SACRED CRAFT

General Discussion
1

Just wanted to let everyone know about the Consumer Surfboard Expo I’m producing.

I hope you guys want to be involved.

MISSION STATEMENT:

   IN THE BEGINNING...

… it was all about the surfboard. The only thing that mattered. From ancient Polynesia to the ASP World Championship Tour; from Waikiki to Maverick’s; from The Endless Summer to Surfline; as the eras passed what we’ve worn or said or listened to or traveled to or read or watched are just sidebars on surfing’s timeline. Because the history of our sport is the history of the surfboard. Nothing has defined the surfing experience more than that on which we ride the waves. Nothing defines the surfer more than his (or her) surfboard. So much more than a tool, the surfboard has become a philosophical icon, a sacred craft, a culturally pervasive symbol of freedom, adventure and enduring youth.

This is why the surfboard builder was once the primary arbiter of surfing culture, from those early Hawaiian kahunas to the first wave of board manufacturers in the early 1960s. Think back: Hobie, Hansen, Bing, Weber, Noll. These labels-the surfboards they produced and the way this product was marketed-shaped surf culture, both literally and figuratively. It was all about the ride-what you wore came second.

Yet as the decade passed, the emphasis shifted away from the surfboard. The surf magazines became the main cultural hub, establishing ethical and aesthetic boundaries and ultimately marginalizing the role of the surfboard in their increasingly narrow portrayal of the sport. According to the surf mags throughout much of the 1980s and ‘90s there was only one way to surf: a mono-board culture.

At the same time the burgeoning surf wear industry began to eclipse all other commercial elements of the sport. Riding a swell of endorsement-based marketing, these soft-good companies became our cultural leaders, creating the imagery and feeding it to a media who, in turn, fed this pre-digested vision back to us: a mirror with no backing, that only reflects outward.

This is not to say there’s been any sort of deliberate attempt to commoditize our passion; the surf media and surfwear manufacturers are not evil, they’re just off track. It is all about the board; has always been about the board. We at the CONSUMER SURFBOARD EXPO feel it is time to reassert that philosophy. To put the surfboard-and the modern-day kahunas who craft them-back at the forefront of surf culture. To place that influence, that importance, that responsibility, back in the hands of the artisans who shape our sacred crafts-and ultimately our future. http://www.surfboardshow.com

2

Swayloholics Anonymous 2007…

same weekend as your little get together…Hmm…

Ray

3

Oops.

Didn’t mean to rain on anyone’s parade. Had no idea.

Follow your heart.

The Swayloholics Anonymous meeting sounds unreal!

4

Thats a good idea, the whole set up, not that it covers SA 2007

5

Hi All -

This looks like such a great event!

I’ve just been sitting on the checks received for SA 2007 so far. None have been cashed so if you’ve sent a check but decide you would rather attend the Sacred Craft event, let me know and I’ll return the checks ASAP.

6

John,

Was that craft or c$$p ?

This has been a poorly planned joke !

7

“I hope you guys want to be involved”

Us be involved? We are the ones who ARE involved, we actually build surfboards here in the USA with our own hands. Do you, Scott Bass, build surfboards with your own hands?

You want us to take our real, authentic, traditionally built surfboards and place them in tiny booths next to large brands that are produced in China, Thialand, and Vietnam, and what will this do? This will legitimize their lame ass attempts to convince surfers that their overseas boards are “real” surfboards. The large, well organized marketers like GSI are trying to draw a circle around us surfboard builders, with themselves inside the circle! They are not us. They are burning the foundation of our tradition and future out from under our own feet and you want us to be involved?

The internet is a conductor for truth, the sell-outs shall be exposed!

Byron

http://www.myspace.com/byrondesign

8

Re: [byrondesign]

Great, I’ll count you guys in!

Byron, perhaps you could host a seminar?

No, I am not a shaper.

Sorry.

9

Byron, it seems to me this show could be what you make it.

Get it together, get a booth (550$ is a steal to get infront of that many potential customers), and explain to everyone that comes by why custom surfboards will improve their surfing. Or not. Whatever. If you keep your boards in your closet you’ll never compete with the interlopers.

Note that there is a Seminar titled “Asian Surfboards: A Threat or No Sweat”. How can discussing the issue at a forum like this be perceived as a marketing ploy for popout makers?

Also whats pro Popout about the Tribute to Masters Shape-off? I doubt SurfTech is going to shape a popout gun… lol

I for one am seriously looking forward to this event.

10

I’m not saying one way or the other if I would be involved, more research into who is pushing this needs to be done. The thing is that the well organized and well funded large brands are doing aggresive marketing like this “Sacred Craft Expo” now, and small independent guys like me are going to have to respode in some way or we will get swept aside and forgotten.

Byron

11

I’m pretty sure Scott Bass is putting this on. It doesn’t look like the major Popout guys are banding together to create sort of perverse popout marketing orgy. :smiley:

Read your other thread, he responds with why he created the show. Small to medium sized shapers.

From the site:

WHY?

Because it dawned on us that the surfboard makers needed a way to market their wares, and the surfer needed a place they could go to talk surfboard design with the people that make them, rather than some 17-year-old shop rat that doesn’t know…shoestrings. Most of you remember a time when you could go into a surfshop and talk to a shaper. They’re still out there, thank God, but sadly they are a dying breed.

12

Actually Scott, I would love to do a seminar!

But my seminar wouldn’t focus on traditional board building like the kind Billy Caster used to do and be proud of.

My seminar would focus on how large, well organized and funded global surf industry distributors are swallowing up all the retail space at the big surf shops in SoCal by frontloading board brands. The giant companies place boards on the floor at no cost to the retailers and replaces everything that sells on a weekly basis, only invoincing the reatilers for what sells. My seminar would explain how it’s getting harder for small independent guys like myself to get a foothold against a giant global company like this and how it will eventually lead to less choices for the consumer. I might even have to mention how a local shop manager was fired recently for some sort of a kick-back scheme he had running with large board producers becuase this is the kind of thing that is really going on and effecting how the average surfer is going to buy surfboards in the future.

The global producers of surfboards want homogenazation, it takes 5 months for a Thialand board to get built and delivered to a US shop, if the designs have fluctuated in that time frame and they can’t sell that board, they lose money, and global surf companies can’t lose money so they must convince surfboard buyers to buy homogenized designs. The global surfboard producers need to make tooling for their “pop-outs”, this is costly so they must convince surfers that the new, more expensive technology will make them surf better. Again all this will lead to less choices for the consumer, less choices in the number of brands and designs to chose from and less choices in the prices surfers pay for their boards. My seminar would not be a veiled attempt to say “surfbaords are sacred”. My seminar would be about how the big money is coming in changing our authentic surfing heritage and our future.

See ya in the water, Byron

http://www.myspace.com/byrondesign

13

Sounds like a neato event. I sincerely hope some Swaylockers attend to give an unbiased account. I would go but it’s a lifestyle thing.

Lets see…go to a big air conditioned room with blaring music, high tech booths with perfectly built, look-but-don’t-touch, bitchen’ surftoys and seminars with microphones and powerpoints or…

Camp in the pine trees with the racoons, fondle backyard experimentals with tacky hotcoats and warbled outlines, hoop finned belly boards and unbuffed, feather light composits, swapping boards in a lineup that will be filled with like-minded fanatics and good friends braving ice cold glassy two footers or onshore 3XOH close-outs…

I won’t think twice.

14

FWIW I contacted Scott directly and wished him the best for success at the Sacred Craft event. I knew straight off that he has taken on a big task and will be dealing with tons of details that would drive an ordinary person insane. I’m sure that for him, it’s a labor of love.

He has offered a free hour for a Swaylocks sponsored spot in the seminar program. I have no idea how to put that together but the fact that he made the offer tells me his heart is in the right place.

Any takers?

15

I’ll go for a day. Can’t make it up North because we leave for Kauai a couple days later but a day trip is do-able.