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>There is still a very big market for performance surfboards in the ~$500 range. Data? From the article, the number of surfers is growing at 1.7% annually, ye

>There is still a very big market for performance surfboards in the ~$500 range. Data? From the article, the number of surfers is growing at 1.7% annually, yet this company now sells 5 times more boards than anyone else. The majority of those sales were taken from other companies. If this isn't a disruption story than I don't know what is.

_-__--- 11y ago
your statements don't conflict, it's just an interpretation of the term "very big." Lots of people are buying the softtops, but those people might not be the people still investing in high-end hardtops (if that's the term). If sales of one item are increasing without a concurrent, statistically significant and apparently causal decrease in the sales of supposedly competing items, then it's not really disrupting a current market. It's just making it a lot bigger and getting most of the new volume. You could say that the market is almost tangential to the existing surf shop market.
- forgetsusername 11y ago
  >but those people might not be the people still investing in high-end hardtops (if that's the term). Without knowing the underlying numbers, sure. It's possible. But the bigger point is that these small surf shops that sell both mid-priced soft-top and expensive hard-top boards are no longer selling the soft-tops, because an equivalent board can be had for $99, exclusively from Costco. That has to put pressure on the industry, and the supply of higher end boards.
mrharrison 11y ago
I would imagine its the type of board that sits in people's garage and gets used once a year. Once you really get into surfing you then upgrade. People who can really surf wouldn't use something like this. Sorry no data, but this what I see everytime I go out to a break. Beginners on these foam tops, intermediate and advanced on a $600 firewire, CI or vintage custom.
- forgetsusername 11y ago
  >People who can really surf wouldn't use something like this. I agree. And let me say, I know nothing about surfing, and am basing my discussion on this one article. I think it's inevitable that the lower barrier to entry will allow the sport to grow, and be good for the "high-end" in the long-run. That's good. But in the meantime, this sort of breakthrough puts pressure on the existing system. I have to assume that shops used to sell more $300 boards than $1000 boards. Now they might be selling zero $300 boards, which have been replaced by the Costco special. So, small shops close. Low-volume producers go out of business. That's exactly what technological disruption is.
  - ryanackley 11y ago
    Again, I have no data, but I imagine that new surfboards are a very low margin business already because the smaller shops seem to stay far away from it. I say this because my local mom and pop surfshop on the beach doesn't even offer in-stock brand-new surfboards. You can however custom order from a local shaper through them. They focus heavily on surf apparel and used surfboards.
ryanackley 11y ago
Some of it is anecdotal. I surf frequently and I am in a relatively large market (Florida). Here is a real data point, the best-selling waveform 8' board is considered a "long" board. Easy to catch waves and ride them into shore but hard to turn and do tricks on. Most surfing literature and culture focuses on riding "short" boards (5'-7'). This is the type of surfing done on the professional circuit and shown in lots of magazines videos etc.
pbrb 11y ago
anecdotal, but here's my viewpoint as a surfer. yes, wavestorms sell like crazy, and are the #1 board i recommend to beginners. even ordering one at $180 w/ shipping can be cheaper than buying another decent used beginner board. so yeah, in that segment of the market, wavestorm is killing it. once you're beyond the beginner stage, outside of small wave or 'fun' sessions, a wavestorm is the last thing you're going to want to surf. a 'hard' surfboard (fiberglass w/ epoxy or poly resin) is pretty much mandatory. the lowest cost 'hard' surfboards are 'pop-outs', made in overseas factories (think ~$300 for a shortboard). these are generally frowned upon by surfers. what surfers really want, and usually buy multiples of, are hand shaped 'hard' boards from local shapers or a couple bigger name brands that still mass produce surfboards, but at a higher price and quality point than the overseas pop-outs ($400-$1000+ depending on size, shaper, color, etc). wave storm is killing it, and definitely disrupted the soft top beginner market. selling through costco with their return policy was probably a very large part of their success too. though, there definitely still is a very large market for performance surfboards in the ~$500 and up range.
- petra 11y ago
  What's wrong with the overseas made boards?
  - mr_luc 11y ago
    Surfer here, spent 7 years in remote coastal south america surfing fairly regularly. It's not that they're made overseas -- it's that the basic method of manufacture he mentioned, "pop-out", in the industry implies using a plastic shell and then pumping foam into it, and a few other similar methods of manufacture. For shortboards, it's pretty terrible. The boards are very heavy for a surfboard, with poor rigidity and flex, and in fact they don't even attempt to target the "real shortboard" market, where extreme light weight, stiffness and a very delicately balanced flex work together to form something that lets you nimbly glide along a decent-sized wave on a board slightly shorter than you are. Basically, the best form of manufacture for surfboards is a core of either high-quality rigid foam (not the heavy, flexible foam used in wavestorm/some pop-outs) or air, covered in substances like fiberglass and/or carbon-fiber fabric and minimal amounts of epoxies (sometimes using the same vacuum techniques as other carbon-fiber manufacturing to minimize weight). I said 'foam or air' because for a while people have been predicting that we'd move to hollow carbon-fiber boards, and there are/have been some of those boards, but they have their drawbacks and are often expensive. Can performance surfboards be disrupted? It's already happened, to a certain extent. Channel Islands and other surfboard brands use automated milling of the foam blanks, and other automated processes as well. Too, any overseas contenders have to worry about shipping. Surfboards are huge -- you could fit 20 boxed iphones in the footprint of a single boxed shortboard. At the price points mentioned ($300-$500), overseas shipping would probably eat into your margin. Shipping is even an issue for domestic producers; often shipping a board halfway across the country can cost $50-$100. Which is a nice bit of extra margin for a local shaper and his customers. When will good surfboards get cheap? Probably when great carbon-fiber bikes get cheap, ie, when carbon-fiber manufacture is so well mastered by man that designs in any shape can be pumped out like Lego.
snowwrestler 11y ago
Not everyone who buys gear uses it. The cheaper the gear, the more that becomes true. I'm not a surfer but I've been a whitewater kayaker for decades. Many people who buy a new whitewater kayak + gear do not go on to become life-long paddlers. And we're talking about $1,500 worth of gear, easy.
rcurry 11y ago
This isn't a disruption story at all - these boards are, basically, cheap bath toys that parents pick up for their kids on Saturday morning before they head to the beach. I think they are great for beginners who don't want to spend money before trying to learn how to surf, but the reality is that most people buy a "real" board almost as soon as they learn to stand up. Also, these things are flimsy - even if you wanted to keep using it after you learn to stand up, the odds of it snapping in half within a few weeks of heavy use are pretty good. I'm not saying they're bad - they are great for beginners, but the market for custom boards isn't really going to get hurt all that much by these.
- leroy_masochist 11y ago
  > these boards are, basically, cheap bath toys that parents pick up for their kids on Saturday morning before they head to the beach. I think they are great for beginners who don't want to spend money before trying to learn how to surf, but the reality is that most people buy a "real" board almost as soon as they learn to stand up. Are you talking about sponge boards in general, or Wavestorm boards specifically? Not like anyone's going to win the Eddie on a Wavestorm, but they're WAY better than previous sponge boards. > the market for custom boards isn't really going to get hurt all that much by these Agree 100%

_-__--- 11y ago

your statements don't conflict, it's just an interpretation of the term "very big." Lots of people are buying the softtops, but those people might not be the people still investing in high-end hardtops (if that's the term). If sales of one item are increasing without a concurrent, statistically significant and apparently causal decrease in the sales of supposedly competing items, then it's not really disrupting a current market. It's just making it a lot bigger and getting most of the new volume. You could say that the market is almost tangential to the existing surf shop market.

forgetsusername 11y ago
>but those people might not be the people still investing in high-end hardtops (if that's the term). Without knowing the underlying numbers, sure. It's possible. But the bigger point is that these small surf shops that sell both mid-priced soft-top and expensive hard-top boards are no longer selling the soft-tops, because an equivalent board can be had for $99, exclusively from Costco. That has to put pressure on the industry, and the supply of higher end boards.

mrharrison 11y ago

I would imagine its the type of board that sits in people's garage and gets used once a year. Once you really get into surfing you then upgrade. People who can really surf wouldn't use something like this. Sorry no data, but this what I see everytime I go out to a break. Beginners on these foam tops, intermediate and advanced on a $600 firewire, CI or vintage custom.

forgetsusername 11y ago
>People who can really surf wouldn't use something like this. I agree. And let me say, I know nothing about surfing, and am basing my discussion on this one article. I think it's inevitable that the lower barrier to entry will allow the sport to grow, and be good for the "high-end" in the long-run. That's good. But in the meantime, this sort of breakthrough puts pressure on the existing system. I have to assume that shops used to sell more $300 boards than $1000 boards. Now they might be selling zero $300 boards, which have been replaced by the Costco special. So, small shops close. Low-volume producers go out of business. That's exactly what technological disruption is.
- ryanackley 11y ago
  Again, I have no data, but I imagine that new surfboards are a very low margin business already because the smaller shops seem to stay far away from it. I say this because my local mom and pop surfshop on the beach doesn't even offer in-stock brand-new surfboards. You can however custom order from a local shaper through them. They focus heavily on surf apparel and used surfboards.

ryanackley 11y ago

Some of it is anecdotal. I surf frequently and I am in a relatively large market (Florida). Here is a real data point, the best-selling waveform 8' board is considered a "long" board. Easy to catch waves and ride them into shore but hard to turn and do tricks on. Most surfing literature and culture focuses on riding "short" boards (5'-7'). This is the type of surfing done on the professional circuit and shown in lots of magazines videos etc.

pbrb 11y ago

anecdotal, but here's my viewpoint as a surfer. yes, wavestorms sell like crazy, and are the #1 board i recommend to beginners. even ordering one at $180 w/ shipping can be cheaper than buying another decent used beginner board. so yeah, in that segment of the market, wavestorm is killing it. once you're beyond the beginner stage, outside of small wave or 'fun' sessions, a wavestorm is the last thing you're going to want to surf. a 'hard' surfboard (fiberglass w/ epoxy or poly resin) is pretty much mandatory. the lowest cost 'hard' surfboards are 'pop-outs', made in overseas factories (think ~$300 for a shortboard). these are generally frowned upon by surfers. what surfers really want, and usually buy multiples of, are hand shaped 'hard' boards from local shapers or a couple bigger name brands that still mass produce surfboards, but at a higher price and quality point than the overseas pop-outs ($400-$1000+ depending on size, shaper, color, etc). wave storm is killing it, and definitely disrupted the soft top beginner market. selling through costco with their return policy was probably a very large part of their success too. though, there definitely still is a very large market for performance surfboards in the ~$500 and up range.

petra 11y ago
What's wrong with the overseas made boards?
- mr_luc 11y ago
  Surfer here, spent 7 years in remote coastal south america surfing fairly regularly. It's not that they're made overseas -- it's that the basic method of manufacture he mentioned, "pop-out", in the industry implies using a plastic shell and then pumping foam into it, and a few other similar methods of manufacture. For shortboards, it's pretty terrible. The boards are very heavy for a surfboard, with poor rigidity and flex, and in fact they don't even attempt to target the "real shortboard" market, where extreme light weight, stiffness and a very delicately balanced flex work together to form something that lets you nimbly glide along a decent-sized wave on a board slightly shorter than you are. Basically, the best form of manufacture for surfboards is a core of either high-quality rigid foam (not the heavy, flexible foam used in wavestorm/some pop-outs) or air, covered in substances like fiberglass and/or carbon-fiber fabric and minimal amounts of epoxies (sometimes using the same vacuum techniques as other carbon-fiber manufacturing to minimize weight). I said 'foam or air' because for a while people have been predicting that we'd move to hollow carbon-fiber boards, and there are/have been some of those boards, but they have their drawbacks and are often expensive. Can performance surfboards be disrupted? It's already happened, to a certain extent. Channel Islands and other surfboard brands use automated milling of the foam blanks, and other automated processes as well. Too, any overseas contenders have to worry about shipping. Surfboards are huge -- you could fit 20 boxed iphones in the footprint of a single boxed shortboard. At the price points mentioned ($300-$500), overseas shipping would probably eat into your margin. Shipping is even an issue for domestic producers; often shipping a board halfway across the country can cost $50-$100. Which is a nice bit of extra margin for a local shaper and his customers. When will good surfboards get cheap? Probably when great carbon-fiber bikes get cheap, ie, when carbon-fiber manufacture is so well mastered by man that designs in any shape can be pumped out like Lego.

snowwrestler 11y ago

Not everyone who buys gear uses it. The cheaper the gear, the more that becomes true. I'm not a surfer but I've been a whitewater kayaker for decades. Many people who buy a new whitewater kayak + gear do not go on to become life-long paddlers. And we're talking about $1,500 worth of gear, easy.

rcurry 11y ago

This isn't a disruption story at all - these boards are, basically, cheap bath toys that parents pick up for their kids on Saturday morning before they head to the beach. I think they are great for beginners who don't want to spend money before trying to learn how to surf, but the reality is that most people buy a "real" board almost as soon as they learn to stand up. Also, these things are flimsy - even if you wanted to keep using it after you learn to stand up, the odds of it snapping in half within a few weeks of heavy use are pretty good. I'm not saying they're bad - they are great for beginners, but the market for custom boards isn't really going to get hurt all that much by these.

leroy_masochist 11y ago
> these boards are, basically, cheap bath toys that parents pick up for their kids on Saturday morning before they head to the beach. I think they are great for beginners who don't want to spend money before trying to learn how to surf, but the reality is that most people buy a "real" board almost as soon as they learn to stand up. Are you talking about sponge boards in general, or Wavestorm boards specifically? Not like anyone's going to win the Eddie on a Wavestorm, but they're WAY better than previous sponge boards. > the market for custom boards isn't really going to get hurt all that much by these Agree 100%