I managed a surf shop over a decade of my adult life, and as I mentioned in the VewDo board post, I’ve see all the accessories and trinkets that sales reps have to pitch, board racks included. Some are for aesthetics, some for function. Few companies offered a product range that covered both needs very well. Store Your Board offers racks for a range of activities from surfing to snowboarding to cycling. They have a wide range of racks that span from minimal displays to utilitarian tools for space management. Prices are fair, and many of their racks are made in the USA. I have the Naked Surf Rack, and it is about as minimalist of a surf rack as you will find. It shows off the board, without the usual bulky foam or metal rack getting in the way. It retails for $25, and is on sale now for…Continue Reading
I grew up surfing, and I was raised in a surf shop.My teenage years all the way up to age 30 I lived at Infinity Surfshop, in Dana Point, CA. We saw every imaginable fad, trend and invention come through the shop, with the sales reps or the inventor of the product selling it to us as the next great thing.From surfboard, skateboard and snowboard accessories, to the off the wall bike boards and electric skateboards, we saw it all.We often were given shop demos to try-before-you-buy.Some good, some not so much.One of the categories in which there was no shortage of products was balance boards.Makes sense, right?Surfing, skating, snowboarding, all require balance.We would stand behind the counters while folding clothes, or ringing customer up, all while balancing on the different offerings of balance boards that we sold in the shop.Different products offered different benefits, some made better than others.One…Continue Reading
Take a step into Futures’ Huntington Beach headquarters where they make their fin boxes, CNC fin molds and engineer their fins. Not all fins are made in the USA. Factory is not open to the public for tours.   Futures USA – Headquarters 5452 McFadden Ave Huntington Beach, CA 92649 714-891-1695
Infinity Surfboards has been shaping custom boards since 1970. They shape all sorts of boards from high-performance shortboards to longboards to Stand Up Paddle boards and Tandem boards. Founded by Steve Boehne, master shaper and owner, Infinity still manufactures, shapes and glasses their surfboards in the USA. The factory is located in San Clemente, California, The two story factory holds 7 shaping bays, an AKU surfboard shaping machine, and a full production glass-shop. If you’re getting a custom board made by Infinity, you can watch it get shaped right at the factory. FACTORY TOUR DETAILS: Cost: FREE Reservations: Required. 949.661.6699 Tour Duration: .5 hour (Longer if you’re watching your board shaped) Factory hours: No schedule. If you’re having a board made by Infinity, you can watch it shaped in their Southern California factory. INFINITY SURFBOARDS (Retail shop. Call for factory directions) 24382 Del Prado Dana Point, CA 92629
Today’s interview is with one of the founders from We Are Runts (WAAR), Michael Quinones. Michael and Matt Davis started WAAR as a mission to bring Made in the USA to market with influences pulled from the surf, skate and motorcycle culture. They have dedicated themselves to bringing an affordable, 100% USA made, product to the consumer.   Can you give 50 BUILT readers some background on yourselves and how WAAR came to be? Matt Davis & I both have worked in the action sports and contemporary apparel market for about a decade now. All the brands that we have been apart of were developed and manufactured overseas with the intent on being more or less volume driven. We saw the issues of developing and producing overseas as startup companies. The constant ‘bait and switch’ that would happen with production, poor quality, and generally zero accountability for the issues at hand…Continue Reading
Matix Design Director Mike Gomez says the Capital Collection is designed to build awareness around the quickly vanishing art of American clothing manufacturing and to shine a light upon the quality produced by those that still take pride in the craft. “It’s surprisingly difficult at this point in time to make stuff in the US,” says Gomez. “There’s just not a lot of factories in existence that can do this work.” Matix VP Brian Dunlap says in addition to using the superior quality of American made textiles, Capital Collection designers went the distance and challenged themselves to source everything, down to the trimming, domestically. “There’s a lot of stuff you see that says Made-In-The-USA,” says Dunlap. “But many of the components that go into these products are actually made overseas. The thing that sets this collection apart is that we’ve gone to great lengths to actually build every trim, every…Continue Reading
Today’s interview is with Steve Boehne of Infinity Surfboards. Infinity brings a unique perspective to 50 BUILT being a manufacturer, retailer and wholesaler of their products. Steve having been a shaper for 50 years now, and Infinity having been around since 1970, together bring an outlook that spans decades, economic times and technology.   How did you get your start in shaping surfboards and how was the surf industry different back then? I would say that all American Surfboard makers started out as surfers in the first place, and that’s where the key to our success is, that we love the sport. With me, I started out surfing when I was 12 years old and that very same year I made my first surfboard. Within 10 years after that, by the time I was 20 years old, I was shaping professionally, at the same time I was going to college.…Continue Reading