Why the surf industry should forget surf and get into wellness, say experts.
The surf industry, like skate and snow, rides the boom-bust cycle with precise timing. One year it’s up, the next it’s down. Up, down, up down. It’s a roller-coaster. Always has been, always will.
Wanna know why? Because it’s a sport.
And some years the kids are riding scooters, sometimes it’s skateboards, sometimes it’s a surfboard. But there’s a base level of surfers, millions of us, enough to keep the meters ticking, the tills buzzing, the websites clicking. It’s only when companies go public, and they become beholden to the mantra of perpetual profitability, and they suck and suck onto a rapidly withering teat, that panic buttons are pushed. Non-surf CEOs hired; entire boards sacked.
You know the stories:
Quiksilver, six hundred mill and debt and thrown into Chapter 11.
Billabong, saved from the brink.
Surf Stitch, worst performing company on the Australian Stock Exchange. Sued by the very people trying to buy it.
The need to feed shareholders’ expectations and dumb acquisitions brought ’em all to the point of ruin.
Anyway, retail analysts interviewed by The Sydney Morning Herald in a story called How the Surf Brands Missed the Wellness Wave say all the misery of sackings and restructuring could’ve been avoided if they’d just started punching out yoga pants. One point five bill a year in “wellness” biz in Australia alone.
Let’s examine etc.
Retail analyst Steve Kulmar said the proliferation of the major surf brands ultimately undermined the integrity of the labels and robbed them of their unique value but he said they also missed the chance to hitch their brands to the wellness trend.
This created a chance for the active wear sector and he said this slice of the apparel market was growing exponentially.
“All the growth in apparel is in active wear; it’s trans-seasonal and people are prepared to pay for it” Mr Kulmar said.
He said wellness had been identified as one of the key growth areas in retail and this was in stark contrast to the “macho, extreme sports profiles” of the big surf brands.
“It’s just another chapter in the pretty sad state that the surf industry is in at the moment,” one analyst said.
Meanwhile, the wellness titan and bullishly expansionist Lululemon has moved into surf.
What’s the greater atrocity? Lululemon Surf or Billabong/Quik Yoga?
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Life’s better in yoga pants
The greatest atrocity is the companies not hiring anyone in their marketing departments who a) are over 15 or b) surf.
Surf leggings are all the rage with the nymphs of Noosa. It’s been at least a year of ‘sun protection without toxic sunscreen’.
Of course they do, they are a sheep bred with a parrot.
Drain the swamp! It may be muddy but I’m sure there’s room for us to do yoga!
Time for Necro to diversify Dell…
the necro skull camel toe yoga pant
i think you could sell 5 million pairs at Byron Market to range rover driving yummy mums up from North Av.
As the shark once said, “have you ever tried to eat a vegan enthusiast lululemon yoga pant wearing surfer? Neither have I…… Neither have I. But I’d try it if they did their yoga offshore cause drumlines and nets suck the witch’s tit”.
that’s fucking brilliant Steve, surf companies should be chasing whatever sorority girls are wearing this year, because they’re so fucking grounded. let’s hitch our wagon to those vapid cunts. guy is on an SUP for sure, probably downward dogging in the bay wearing Lulu trunks.
fuck yeah, RVCA wearing dudes in southern CA are nuts deep in it, stickers on their cars and shit. then again, those guys had Rollerblades too.
Present tense: “HAVE Rollerblades too”
i hate rvca more than i hate medina and makua rothman combinbed
too bad Seventeen didn’t work out for Conan, could have avoided all of this
That’s really like asking which animals should never be bred together by deranged scientists. Never should bats be bred with sharks. Never should goats mate with bears. And never, repeat never, should a surf company attempt to engage with Wellness.
https://www.youtube.com/wat…
A-fucking-men!
Im going to start making full deck traction pads from yoga mats. I can Downward Dog in the pit. Board Wellness – Its the future.
SUP
Let’s pray that yoga pants stay around forever and get more see thru. Chicks only though.
wellness is too close to yoga and yoga is too close to stupid ass pop spirituality, which is what surfers are still burnt out on after the hilarious debacle of the bell-bottoms-and-air-brush-rainbows-on-everything-and-abusive-guru-cults-and-pedo-stache-with-the-bowl-cut-combo 70s (although hasn’t roxy been making active wear for at least a decade?). not really. but maybe. either way, only a small segment of people (and they’re all ladies apparently) are into the commercial image of yoga-loving boho hippie bullshit enough to buy something evocative of that
besides that, i still find it ridiculous when surf companies make any not-actually-for-surfing clothes besides t-shirts and hats. why the fuck is vissla making jeans? does anyone actually wear them? if yall stopped making damn 60 dollar chinos maybe you’d finally get out of the hole
according to people in touch with me workwise yes it is!!!
I read this “According to the people who touch me workwise…” and it made even more sense!
Now you know what I do for work nude fitness classes
Will only be 4.75 million extra pairs of yoga pants sold according to your surf stats!!! But that is big coin!!
God help us when all the fucking Crossfit muppets enter the surf arena – “Crossfit Quiksilver”!! Quik went so good with rossignol wouldn’t be surprised if they logoed up a set of Kettlebells and just hit fitness/wellness market big time.