Features
NEWSWIRE
PROFILES
Exposure Meter
PRODUCTS
How-To

biz_editor



Articles posted by biz_editor

Rusty Contest Teams Shaper With Surfer

Rusty Surfboards is challenging all surfer-shaper combinations to come up with their own version of Rusty’s C-5 board design and then compete in a special contest. On May 24—28, the winner-take-all event will be held at Lower Trestles in California, with 10,000 dollars going to the winning surfer and 10,000 to his shaper.

The unique aspect of the contest is how Rusty is “trying to push technicality in hardgoods and progression in surfing,” says Brad Drew of Rusty marketing. According to Drew there will be two riders per shaper with a total of 64 contestants allowed to enter. In the 30-minute heats, the only score counted will be a rider’s highest wave. That wave score is doubled, with a second wave counting as a tie-breaker. The contest is double-elimination, and scores will be announced as they are tallied.

This contest is aimed at the shapers. In Rusty Preisendorfer’s attempt to encourage creativity, he says, “I wanted to reward shapers because there are still a lot of great shapers. I want to give something back.”

Priesendorfer came up with the idea when he challenged himself to come up with a futuristic board. There were two inspirations for the new board: While fishing on surf trips in the South Pacific, he noticed the tuna had a smaller grainy fin with an angle opposite the bigger fin behind it–seemed to help the fish swim faster. The second inspiration came from the Campbell Brothers’ five-fin bonzer, which had a dominant single fin combined with the angle of the smaller bonzer fins that made it a good down-the-line board but hindered turning. Preisendorfer feels the C-5 is a combination of the bonzer boards and the twinzers made between 1989 and 1991.

The first C-5 was made in September of 1996. Priesendorfer insists, “I’m not claiming it’ll revolutionize design. People are skeptical about weird designs. I wanted to come up with a way of getting people to open up to the design.”

Just as Simon Anderson’s tri-fin was validated by his winning two events, Preisendorfer’s hoping this event will do the same.

He says people who have tried the C-5 are stoked on it; over the last two years Rusty has built more than a thousand of them. The company has tried many combinations of tail and wing designs in addition to surfing them on all kinds of breaks. The most popular C-5 result has been the short, hippy, swallowtail (fish).

To receive a registration form and C-5 package for participation, fax Rusty Marketing at: (949) 261-5275.

Design Suggestions

Through all the design and experimentation, the following are key points and suggestions (not guidelines) from Rusty that shapers might want to use:

 Ride an inch or two shorter than your regular shortboard.

 Pull the wide point back an inch or two.

 Make the back half of the board 1/4 to 1/2 inch wider.

 Cluster the main fins a little (1/4 to 1/2 inch) closer.

 Place the little fins so that they have a slight overlap with the main fins.

 The rear of the small fin should roughly split the distance from the rail to the main fin.

 Try the small fins angled out slightly more than the main fins.

 Try the small fins pointing to approximately the same place as the main fins.

 Try the main fins slightly smaller than you would normally ride.

 The twinzer-style fin lends to more vertical surfing.

 The half-moon fin has a drivier, down-the-line feeling.

–Aaron Checkwood

biz_editor

  • April 07 1999 | 1 views

Hurley Burly: Bob Hurley looks backward and forward.

Bob Hurley is giving Dick Clark a run for the “world’s oldest teenager” title. At 40-something years old, Hurley retains the enthusiasm of a teenager, but a hard-working teenager who has turned a $70,000-a-year hobby into a $70,000,000 a year business.

That is what Bob Hurley did with the Billabong USA license over 15 years, and so the surfing world was shocked when, in June of 1998, he announced to the world that he wouldn’t be renewing his five-year licensing agreement with Billabong International and would be starting his own company, called Hurley.

It isn’t every day that a surf industry mogul turns his back on a property worth $70,000,000 and Hurley’s decision got the surfing world buzzing. Now, less than a year later, we talked to Hurley about the transition.

TransWorld SURF Business: Wow, this is really strange.

Bob Hurley: What’s that?

TransWorld SURF Business: I’m taping this conversation with a cheapo, 50-dollar cassette recorder from Radio Shack and for some reason, there’s a Gospel radio station coming through the speaker.

Bob Hurley: Get out of here.

TransWorld SURF Business: Serious. This thing isn’t a radio, it’s a tape recorder that thinks it’s a radio and it only gets a Gospel station. Is this some weird Hurley 999 Christian trick?

Bob Hurley: I have nothing to do with it. Your tape recorder is possessed.

TransWorld SURF Business: It’s possessed by a Christian radio station.

Bob Hurley: Speaking of posessed Christians, did you see that story on Rodney King in the L.A. Times yesterday?

TransWorld SURF Business: Yeah, he was standing in the rocks at San Onofre with a longboard.

Bob Hurley: Is he really a surfer?

TransWorld SURF Business: I think so. I’ve been reading about him for awhile, saying that surfing is his new religion and that he feels like a new person when he’s in the water. I tried to get him for the Surfer Magazine Surf Video Awards two years ago. We wanted him to hand out the Worst Beating award, but he wasn’t into it.

Bob Hurley: I wonder why he wouldn’t want to do that. He was wearing Billabong shorts in the photo. Yeah!

TransWorld SURF Business: Why wasn’t he wearing Hurley?

Bob Hurley: I don’t know. We don’t sponsor him. He’s an older demographic. But we do love jailbirds, just FYI. Some of my best friends are in jail

TransWorld SURF Business: I have a friend who’s in jail.

Bob Hurley: Everybody messes up every once in a while, don’t they?

TransWorld SURF Business: Not me.

Bob Hurley: Not me either, just every day. So we missed out on the free publicity with Rodney King, but we got it somewhere else. I’m reading this new Details Magazine and there’s a Letter to the Editor about Elizabeth Hurley and it’s titled Hurley Girlie. That’s what we call our girls stuff. Thank goodness for free, cheap publicity, huh?

TransWorld SURF Business: You should flow some stuff to Elizabeth Hurley, get her to model for you. She’s the bomb.

Bob Hurley: I wonder if she’d like this necklace I’m wearing?

TransWorld SURF Business: You’re wearing a necklace?

Bob Hurley: It’s just a rhinestone necklace.

TransWorld SURF Business: Is that part of the Hurley Girlie line?

Bob Hurley: Yeah. It gives me power.

TransWorld SURF Business: Are you power hungry?

Bob Hurley: I’m hungry, actually. It’s almost dinner time. But I’m not power hungry. But I do have this little girl’s necklace on because we’re organizing a photo shoot tomorrow and it’s kind of weird. I just like wearing it.

TransWorld SURF Business: I went through the town of Hurley when I was in England.

Bob Hurley: Cool!

TransWorld SURF Business: It’s on the Thames, near Henley. I was going to stop and buy you a keychain or a coffee cup or something, but it was 11:00 PM and we were looking for a Bed and Breakfast.

Bob Hurley: Was Elizabeth there?

TransWorld SURF Business: No, the town of Hurley is all one-eyed hunchbacks, people who are emotionally, mentally and physically disabled, which Elizabeth Hurley definitely is not.

Bob Hurley: You’re having me on, aren’t you?

TransWorld SURF Business: I am, but now it’s down to the serious stuff. Business.

Bob Hurley: shouts Surf business!

TransWorld SURF Business: Boring?

Bob Hurley: No, it’s never boring.

TransWorld SURF Business: Are all those pesky B’s gone from your building?

Bob Hurley: The Billabong B’s? Yes, the beekeeper let them all out of the hive, but there’s a few stragglers.

TransWorld SURF Business: What are the stragglers?

Bob Hurley: Well, we’re just finishing up. We still have another month of stuff to ship but it’s just the right amount. Just the tinsiest, tinsiest little bit, the end of the spring line. We took orders for all of this stuff in October and so we’re just fulfilling our obligations to our customers and to Billabong and we’re very happy about it.

TransWorld SURF Business: How long have you been shipping Hurley goods?

Bob Hurley: Since November.

TransWorld SURF Business: Shipping to retailers across the United States?

Bob Hurley: To the United States and one hundred and eighty three countries and some parts of the universe.

TransWorld SURF Business: Go on. There aren’t 183 countries anymore. Kosovo just got blown up.

Bob Hurley: Oh that’s right. One hundred and eighty two, like Blink 182. They have that name because somebody else already had Blink and 182 is the number of times the f-word was used in Scarface.

TransWorld SURF Business: You’re full of interesting information. It’s time for a past life regression. We’re going back to June of 1998, when you were still the Billabong dude and made a fateful decision.

Bob Hurley: I did.

TransWorld SURF Business: In June you flew to Australia and told Billabong International president Gordon Merchant that you wouldn’t be renewing your five-year license for Billy USA — is that what it was called?

Bob Hurley: Well my license was actually for Billabong and our company was called Billy International.

TransWorld SURF Business: Okay, gotcha.

Bob Hurley: No, not Gotcha. That’s the other company.

TransWorld SURF Business: Oops. I didn’t even meant to say that but it will be a very funny part of this interview. But that announcement started a number of things. You made poor Gordon Merchant fly to Huntington Beach and spend two long months in the Huntington Beach Hilton interviewing people. Don’t you feel rotten?

Bob Hurley: No, because nothing really bad happened to Billabong. We just decided that in the future we would cease to operate on his behalf so we gave him a year’s notice to come up with someone else that would. He didn’t really have a financial investment in our company or anything so nothing sour financially happened to him. All that happened was we weren’t going to continue sending him money. His choice at that time was should he start up another Billabong in the United States or should he get someone else to send him money or what. He decided to start up another Billabong so he had to spend some time in Huntington Beach.

TransWorld SURF Business: Well he wanted to find a licensee but he couldn’t.

Bob Hurley: Yeah so, no I don’t feel bad.

TransWorld SURF Business: Do you think they’ve landed on their feet over there at the new Billabong?

Bob Hurley: I have no idea.

TransWorld SURF Business: You’re not aware of what they’re doing?

Bob Hurley: Well I know they hired a lot of people and I think they have a lot of stuff going on. But our business is so performance oriented that it doesn’t matter who works in my company or in their company or who does anything. The only thing that matters in the end is whether the consumer buys the product and is happy with it. There’s a lot of things that have to happen in between. They’ve probably come half that way so far but the major thing is they’re about to deliver product. But that’s a very complicated thing to have happen. Hopefully they’ll do really well with that and everything will be successful.

TransWorld SURF Business: You’re being diplomatic.

Bob Hurley: I just got my Blue Shield medical cards just now.

TransWorld SURF Business: The new Hurley business medical plan.

Bob Hurley: Yeah I’m pretty happy about it.

TransWorld SURF Business: This is one of a million details you had to worry about in the transition?

Bob Hurley: Well not really. I don’t really worry about that stuff. There’s a guy here who worries about all that stuff.

TransWorld SURF Business: The transition wasn’t as tricky for you as it was for Gordon Merchant, or was it?

Bob Hurley: No, not that tricky. No magic potions. No nothing. What we did everyday, we’re still doing it but under a different banner.

TransWorld SURF Business: What was the hardest, most brain-racking part of the transition for you?

Bob Hurley: What was the most brain-racking thing? I know exactly what it is, but how do I put it? Financially it wasn’t a problem, operationally not a problem, business-wise not a problem. All the emotional upset that people had to experience because I made what I thought was the best choice for our company. That was the hardest thing.

TransWorld SURF Business: It was a dramatic change.

Bob Hurley: I’d say on the whole people are adverse to change. I personally am not adverse to change and some of the people I work closest with are not adverse to change. They embrace it and welcome it, but there are a lot of people who are nervous about change. The hardest part for me was to calm people and explain that change is a good thing and not a bad thing.

TransWorld SURF Business: Which people. People who work for you or?

Bob Hurley: All kinds of people. People who work with me. Friends and family. Customers. General public. Surf publications. Newspapers. I was happy with with how my relationship had been with Billabong for fifteen years but most people translated my decision into the whole Billabong thing was rotten and I had to get out of it. I didn’t feel that way so explaining the reasons for the change was the difficult thing for me.

TransWorld SURF Business: You had to do that a lot.

Bob Hurley: A lot. People deserved an explanation — some people took it very seriously, like “How could you, Bob Hurley, do this to us.”

TransWorld SURF Business: Did anyone get really angry?

Bob Hurley: Some people. Like some of the sales reps that left. They still don’t and can’t know the full extent of my reasons. The reasons don’t matter that much. I was pretty happy with where I was and now I’m happier with where I’m at and it’s just sad that I had to do so much explaining and it wasn’t always understood. But that was the hardest part for me.

TransWorld SURF Business: The majority of the people who were with you before are still with you, right?

Bob Hurley: Most of them. There were eight sales reps who left and there were four in-house employees: Mark Machado, Dave Uecker, Kevin Harrell and Richard Saunders.

TransWorld SURF Business: You can’t blame the sales reps. They were probably making six figures with Billabong.

Bob Hurley: Some of them were, yeah.

TransWorld SURF Business: They had a nice solid groove going and then they were faced with going off on your risky venture or staying with the established name. People have mortgages and things like that.

Bob Hurley: I guess some of them saw it that way which I don’t understand and I may never understand until the day I die. Because where I sit at my desk all business is a risk. I don’t think there’s any indication that they’ll necessarily make any more by staying with the new Billabong. I think the announcement in and of itself was bound to effect their income. I think anyone that chose to go there to maintain their income I think that’s an illusion because it may be less or it may be more. You don’t really know. It’s a big unknown. Same with staying here but unfortunately for them the announcment in and of itself the transition meant probably less of a paycheck but their method of solving the problem of going there I think only time will tell if that was a good idea or not.

TransWorld SURF Business: Which sales reps departed?

Bob Hurley: Wes Laine, Tim Finlay, Jon Kleintop, Gary Clisby, Jimbo Gaskin, Rob Willis. How many is that?

TransWorld SURF Business: Six.

Bob Hurley: And Keoni Watson, yeah.

TransWorld SURF Business: These are all long-time friends.

Bob Hurley: Yes.

TransWorld SURF Business: Do you miss them?

Bob Hurley: Uh. Miss them? Uh.

TransWorld SURF Business: Are you still friends with some of them?

Bob Hurley: I’m still friends with Rob Willis.

TransWorld SURF Business: Wow. So it got a little ugly?

Bob Hurley: Well, not really. I just think different people handle different situations in different ways. Unfortunately for those guys most of them are younger than me and they probably haven’t been through as much as I have. They didn’t handle their situation in a professional or even a friendly way. And it really hurt my feelings to a large degree. I wouldn’t say that I’m not friends with them, it’s just that I haven’t talked to them. None of them have bothered to call.

TransWorld SURF Business: Was there some sort of official avenue for saying which way they were going to go?

Bob Hurley: Yeah, they all sent Federal Express letters.

TransWorld SURF Business: All of them?

Bob Hurley: Yep. On the same day.

TransWorld SURF Business: So it was kind of a conspiracy.

Bob Hurley: I wouldn’t say that.

TransWorld SURF Business: Were you surprised?

Bob Hurley: I was devastated on a personal level. On a business level I was glad. But on a personal level I was devastated.

TransWorld SURF Business: Who have you found to replace Wes Laine?

Bob Hurley: Brad Harrell now does Wes Laine’s territory and is really doing a good job. Denny Reardon replaces Jon Kleintop in Florida and Seth McKinney replaces Keoni Watson in Hawaii and Mark Weber replaces Gary Clisby in San Diego and Dean Quinn replaces Jimbo Gaskin in Orange County and Mark Simpson replaces Tim Finlay in Northern California. Oh and there was another one who left, Mike Green in Seattle. Tim and Jennifer Schwab replaced him.

TransWorld SURF Business: But other than that your team is the same team?

Bob Hurley: I think so.

TransWorld SURF Business: Key players are Paul Gomez, Marketing Director.

Bob Hurley: Yes sir.

TransWorld SURF Business: Joe McElroy.

Bob Hurley: Creative Director.

TransWorld SURF Business: Mike Lesher.

Bob Hurley: Director of Sales. Mike Ochsner is Director of Finance. Leeanne Murray is Director of Merchandising and Design. Joe K is Director of Production. Everyone who works here on every level is really super important to me. There are so many important people like guys who work in the warehouse or guys who work in production. Guys who handle our stuff are so on a mission it’s just really exciting. And they make the days more fun.

TransWorld SURF Business: Number of employees?

Bob Hurley: One hundred and thirty.

TransWorld SURF Business: I hate to use the word vibe but how is the vibe at Hurley since the transition? Are people challenged? Invigorated?

Bob Hurley: I think they’re enthused to be a part of something new, to feel they’re in on the ground floor of something. We always had a great company and great people but after a while you get into a certain hum drum rut, like, “Oh yeah business is up this year another X per cent.” This change has shaken things up and it’s definitely not hum drum. It’s really fun to be doing something all over at this point of my life, something brand new. And I think everybody is amped to be working on this whole new concept.

TransWorld SURF Business: Explain this new concept. How are the H’s different from the B’s?

Bob Hurley: Well the new story we are writing and the new life we are designing for ourselves tends to focus more on a younger audience. We’re a little more aggressive and a little less influenced by the past. It comes at a good time because the whole century is changing and 1999 and blah blah blah.

TransWorld SURF Business: What would you say was the target market of Billabong?

Bob Hurley: Like an 18 to 24 year old surfer.

TransWorld SURF Business: And the target market of Hurley?

Bob Hurley: A 16-year-old person, boy or girl, who likes surfing, skateboarding, snowboarding, punk rock music, hip hop music. Lawrence Welk. Spaghetti-O’s.

TransWorld SURF Business: What is the sixteen-year-old looking for these days?

Bob Hurley: I don’t know.

TransWorld SURF Business: You don’t know? You haven’t done any research?

Bob Hurley: Oh we don’t do research. Our whole deal is? it sounds so cliché and I don’t know a better way to say it but our whole deal is about keeping it real. We make clothes for the people we love and the people we want to be involved with. It’s a very personal thing. We don’t have market research or anything like that. It’s kind of about love and keeping it real and word of mouth and hanging out with our friends.

TransWorld SURF Business: Who do you rely on? Who are your real people?

Bob Hurley: Everyone. Kim Rios at the front desk. The people who ship the merchandise, the people who design it, the team riders, the musicians who come through. We do fun stuff like today my friend Mark who’s in a punk band was just sitting in my office as I was signing a bunch of papers to register Hurley as an international name. Mark was around and he acted as my witness, just a singer in a punk band and it was kind of fun.

TransWorld SURF Business: Could he sign his own name?

Bob Hurley: He could barely sign his own name. Most punkers really don’t know how to spell too well but he used an X and he’s missing a few teeth so he spit a lot while he was signing that.

TransWorld SURF Business: We’ve established that you’re making rhinestone necklaces, but what else?

Bob Hurley: Jeans, board shorts, walk shorts, all that kind of stuff. Sweaters, snowboard gear. I don’t know. T-shirts, stickers. Rhinestone necklaces, because we’re playing grown up here. Playing dress up. We make clothes we like.

TransWorld SURF Business: Can you say what your projected sales are for your first year?

Bob Hurley: Yes, one billion dollars.

TransWorld SURF Business: Laughter.

Bob Hurley: Why, does that sound high?

TransWorld SURF Business: Naw, not these days. A billion isn’t what it used to be.

Bob Hurley: I don’t think that’s high.

TransWorld SURF Business: Will Hurley have the funds to sponsor some big surf contests?

Bob Hurley: Well, you figure it out. With a billion in sales we have more money than just about anyone. We’re already sponsoring the HB surf series which is, 10 pro ams with a $2,000 first prize. California pro surfing is kind of stagnant right now, so that’s kind of a fun thing. And we’re involved in a lot of other projects. We sponsor some skate contests, we’re a co-sponsor of the Warp Tour. We get involved with things that teenagers like.

TransWorld SURF Business: So you’re as much a skate and snowboard company as you are a surf company?

Bob Hurley: Oh I don’t know, that’s such a hard thing to define. I’m primarily a surfer and a surfboard shaper and we like it all. I want to be a good skateboader but I’m not. We sponsor a lot of great skateboarders and we’re definitely into it. Seems like all the lines are crossing for that stuff.

TransWorld SURF Business: Any other special projects?

Bob Hurley: Yeah but if I told you I’d have to kill you, wouldn’t I? Peter King is making a really bitchin’ video for us, called The Underground. He did the Internet site for us too, at www.hurley999.com, that was a fun new project. And then Chris Malloy is working on a documentary of his travels for a year and he’s making a book. We’re helping him out with that.

TransWorld SURF Business: I just looked at your Website as we were talking. I checked out the team roster and saw some good talent — all of the Malloys, Noah Johnson, Kahea Hart — but I didn’t see Ross Williams and Shane Dorian. They stayed with Billabong?

Bob Hurley: Well they went to Billabong. I’m going to keep correcting you because I’m a dick.

TransWorld SURF Business: They went to Billabong?

Bob Hurley: Yes, they left our company.

TransWorld SURF Business: Right, but you could say they stayed with Billabong.

Bob Hurley: Uh uh. That’s an inaccurate journalistic statement. Don’t you think?

TransWorld SURF Business: Well they were with Billabong before.

Bob Hurley: But they only ever got a paycheck from me.

TransWorld SURF Business: True. But the name of the company was Billabong.

Bob Hurley: Yeah.

TransWorld SURF Business: So.

Bob Hurley: So you’re probably right. So what? I’ll be right some time.

TransWorld SURF Business: Who else? Which surfers went to Billabong as you say.

Bob Hurley: Shane Dorian, Ross Williams, Benji Weatherley, and some of the amateur team.

TransWorld SURF Business: Was there a bidding war for those chaps?

Bob Hurley: There was a bit of one. It seemed like Billabong was willing to spend a lot more money than I was so they threw out a lot of money.

TransWorld SURF Business: Shane Dorian is worth a lot of money.

Bob Hurley: I’ve heard.

TransWorld SURF Business: He was impressive at the Hui Backdoor Shootout.

Bob Hurley: He gives a 100 percent effort. Not many guys do that. I’m so proud of him and how he’s doing. But I did steal one of his surfboards as an unsigning bonus. It was so fun.

TransWorld SURF Business: An unsigning bonus?

Bob Hurley: Uh huh. I was at Chris Malloy’s house in Hawaii and I was like, “Man I like this round pin.” And he said, “It’s Shane’s, you should take it.” And I said, “No I can’t take it.” And he’s like, “Just take it.” So I said okay and I put it in the car and I’m like, “No I can’t do it,” and Chris said, “Just consider it an unsigning bonus.” And I’m like, “Hey, I like that. I’ll take it.”

TransWorld SURF Business: Is Shane aware of this?

Bob Hurley: Nope.

TransWorld SURF Business: Oh dear. Are you on speaking terms with those guys?

Bob Hurley: Oh, yeah, totally. I love those guys.

TransWorld SURF Business: What is the status of the zipperless wetsuit patent?

Bob Hurley: I gave it to the NSSA.

TransWorld SURF Business: That was nice of you. Why did you do that?

Bob Hurley: Well, from the beginning I was turning over any licensing fees on the zipperless thing to the NSSA, but a lot of companies who were making wetsuits covered by our patent didn’t want to pay us, a competing company, for that right. So I turned the patent over to the NSSA hoping that companies will pay the money directly to them.

TransWorld SURF Business: Is it much money?

Bob Hurley: It’s not a whole lot of money, but every little but helps with the NSSA. I think that’s where the future of surfing lies.

TransWorld SURF Business: Money. In the transition from Billabong to Hurley, there was a lot of talk about whether you were going to make it. There was some buzz about Hurley being picked up by Pacific Sunwear. Was that a big deal?

Bob Hurley: Oh, I don’t know. They haven’t been carrying too much of our stuff and business has been fantastic, so I don’t know if Pacific Sunwear was that big of a deal. I don’t know if anything is that big of a deal. I’m one of those guys who’s always like, “so?” Does anything matter? Does anyone buy our clothes? Does anyone read a magazine? Just so long as I can come in here and see Paul Gomes every day and Mike Lesher and my brother and my daughter and our designers and art people and make fun stuff. As long as I have the money to do that, I’m stoked. To be able to make an ad or a poster of one of our friends doing something crazy, that’s so fun.

TransWorld SURF Business: And you are still enjoying what you do?

Bob Hurley: I have so much fun every day, I can’t even tell you. Every single day is the best.

TransWorld SURF Business: How much longer are you going to do this?

Bob Hurley: Until I’m not having any fun. But I can’t imagine not working.

TransWorld SURF Business: Any last statements you want to make?

Bob Hurley: Just one thing. People are always trying to turn this into an us-against-them thing, a Hurley against Billabong thing or a Bob Hurley against Gordon Merchant thing and it’s just not like that.

TransWorld SURF Business: Well, people like to create conflict, I guess.

Bob Hurley: We don’t think like that here. It’s just me and Joe Mac and Paul Gomez and the rest of my homeys sitting around and thinking about fun stuff to do.

TransWorld SURF Business: It’s all about having fun?

Bob Hurley: That’s what it’s all about.

biz_editor

  • April 07 1999 | 82 views

Rusty Contest Teams Shaper With Surfer

Rusty Surfboards is challenging all surfer-shaper combinations to come up with their own version of Rusty’s C-5 board design and then compete in a special contest. On May 24—28, the winner-take-all event will be held at Lower Trestles in California, with 10,000 dollars going to the winning surfer and 10,000 to his shaper.

The unique aspect of the contest is how Rusty is “trying to push technicality in hardgoods and progression in surfing,” says Brad Drew of Rusty marketing. According to Drew there will be two riders per shaper with a total of 64 contestants allowed to enter. In the 30-minute heats, the only score counted will be a rider’s highest wave. That wave score is doubled, with a second wave counting as a tie-breaker. The contest is double-elimination, and scores will be announced as they are tallied.

This contest is aimed at the shapers. In Rusty Preisendorfer’s attempt to encourage creativity, he says, “I wanted to reward shapers because there are still a lot of great shapers. I want to give something back.”

Priesendorfer came up with the idea when he challenged himself to come up with a futuristic board. There were two inspirations for the new board: While fishing on surf trips in the South Pacific, he noticed the tuna had a smaller grainy fin with an angle opposite the bigger fin behind it–seemed to help the fish swim faster. The second inspiration came from the Campbell Brothers’ five-fin bonzer, which had a dominant single fin combined with the angle of the smaller bonzer fins that made it a good down-the-line board but hindered turning. Preisendorfer feels the C-5 is a combination of the bonzer boards and the twinzers made between 1989 and 1991.

The first C-5 was made in September of 1996. Priesendorfer insists, “I’m not claiming it’ll revolutionize design. People are skeptical about weird designs. I wanted to come up with a way of getting people to open up to the design.”

Just as Simon Anderson’s tri-fin was validated by his winning two events, Preisendorfer’s hoping this event will do the same.

He says people who have tried the C-5 are stoked on it; over the last two years Rusty has built more than a thousand of them. The company has tried many combinations of tail and wing designs in addition to surfing them on all kinds of breaks. The most popular C-5 result has been the short, hippy, swallowtail (fish).

To receive a registration form and C-5 package for participation, fax Rusty Marketing at: (949) 261-5275.

Design Suggestions

Through all the design and experimentation, the following are key points and suggestions (not guidelines) from Rusty that shapers might want to use:

? Ride an inch or two shorter than your regular shortboard.

? Pull the wide point back an inch or two.

? Make the back half of the board 1/4 to 1/2 inch wider.

? Cluster the main fins a little (1/4 to 1/2 inch) closer.

? Place the little fins so that they have a slight overlap with the main fins.

? The rear of the small fin should roughly split the distance from the rail to the main fin.

? Try the small fins angled out slightly more than the main fins.

? Try the small fins pointing to approximately the same place as the main fins.

? Try the main fins slightly smaller than you would normally ride.

? The twinzer-style fin lends to more vertical surfing.

? The half-moon fin has a drivier, down-the-line feeling.

–Aaron Checkwood

biz_editor

  • April 07 1999 | 68 views

Chairman Of The Boards: Bob McKnight believes in surfing.

Is Bob McKnight the most powerful man in surfing? The claim is at least arguable, as his already vast Quiksilver empire continues to grow at an incredible rate. TransWorld SURF Business caught up with McKnight mid March at the SIA Show in Las Vegas. Here’s what he had to say about the growing surfwear company and its future.

TransWorld SURF Business

: In the latest quarterly reports, Quiksilver’s sales were up again–almost 60 percent in the United States and 50 percent in Europe. What’s contributing to this success?

McKnight: I think it’s a case where the worldwide Generation Y market–the fourteen- to eighteen-year-old male or female–is such a huge demographic that our marketplace has doubled.

The youth business is growing about twenty to 30 percent a year. But we’ve gotten a big kick from Roxy–all of sudden we’re now doing a line for girls who share the same enthusiasm for sports and the outdoors as young men do.

This new group is very positive about life, and they spend about 35 to 40 percent of their money on apparel and another 30 percent on entertainment. Their entertainment is snowboarding, surfing, and all that stuff. So you start talking about 60 percent of what they spend their money on are things we have something to do with.

I think that this momentum is going to continue for quite some time. We have about a fifteen-year window, which I think holds well for everything all of us do–surfing, skating, snowboarding–all that stuff.

With your growth and expansion in young men’s and juniors’ lines, do you think lot of your customers aren’t ‘core surfers anymore?

I think that’s always been the case, and that’s the case for everybody like Billabong, Rusty, and O’Neill. Probably five to ten percent of all our stuff is worn by people who actually surf, skate, or do any of the ‘core sports.

But the deal is that while this Generation Y customer might go to the coast for a week during the year, he wants to look like a surfer while he’s there. And so he goes back to Des Moines, and to him, he’s a surfer–and you’re not going to tell him any different.

This kid is the same everywhere in the world. And they’re instantaneously connected now by MTV, the Internet, advertising, magazines, television, and all the things everybody does in the media.

The trends and ideas no longer start on the West Coast, move inland, and slowly move to the East Coast. Everybody knows what’s going on immediately now. Dennis Rodman’s haircut is seen as fast in Chicago as it is in Los Angeles.

You started Quiksilver in 1976 in the U.S.–almost 25 years ago. You, your managers, your reps, and basically everyone in the company is older now. How do you stay connected to the young kids?

We have to get our senior management to stay young. By staying young I mean by hanging out with as many of these kids and our riders as we can.

I also try to be involved with the designers and go on trips with them. I go to the clubs where they go, read all the magazines they read, look at all the stuff. And then I demand that of my other senior people.

Can you explain the corporate structure of the company?

Quiksilver was founded in Australia by Alan Green and John Law, who made Ugg boots for winter. In the summertime, they started making swimwear. So they went back and forth for a number of years between Ugg boots and boardshorts. That’s why the logo is a wave breaking over a snow-capped mountain–they wanted it to represent both lifestyles. In time, they sold the Ugg business.

In 1976, I got to know Jeff Hakman through my surfing in Hawai’i and Bali. We were best friends. We decided to approach these guys in Australia to become the licensee of Quiksilver boardshorts in America.

In 1976 we came here, started making boardshorts, and sold them out of my Volkswagen van as we drove up and down the coast. Our first three accounts are still three of our best accounts: Val Surf, Newport Surf and Sport, and Hobie in Dana Point. We never lost a core account, but we got rid of some. We’re number one, two, or three in every surf shop in America.

In 1991 we bought their Quiksilver’s licensee in Europe called Napali, and folded it into our company as a wholly owned subsidiary. So my company, Quiksilver, Inc., is America, Europe, and Mexico. Plus we also are the licensee of Quiksilver Australia for Canada and parts of South America.

We contribute to a fund called Pavilion that does big events and pays for our big pros like Lisa Anderson, our high-level snow guys, events like The Crossing a promotional tour, and the Extreme IMAX movie. It’s really unique kind of company structure.

Is the U.S. organization larger than the other ones?

Yeah, we have about 700 people working for us. When you put us and France together, we’re probably three-quarters of the Quiksilver business worldwide. Between us, Mervin, and Napali we probably have about 1,200 employees.

You’re making a Roxy perfume now. What other expansion plans do you have?

We have two or three more years of strong growth with our young men’s business. Levi’s went from seven-billion dollars of sales to six-billion dollars. That whole JNCO, Fubu thing is slowing down. So there’s denim business out there, and why not us? We think there’s maybe a 50- to 100-million-dollar denim business we can evolve into.

Our business in Europe is growing 40 percent, and that should continue, because we’re not even present in Germany and some of the other countries.

We think the Roxy thing is a complete phenomenon. If you use Esprit clothing as a target, they were a billion-dollar company. I think we can do that.

Young women love to shop, and we’re building a brand that’s highly recognizable for that certain age group. The growth can be absolutely explosive if you hit the girls’ market right between the eyes. So far we’ve done that.

We’re always looking at deals out there. The shoe industry is interesting to us. The outerwear industry is interesting to us. There are other things that, while not as fun or sexy as buying another brand, can really help your gross margin. Like owning our own screenprinting facility.

Your ad campaign has been very consistent, some say even stale. Are you going to change it anytime soon?

Our job is to fill in the gap from coast to coast and all over Europe. The only way you can do that is by doing national campaigns. The red logo–we call it the clicker bar–is an icon we all gravitate around internationally. The ads are different in Australia and in Europe, but the clicker bar ties them together, so everyone thinks they’re seeing the same ad.

Now that Slater’s off the tour, how does that affect the market?

I don’t think it’s as important as it is to have a good ambassador for your company. We want the characters like Shaun Palmer, Strider, or Marvin Foster. Guys who maybe crash and burn and all that, but they’re really good for selling product. We’ve always had that strategy, and it’s worked well for us.

What will Lisa and Kelly be doing instead of the tour?

We have this giant promotion coming up called The Crossing. We’ve rented the 80-foot Indie Trader One sailboat and we’ve painted it with tropical graphics. We’re gonna take the boat and go right along the equator around the world for the next fourteen months and try to find all the best surf spots in the world.

We have Ricky Grigg on board as a link back to the University of Hawai’i to do a biology science Web site for the schools. We’re interested in the surf spots with the hook of studying the fauna, the marine life, the ecology, and the cultures of those regions. We want to gain all this experience and knowledge so later on we can maybe help develop those regions into suitable surfing zones. Hopefully we’ll do it correctly so they surfers don’t wreck them.

The Crossing is going to be fantastic because Kelly can go on a lot of these trips, and he can’t wait. He’ll be able to work on his boards, have a great time, enjoy Pamela Anderson, and come back a more well-rounded person. Then he’s gonna come back. He’s so goddamn competitive, he’ll come back and kick everyone’s ass.

Every couple of weeks there will be another group who fly to the boat in a new undiscovered, uncharted region, to find more and more beautiful surf. Don King and Jeff Hornbaker will film, and it’s going to be incredible.

Does the company plan to hold another contest in Bali?

Yeah, we definitely want to be at G-land. It’s such a consistent wave. I don’t want to say better, because on Cloudbreak’s best day and on G-land’s best day, I have a real hard time choosing.

What will it take for you to put it back there?

The politics need to settle down. I think right now it’s unsafe and the country may go into revolution at any moment.

The money’s no good. There’s no food. Plus, I think it’d be really distasteful and kind of rude for us to have a contest while the country is kind of in a meltdown.

Do you have anything else going on?

We’re doing this big millennium event. We’re taking over Namotu and Tavarua for the first week of the new millennium. We’re gonna bring down a bunch of Quiksilver founders, employees, and invite six guys or girls who represent the most modern, forward, futuristic surfing today. And we’re going to have bands on the island, and MTV will be following the whole thing.

Fiji is one of the first places where the New Year happens, and one of the plans is to go over there at midnight and have Kelly and Lisa be the first male and female to surf the first wave of the new year.

Who do you think the next surfing champ will be?

Well, Derek Hynd says Mick Campbell. I think the guys who will have a shot will be Mick Campbell and Shane Beschen. I think Taj Burrow, if he can keep his head straight, will have a good shot. Mick is prepared to die to win the championship.

After so many years, how much longer will you stay around with Quiksilver?

I still really enjoy it because I love seeing the family at Quiksilver. I really don’t run the day-to-day anymore. My job is to oversee the philosophical direction and make sure the product isn’t going too disco or whatever.

I’ve been through some good eras at Quiksilver and some really bad ones, and this one’s really fun. I’m 45 right now, so for sure another five years. Maybe 50 is the magic age, but I don’t see myself entirely removed even then. Maybe I’ll be chairman of the board and let somebody else run what I do now.

biz_editor

  • April 07 1999 | 51 views

Recall Woes Plague Step-ins

Burton and Emery go the distance to service customers.

Just days before the Thanksgiving holiday-traditionally one of the busiest retail sales times of the year-retailers, resorts, rental shops, and consumers received a bombshell announcement from binding manufacturer Emery. All SIS step-in 1998/1999 Adult snowboard bindings, which are sold under the Rossignol, Original Sin, and Emery trademarks, would have to undergo an immediate quality-control inspection.

The root of the problem was with the transmission bar on the bottom of the SIS binding-a part that was subcontracted out by Emery. On certain affected bindings, and in specific high-vibration conditions, misalignment of the transmission bar could result in the rider stepping out of the binding.

A month earlier, on October 30, the much-anticipated Burton SI system was also recalled when flaws in the automatic engagement system were discovered. This problem forced some riders to manually lift the engagement tabs to lock in, instead of having the tabs automatically engage when the rider stepped into the binding.

How big of a problem were these two recalls? Burton National Sales Manager Clark Gundlach declined to give an exact number of SI bindings recalled worldwide. However, industry estimates says this number is probably around 40,000 to 60,000 units-with one estimate as high as 100,000 units.

With the Emery recall, Pascal Joubert des Ouches, snowboard marketing manager for Rossignol, says 60,000 to 70,000 units were affected: 15,000 pairs for Rossignol U.S., 5,000 for Rossignol Canada, 5,000 for Original Sin, with the remainder from international Emery and Rossignol sales and from MLY’s U.S. distributorship of the Emery SIS system.

The total cost of the two recalls could easily exceed one-million dollars.

Both situations allowed the affected companies to show customers the lengths they would go to solve the problem as rapid-response plans were put into place.

Burton Calls ‘Em Back

With the Burton SI recall, retailers and consumers were instructed to second-day ship the bindings back to Burton’s Burlington, Vermont-based headquarters.

Vice President of Marketing Dave Schriber says the retro-fit could have been fixed in the field by retailers, but it was easier to have the bindings sent back immediately (before too many were sold) to get it taken care of.

“It is totally not a safety issue, it’s a convenience issue,” he says. “There are two orange indicators that tell you when you’re in. There is no possibility of a false positive. Sometimes you have to wiggle your foot to get it to engage, and sometimes-no matter how much you wiggle-there’s no way it’s going to engage so you’d have to reach down to engage it. To us, that’s not a step-in. But we’ve got the fix and it’ll be lightning quick.”

There was no good time to catch the problem, but sources at Burton say only about 35 percent of the step-ins had been shipped before the recall. “It’s still early enough in the season when not a lot of people are out riding yet,” Schriber adds.

Burton promised retailers and consumers that the bindings would be repaired and shipped back by second-day air within five days of their receipt in Vermont. Although this goal was not met in some instances, most retailers generally gave Burton high marks for how it handled the situation.

Repaired Burton SI bindings feature a hologram sticker on the highback.

The Worst Possible Time

The SIS 1998/1999 adult snowboard bindings recall couldn’t have happened at a worse time-for a number of reasons. The Thanksgiving weekend represents the launch of both the busy shopping and snowboarding season, and most product had already shipped.

Rossignol, MLY, and Emery also placed a lot of emphasis on the rental market when it came to the SIS binding, and had negotiated some SIS-exclusive rental deals with some resort.

If these rental shops didn’t have product, each customer turned away would represent a lost rental sale the SIS-exclusive shops could’ve billed the brands for-which could’ve easily climbed into the tens of thousands of dollars.

“We made it by the skin of our teeth,” says Marc Bujold, the U.S. snowboard division manager for Rossignol, referring to keeping these important customers open through Thanksgiving with product to rent. Bujold says the retrofit was proceeding on schedule and that 75 percent of the bindings had been fixed by the first week of December. “We haven’t received any negative fallout,” he says, “but we really had to jump through hoops to get it done.”

Indeed, Bujold says that when it came right down to it, Rossignol spent the money necessary to minimize the impact of the recall.

“We hired a full-time employee to handle the 1-800 number, we flew in fourteen of our Rossignol reps so they could see and understand the problem, we worked two shifts on the Thanksgiving weekend turning screws, we made more than 100 counter-to-counter courier drops to get the needed equipment to reps so they could drive to our rental accounts and keep them open.”

Bujold says these reps were given carte blanche to use the necessary resources to make the repairs as quickly as possible. “I told one rep, ‘You need five guys to make repairs to the Heavenly Valley rental operation? Hire ‘em!’” says Bujold.

And who will be picking up the tab for these costs? According to Bujold, a separate budget was formed to keep track of expenses and when the recall is over, Emery will receive an invoice for this amount, which Emery’s insurance will ultimately pay. This will also be the case at MLY, according to Sales and Marketing Manager Mark Miller, who says he was nearly finished with his company’s 2,000 retrofits on December 1.

“We aren’t going out and spending money like crazy to f*** Emery,” says Bujold. “We’re doing this to service our customers and to minimize the impact it has on their business.”

Since Rossignol owns 30 percent of Emery, the recall renewed speculation that Rossi would endeavor to purchase the remainder of the company from Owner Robert Emery. Indeed, Joubert indicated in late November that this purchase might be imminent. How the recall will affect the asking price is open for speculation-but a fire sale could be in the cards.

-Sean O’Brien and Robyn Hakes

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 106 views

Watch Out For The Powder Pigs

Blizzard Babies wear tights, Snowboard Beavers break dance, and Powder Pigs put snow in your pants. If this all sounds a little childish, you’re right. But the new Snow Monsters video was designed to get kids interested in snow safety.

The National Ski Areas Association (NSAA) and SIRDAR, Jack Turner’s marketing and production company located in Durango, Colorado, have agreed to jointly develop the Snow Monsters national ski and snowboard program for children.

“Our industry needs to reach out to kids and their families with images that convey the fun of snowboarding and skiing,” says Rob Linde, NSAA’s director of marketing. “In the case of Snow Monsters, we are also sending positive messages about safety, courtesy, and the ‘your responsibility code.’”

Snow Monsters, created and developed by Turner, is a story about two kids, Hannah and Grady, and their first day on the mountain. The kids make friends with Snowball, the snow tiger, who shows them what a day on the slopes is like. Along the way, Snowball introduces the kids to the delightful array of characters.

According to Turner, the video makes kids want to snowboard and ski: “To sit and tell a kid not to jump is like telling a kid to not jump in the mud. So instead of falls being bad, falls are good, and characters such as the Snow Snakes help them.”

Major artists such as John Lee Hooker and Big Head Todd and The Monsters accompany the action. “Kids can’t stand Barney music,” says Turner.

According to the agreement between NSAA and SIRDAR, all NSAA member resorts can show the Snow Monsters video at the mountain and local schools. Turner also says there is an FCC-approved television version that could take the place of cartoons at resorts.

Videotapes and coloring books are available from SIRDAR for resort retail sales. For more information, call Turner at: (970) 247-3435.

-Aaron Checkwood

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 91 views

Northwest Regional Report

“It’s tough to stay open in a small town,” says Jon Tomashiro, owner of Extreme Boardshop in Grant’s Pass, Oregon. Tomashiro says smaller shops have come and gone, and the main competition comes from a mass-merchandise chain store across town. It hasn’t been easy-Tomashiro has had to work at two jobs just to keep his business alive. Things seem to be paying off, however, and he’s building capital with merchandise such as Burton, Lib Tech, Gnu, and Morrow. He views these companies, his excellent customer service, and extensive demos as key to his steady growth in sales.

Reuben Davis, owner of Low Down in Ashland, Oregon, says the increasing number of chain stores has all but forced the specialty retailer out of business. Price gouging took its toll on him when a chain moved into town and sold its entire stock of snowboard gear at wholesale. Now the chain’s prices are too high for the Ashland market, he says, but “you can only gouge too long before eating it.”

What sets Low Down apart from the chains is that it’s a family-run business anchored in the community. His television ads make it clear that store profits stay in the community-instead of being sent to another state like the chains. He also supported local riders by fighting to get a skatepark built in Ashland, and a local resort has included him in its development committee for future parks and lifts.

Things have changed a lot for Drew Hampton, manager of On Edge Snowboard Shop in Idaho Falls, Idaho. A big chain store in the mall, plus a couple of other shops have all moved into town-and carry many of the same brands found in On Edge. The shop features Burton, Lib Tech, Gnu, and Never Summer. Hampton is trying to compete with the use of promotions, excellent tune-ups, and rentals. The shop also sponsors a snowboard team, snowboard movies at a local theater, and a daily snow report on nearby resorts.

“The mall-style stores have had the biggest effect on local competition,” says Kyle Finn, owner of 35th Avenue Sales Limited, in Federal Way, Washington. While a few specialty stores have gone out of business in the area, the situation is fairly stable says Finn. “Big stores just take business because of their accessibility,” he says. He admits snowboard shops in malls are convenient for both parents and kids since they’re shopping in the mall already. Finn keeps the hardcore customers because he hires people who know what they’re doing and he carries brands not often found in the big stores. Part of his customer-service initiative includes always offering free labor-even if a board is bought somewhere else, Finn says his shop will mount bindings for free.

More shops equals more snowboarders and business for all says Candace Stime, owner of Extremely Board in Issaquah, Washington. According to Stime, smaller shops went out of business because they weren’t running it like a business. “Specialty matters,” says Stime. “Kids won’t go back to big stores that are in it to make a buck.” Customers will go into her store and ask if it’s rider-owned. That’s why Stime says she finds unique ways to show customers Extremely Board cares about the sport and its riders-whether it’s through the shop’s layaway program, consignments, or just spending time educating their customers.

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 83 views

Midwest Report

Kyle Cabaya, manager of Alternative Bike and Board in Minneapolis, Minnesota says there’s been a lot of consolidation in his area. A large retailer with five stores recently went out of business. Even though there are still some smaller chain stores around Minneapolis, he says snowboard specialty shops are still strong: while ski shops are hurting from old inventory, low cash flow, and falling sales. There’s been no need to cut prices, he says, since discounters couldn’t last-they offered no service, no warranties, and the small board companies they carried went out of business.

Alternative Bike and Board carries brands such as Burton, Solomon, K2, Nitro, and Grind. It’s avoiding competitive mistakes by providing service with an in-house grinder, overnight tune-ups, and lifetime warranties. If a customer with a warranty has a blown edge or needs a tune-up, the shop only charges five dollars-something that also brings customers back.

Jocelyne Ninneman, assistant manager at Corky’s Surf Shop in Roseville, Michigan, also says customer service is an advantage for her shop. Corky’s opened two additional stores in high-traffic areas and there are only two other snowboard shops nearby. The closest chain competition is a ski store that added more snowboard inventory. Corky’s has addressed its situation with increased customer service. By adding mailing lists, company demos, shows, swap meets twice a year, and giveaways, Ninneman says, “We have more continuous business where the others get one or two visits a year.”

According to Beth Mackey, assistant manager of Flying Fish, in Madison, Wisconsin, competition has grown enormously in the last year in their area. This season alone a variety of non-snowboarding stores have started to carry snowboards. In addition, there has been an influx of large discount stores moving into the community. “Early sales are down,” says Mackey. “We’re in the stages of ‘gotta do something’.” There is also competition coming from low prices on the Internet, which is tough on Flying Fish’s meet-or-beat policy. Mackey says, “We’ve always been big on customers.” So the shop’s customer service includes a large mailing list, coupons, and swap meets.

“There’s no such thing as a specialty snowboard shop in this part of the world,” says Michael Boatwright, manager of St. Bernard Sports in Dallas, Texas. The stores in Boatwright’s area carry a variety of products because of their sunbelt location. The past few years have shown an increase in competition-however, if anything his prices have gone up. According to Boatwright, the big chain stores carry snowboards but try to sell them when they don’t know anything about them. With brands such as Burton, K2, and Lib Tech, Boatwright pays to have riders/technicians trained to know what they are talking about.

Amos Kolbo, the seventeen-year-old owner of Amos’ Fifth Board Shop, says his is the only specialty board shop in North Dakota. Some other stores carry boards, however, Kolbo feels his exclusivity puts a damper on everyone else. This has also given him an advantage in obtaining more brands. Kolbo’s prices are the lowest, and he says this has forced competition to drop their prices. His shop offers tune-ups, warranties, and repairs as part of their customer service.

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 108 views

An Awakening Giant Rossignol focuses its attention on the U.S. market

Pascal Joubert des Ouches, snowboard marketing manager for Rossignol, guns the rental car into the foothills of the Spanish Pyrénées at a smooth 140 kilometers per hour. It’s raining steadily and he’s not sure where he’s going. He’s also simultaneously answering my questions about Rossignol, its strengths, weaknesses, and position in the market.

He chooses his words carefully as he mentally translates his answers from his native French into English. It’s quite a display of concentration-especially when he pauses mid-answer to power through a crowded roundabout outside Pamplona, then picks up exactly where he left off.

But it’s what he’s saying that’s fascinating. I look down at my tape recorder for the tenth time, making sure the tiny wheels are still spinning.

“I think today the typical customer for Rossignol is not what we want to achieve,” he says. “To be honest, the typical Rossi customer today is someone who is either crossing over from skiing or a more mature snowboarder than the core target of the market.

“We attract the twenty- to 25-year-old rider instead of the rider between twelve and twenty. They are looking for reassurance in terms of technology, service, and efficiency-not image.

“Today, the Rossignol Snowboard image is a patchwork,” he continues as the road ducks into another tunnel. “It’s inconsistent worldwide, and to be honest it will be very easy to do much better. I know where the weaknesses are.”

He says he knows Rossignol Snowboard’s image in the United States needs to improve. He admits the product didn’t meet the needs of U.S. retailers a few years back and to succeed he must regain their confidence. Yes, he knows the graphics were wrong for the most important snowboard market in the world.

At the very least, it’s one hell of a surprising conversation.

But as he continues, it dawns on me that his frank answers are more a product of Rossignol’s strengths than weaknesses. The impression is that if Rossignol has been able to become one of the major brands in the United States despite these miscues, imagine what it will become now that it has its act together.

The Strategy

“We’re the third-largest brand globally,” says Marc Bujold, the U.S. snowboard division manager for Rossignol. “According to the SIA Retail Audit, we were the fifth brand in board units in specialty stores in the United States at the end of the ‘97/98 season. It’s our plan to move into the top three within two years.”

Rossignol’s strategy seems simple: Fess up to past blunders and clearly explain solutions. Emphasize Rossignol’s unique product technologies and how they enhance performance and fun. Highlight the state-of-the-art factory in Spain where all Rossi snowboards will be constructed. Explain how product development comes directly from hardcore snowboarders and how the entire snowboard division is staffed with riders passionate about the sport.

Finally-and perhaps most importantly-show the brand is in touch with riders by combining all these elements in a clear, consistent marketing message that brings consumers to the shop predisposed to buy Rossignol products.

And this isn’t some low-stakes game here. “The ski market is shrinking,” says Joubert. “Some years ago, six-million pairs of skis were sold in the world. Now it’s dropped to 4.5-million. However, 1.5-million snowboards are now sold worldwide, so we’re still talking about six-million units of snow-surfing equipment.

“So there’s a transfer of consumption,” he continues, “and therefore we must strengthen our position in the snowboard market. That’s why we’re putting more resources behind snowboarding; it’s crucial for the company. In a few years, the overall number of snowboarders will equal skiers-it’s not foolish to say that.”

It’s also not foolish to say the overall health of the Rossignol brand rests with its success in snowboarding. For the first half of the year, sales of Rossignol wintersports equipment fell more than 25 percent to 752-million frances, while sales in the snowboard division rode 17.5 percent to more than 65-million francs. The company says it expects to maintain an annual growth rate of fifteen to twenty percent a year-due in large part to the low cost of production in Spain.

The Factory

I’m taking notes as fast as I can as Joan Duocastella, Rossignol’s director of production, literally leads me by the elbow through his 46,000-square-meter factory.

His eyes sparkle as he enthusiastically explains each step of the production process; his face alternating between beaming smile and earnest seriousness as he explains each whirring machine.

Located an hour northeast of Barcelona, Spain in the tiny town of Artes, the factory opened in 1972, employs 182 year-round workers, and serves as the town’s dominant employer.

Three years ago, all Rossignol snowboards were made in France, where under the company umbrella three facilities are located: two factories at the company headquarters in Voiron and the Dynastar facility near Chamonix.

For ‘99/00, Rossignol snowboard production will be entirely in Spain and Original Sin will soon follow-moving production out of the Chamonix Dynastar factory to take advantage of Artes’ volume.

The factory operates in two shifts: 6:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. and 2:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m., but since maintenance is done at night, the factory is rarely empty. This year, more than 120,000 snowboards and 333,000 skis will ship from this small Spanish town. The factory has the capacity to do 250,000 snowboards and the company expects to soon be at that level.

In the more than twenty years he’s worked here, Duocastella has supervised not only the construction of millions of skis and snowboards, but he’s been responsible for the design and implementation of most of the production line. The majority of welcome datacompthe machines are fabricated in-house in a separate 3,300-square-foot machine shop.

It’s been time well spent. The degree of automation within the factory, the utilization of technology along the entire production line, and the uniform cleanliness-coupled with the factory’s size and production volume-makes this the most impressive of the twenty snowboard factories I’ve visited.

The tour starts in the ski and snowboard core fabrication area and it’s a good introduction to the high-degree of automation and quality control found throughout the factory.

On the day of my visit this area was churning out ski woodcores. A block of wood approximately three feet long and shaped roughly like a four-by-four enters one side of the snaking, fully automated production line and fully milled, cambered, full-length woodcores came out the other side. Tolerances are measured in millimeters and one employee can make 1,400 ski woodcores in a shift.

Manufacture of the snowboard cores, which are offered in Microcell, wood, and THC (Microcell, wood, and Isocore) combinations, don’t have the same degree of automation, but Duocastella says this will be in place by next year.

A nearby room houses the new ultrasonic die-cutting machine. Vibrating more the 20,000 times a second, the computer-controlled blade quickly cuts the bulk roll of basesheet material into the needed board shapes and sizes. It also produces amazingly detailed die-cut bases-a feature sure to be prominent on the ‘99/00 board line.

We make a shortcut outside and re-enter the factory in the press room, which houses twelve Alpine double presses, three Nordic double presses, and seven snowboard double presses. It’s here that each board is laid up by hand, before being placed in the computer-controlled steam press. Temperature, time, and pressure are monitored on both the top and bottom of the press, and this data can be monitored from Duocastella’s desk.

This year, the Artes factory is only producing sidewall-constructed boards (cap and Dualtec boards have been made in France), but the ‘99/00 line features full-cap and half-cap models, Dualtec, and sidewall models.

After the boards come out of the presses, they head for a large automated finishing area. Once again, only a few employees are needed as a series of machines sand the board edges twice, rough belt sand the bases, mill the sidewalls, and belt polish the base. Then each board undergoes four passes of manual belt sanding-depending on the model-before a five-axis CAD/CAM machine does the final finishing.

Close to the finishing area is the four-color silk-screening department. According to Eric Bobrowicz, technical manager for Rossignol, silk-screening technology has improved greatly in the last four years.

“Back then it was very difficult to make something tech with silk-screening,” he says, “but that’s not the case now. We made lots of tests with sublimation and other technologies, but the benefits of silk-screening are very strong.”

After the boards are sanded and polished they are transported to another wing of the factory where they receive a coat of varnish, inserts are drilled and checked, and the boards are shrink-wrapped and bar-coded. This is also where the final quality control checks are made. With skis, each is checked for weight and flex after varnishing-a system that will also soon be in place for snowboards.

On-Snow Development

Of course, the most dazzling factory isn’t worth dip if the design of the product is wrong. That’s why Joubert and Bobrowicz go to great lengths to explain how the genesis of each board occurs on-snow.

“Four years ago, some people thought it was possible to design everything on the computer, but it’s impossible,” says Bobrowicz in his heavily accented English. “Computers are a big help, but the feeling comes from the snow. We can go onto the snow every day of the year. It’s something very important.”

As head snowboard designer, Bobrowicz first tests design ideas on the computer, then molds are made on Rossignol’s CNC machines in Voiron.

“Afterward, we send the mold to Artes to make the first prototype,” he says. Prototypes are sent back to the French Alps for testing. “For the snow test, I have three guys working with me testing the boards, then I make a lot of tests with the team riders.

“I really want to have a Rossi style on the snow,” he continues. “I don’t want to make a Burton board or a K2 board. For me, it’s something very important to keep our specification to our style. It’s one of the reasons we developed the THC.”

THC cores were introduced last year and use lengthwise strips of Microcell foam and wood. “THC gives you the feel of Microcell (which reduces vibration and makes the board stable), the snappy liveliness of Isocore, and the lightweight qualities of wood. The idea is to take the best from each material.”

According to Bujold, getting consumers familiar with THC will be one of the marketing cornerstones next year. Part of this push includes small, transparent die-cut view ports in the ‘99/00 board topsheets. “If consumers are skeptical about our core technology, then it’s important for them to be able to see what makes our boards different,” says Bujold.

Joubert points out, however, that Rossignol’s task is to explain the benefits of this technology. “I want the consumer to know that our product is really technologically advanced,” he says, “but not just for technology’s sake. What we’re doing is producing boards that take the benefits of technology and increases the rider’s pleasure and comfort.”

A Consistent Message

So, the factory rocks and the board technology is first rate, but image is what drives the market, right?

Altering the image of a 70-year-old brand is like turning a super tanker, but improving Rossignol’s snowboard image is a task Joubert says he can tackle. “You have to consider Rossignol Snowboards a mainstream company,” he says. “Because of the name, the size of the company, and the resources we put into it, we have to go after a wide spectrum of customers-from the opinion leader to the 30- to 35-year-old beginner crossing over from skiing.”

But this is a benefit, not a disadvantage, adds Joubert. “I don’t imagine Rossignol snowboards as ever being a super image brand for the twelve- to eighteen-year-old customer. This is not our task, and being just an image brand is a dangerous position. In this segment, consumers change their mind very often and fashion trends are very important. They’ll drop a brand just as fast as they consider it. We can’t afford to do that.”

He says the brand’s distribution strategy is clear. “At the present time we have the biggest market share in the rental business,” he adds. “Where we are weak today is in retail, because the graphics were all wrong in the past years.

“Last year we had something that didn’t fit the U.S. market,” he continues, “and the retailer was stuck with boards that weren’t selling. We’ve got to regain their confidence and show them we understand the U.S. market and we developed the product just for them.”

Joubert’s main focus is to penetrate retail with a complete package-not just at pricepoint but at top price. “To regain retailer confidence, we’ve already produced a consumer catalog that appeared in SNOWboarding magazine. Our goal is to bring consumers to the shop wanting to buy Rossignol products. The task is to build a strong message so the consumer will realize the benefits of the brand-not only in product, but in terms of image. We need to show that we have the same culture, that we think like them.”

Joubert says retailer’s see some concrete benefits when they deal with Rossignol. “We’ve tried everything in terms of board technologies, in terms of topsheets, bases-whatever. We have a huge R&D department dedicated to all the winter activities. So when we build a snowboard, all these experiences add up, and the retailer and the consumer both benefit.

“We also have decades of experience servicing the retailer,” he continues. “When we launch a product, we make sure it’s something that’s been tested and something we can supply and service. We haven’t been doing that for just a few years, we’ve been doing that for close to 70 years.

“So, I would say experience, technology, reliability-and we’ve always offered exceptional specs-on-price ratio-which is a guarantee the consumer will have a really good product for a low price.”

But that’s a fine line. Although Rossignol has products that reach across the spectrum of prices, its critics call it nothing more than a pricepoint brand. Some competitors even assert Rossignol gouged prices to an unprofitable level in an effort to gain market share.

“We didn’t drop the overall price of our offering,” says Bujold. “We introduced a new price point 250 dollars to round out our offering and make it easy for people to get into snowboarding. You bet we’ll gain market share with those boards, but that wasn’t the reason we offered them.”

Joubert maintains Rossignol’s pricing structure is a benefit to the brand-and the industry: “If we can afford to do a good business for the company by offering good product at good prices for the consumers, hey come on, the consumer won’t be fooled for very long. One day they’ll stop buying only image product and they’ll recognize where the truth is.

“Sure, we have lack of image today-which we are trying to fix-but it’s also because our boards at low price and middle price are so good that it’s difficult to go further.

“All the experience we have in terms of technology gives us the ability to organize a production line that’s so efficient that we can afford to offer the boards at these prices,” he continues. “We’re not there to dump the price. That is not our goal, because it would play against us. But we’re also here to open up the sport to newcomers. You know, if the board is inexpensive and good, I think it’s a good service to the entire industry.”

An Awakening Giant

So, what are you left with?

The factory is incredible, and the entire testing and design process authentic and first rate.

The graphics for ‘99/00 look significantly better than last year’s, and last year’s were three times better than the year before. It seems the company’s focus is on snowboarding, and it’s dedicating the resources the division needs to grow.

And yet the remaining task appears daunting. Rossignol hopes to appeal to the image makers while offering products for all wallet sizes and rider types. They want a stronger identity in specialty stores while acknowledging the market is heading toward multi-sport and chains. The dynamic between ‘core and mainstream-especially as it relates to image-isn’t easily mastered.

But try as I might to remain analytical, I couldn’t avoid being carried along by the enthusiasm people like Joubert, Bujold, Duocastella, and Bobrowicz have for the brand and where it’s going. The trick will be getting retailers to feel the same way. But if they do, the possibilities for growth appear substantial.

Bujold likes the analogy that Rossignol was a sleeping giant that’s starting to wake up. I’ll go one step further, the giant is awake-and he looks hungry.

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 114 views

AASI Shows Its Hand To The Industry

The AASI/PSIA Team Training Week.

Contemporary, authentic, true to the sport, describing not defining, shaking things up and breaking the mold for the 38-year-old organization: These were the prevalent themes at the American Association of Snowboard Instructors (AASI) and Professional Ski Instructors of America (PSIA) Team Training Week held at Copper Mountain, Colorado, in the first week of November 1998.

After a successful launch last year, AASI was finally able to show the snowboarding industry and media some tangible results of its work-and also give some important indications on which direction AASI and the PSIA wants to take snowboard instruction.

With the debut of a new snowboard-instructor manual and video, and the announcement of some major changes in the selection process of the AASI national demo team, the focus of the entire week seemed to be on snowboarding.

AASI’s viewpoint is especially relevant to the snowboarding industry. By developing certification standards and educational materials for snowboard instructors (which parent-organization PSIA has done nationally for ski instructors for almost four decades), this nonprofit organization has become the “teacher of the teachers”-setting the tone and scope for snowboard lessons around the country. If it’s off message or out of date, thousands of riders could potentially be turned off to the sport.

In fact, at the annual media breakfast attended primarily by Alpine ski journalists, hardly any mention was made of the Alpine or Nordic teams. Instead, the group of journalists was shown the halfpipe portion of the AASI instruction video, and received a briefing on the new snowboard instruction manual.

In fact, it seemed AASI/PSIA was bending over backward to show how it had become more in touch with contemporary snowboarding and in synch with the industry’s desire to keep the lock-step, ski-nazi instruction mumbo-jumbo to an absolute minimum.

“I’m going to be interested to see what the industry’s acceptance and reaction to what AASI’s done over the past year,” says PSIA Marketing Director Mark Dorsey. “The manual is obviously the culmination of a big retooling for the entire organization. Now our folks are going to have to go out and show off the product, get feedback, and make sure it’s in tune with where the industry is.”

According to AASI, the manual attempts to describe-not define-snowboarding, and is in essence a work in progress. “The concepts in the book are simple,” says Brian Spear, captain of the AASI demo team. “This gives us the ability to come up with short, detailed papers about different concepts in the next three years as we receive feedback. For example, dynamic turns are defined in the glossary and mentioned in some of the instruction models, but we didn’t go off and write fifteen pages about it. Rather than have this thick manual, we’ll have piece on the Web or a magazine article in the Pro Rider AASI’s magazine for snowboard instructors.”

Spear says he hopes to continue to strengthen the ties AASI has with the snowboarding industry: “Our job is to connect what’s going on at snowboard contests, World Cups, and ISF contests with the general population. So the closer we are to the top, and the better ties we have with the industry, the easier it will be to get those progressive concepts down to snowboarders. A familiar complaint in the Alpine ski program is what we’re teaching is five years old. That can’t be the case in snowboarding-it’s changing too quickly.”

A good example of AASI’s industry ties could be seen at the foot of Copper Mountain on the Saturday demo day. Snowboard equipment suppliers such as Exo, Elan, and MLY were all busy getting the AASI and PSIA teams outfitted with the latest products. According to MLY’s Marketing Manager Mark Miller, the relationship the brand established with AASI is paying off. “A lot of times when people are taking a lesson, the first person they talk to about which product to buy is the instructor,” he says. “We want those instructors to have an opportunity to be on a MLY snowboard when they answer that question.”

MLY’s Marketing Services Manager Doug Howard agrees, noting, “In general, the PSIA is a non-factor to most manufacturers. It’s something they don’t consider in their marketing-which they should. It would be good to see some other companies come in, and create some recognition for the PSIA.” Howard mentioned that 500 MLY boards were sold through the AASI VIP program last year.

One of the biggest changes AASI has planned is in its selection process for the national demo team. National tryouts will be held next year instead of the hand-picked regional method used now. While some members of the existing team may return, the competition is going to be tough. “What prompted this is AASI really doesn’t have anyone who is a true freestyle teacher,” says Miller, “and that’s what the kids are interested in. You can explain how to ride a pipe, but you also need to be able to show them. Credibility-wise you need to do that, and from that perspective this group is a little outdated-but it looks like they’re making the change.”

Dorsey points out that it was the existing team’s decision to change the selection process. “The current team is limited in terms of some of the things it can do and in terms of the contemporary snowboard image we want to have,” he says. “But the selection process is not just going to be hot feet-you’re going to have to also be a good teacher as well.

“Our primary goal is to introduce people to the sport and stay true to its spirit,” he continues. “Where we’ve sometimes gotten a bad rap is some people thought that wasn’t what we’re about-that we were trying to take away the true spirit of snowboarding. I hope the snowboarding industry can see that’s certainly not the case.”

-Sean O’Brien

biz_editor

  • December 01 1998 | 117 views

The Biz Network is a collection of content from hand-picked personalities and organizations across the action sports industry. It's the ultimate source for behind-the-scenes perspective on the issues and events shaping our business. Look for more channels to be added soon.

Agenda Trade Show TW Biz Staff Blog ASR Trade Show
Agenda Trade Show TW Biz Staff ASR Trade Show
     
Imagine Marketing Market Watch
Imagine Marketing 60-Second Sell Market Watch

Current Issue

October is here and TransWorld Business has an issue full of useful business insight, relevant news, and hot industry topics.

Subscribe to TransWorld Business

Stock Quotes

DJIA10433.71  chart-17.24
NASDAQ2169.18  chart-6.83
S&P 5001105.65  chart-0.59
Billabong Intl Lt9.20  chart-0.05
Globe Intl Ltd0.35  chart+0.00
Jarden Cp27.58  chart-0.33
Pacific Sunwear O3.55  chart+0.02
V F Cp72.34  chart-0.91
Quiksilver Cp1.87  chart-0.05
Zumiez Inc.11.02  chart-0.68
Abercrombie & Fit39.42  chart+0.26
Orange 21 Inc.0.71  chart+0.00
Sorc0.00  chart+0.00
Volcom, Inc.16.50  chart-0.05
Nike Inc Cl B64.52  chart+0.03
November 24, 2009, 4:01 pm

Polls

How do you expect PacSun's announcement it is bringing footwear back into 300 stores to affect your business?

View Results

Loading ... Loading ...

B2B Marketplace


Recent Comments

Newsletter Signup

Sign-up NOW to get the most up to date industry news and information sent to your inbox every month. Subscribers also get access to exclusive content, brand give-aways, and special offers!

* If you would like to receive breaking news & special offers via SMS text messages. Standard text messaging rates apply.