greater durability, easier cleaning, and two-stage technology that cools fishboxes faster and keeps them colder.
Seawater is used to cool refrigerant, which in turn is used to chill a liquid coolant that circulates through the coils in the fishbox at 15˚F or less.
The system can be controlled via the company’s own digital control panel or through networked Raymarine or Simrad multi-function displays.
The Future of Cooling
The Frostbox system is currently installed as original equipment only by Boston Whaler in the fishboxes of a few of the company’s large Outrage and Conquest models. Recently, though, Whaler asked Frostbox to design a system for a food and beverage cooler on the 405 and 365 Conquest.
Thanks to the two-stage technology, that was a matter simply of running another set of lines from the central chiller to a set of coils in the beverage cooler.
Recently, though, Whaler asked Frostbox to design a system for a food and beverage cooler on the 405 and 365 Conquest.
At the upcoming IBEX (International Boatbuilders Exhibition & Conference) show in Tampa, Frostbox hopes to attract the attention of other leading fishing boat and yacht manufacturers.
More than Marine
It might seem strange for Boat Outfitters to be designing and building trade show displays — even if it’s a marine industry trade show. In fact, though, Boat Outfitters has designed and fabricated displays for a variety of companies over the years, both within the marine industry and outside it.
Our expertise in building boat boxes, doors, cabinets, countertops and much more translates quite well — just like marine storage and furniture, tradeshow displays have to be hard to damage and easy to clean, maximize space, minimize weight, and look great at the same time.
And it’s not just trade show displays. Over the years, we’ve built van and RV storage and furniture, all kinds of signage, acrylic shields during the pandemic, storage systems for fire and EMS trucks, cabinetry for mobile pet grooming vans, outdoor nativity sets, and much more!