Haydenshapes' spectacular Mona Vale factory destroyed by fire…
A couple of weeks back your ol pal DR spent a delightful hour or so shooting the breeze with the shaper Hayden Cox and his biz partner, marketing whiz wife Dani at their factory in Mona Vale, Sydney.
It ain’t hard to admire this pair. There’s Hayden, the sunny faced forty-one-year-old with a boyish face and his rock star chic gal Dani who still own a biz that could’ve fallen into investors’ paws years back, pouring their hearts into a conga-line of new ventures. For these kids, it’s all sweat equity.
And the factory is spectacular, what you might call a paradoxical minimalist grandeur. The pair proudly showed me through the place, their baby, with its concrete floors, the soaring ceilings and its acres of glass.
I wasn’t surprised. The couple has collabed with Audi, Alexander Wang, IWC watches, Dion Lee, Mr Porter (for their eponymous surfwear brand) as well as making resin furniture for high-end Australian brand SP01.
So it’s a little heartbreaking to hear the joint went up in flames earlier today, thirty firefighters and hazmat crews “racing to control a fire belching enormous billows of smoke…but the well-known surfboard factory the fire sparked within was destroyed.”
The Haydenshapes factory at Tengah Crescent lit up in the late afternoon, although a cause has yet to be determined. One staff member was treated for burns.
Hayden started Haydenshapes in 1997 when he was twenty-two, and who wrote a best-selling book seven years ago called New Wave Vision about his climb to the top.
I described it back then as “a wonderful story of a driven kid who shucks the expectations of his family (accountancy!) to learn to shape, build a surfboard company, create a unique method of surfboard construction and, eventually, be feted by icons as diverse as Audi and Alexander Wang. A tough biz-man, sure, and…oowee… a little sensitive to the inconsequential yapping of critics, but his advice, his thoughts, are compelling… as a window into a young shaper’s rise, fall and rise, of the challenges of the surfboard game, of defiance in the face of unsupportive parents, of making your way in the world on your own terms, it works.”
Yea in a back yard set up for sure or even a scrappy poorly managed job , but a modern state of the art Factory full insured with a fire inspection clearance less so.
Left out the part where he fired the entire Mona staff last week over Skype.
hmm now there is a full blown investigation into the fire!
1,000,000 Hypto Krypto’s up in smoke
So if your saying Hayden is worsening the situation, do we also throw into this conversation any board brands that get their boards made overseas. If that is the case lets put in JS, DHD, Merrick, Lost, Pyzel, Rod Dahlberg, Free Flight, MR, Quiksilver boards, Murray Bourton, Brett Warner, Emery, Aloha, Mctavish and Phil Myers to name a few.
love your passion for HS and his great Krypto empire .
yeah a lot of guys/shapers are getting some of their bds done in Asia……big brands that wholesale s/bds and need volumes of boards to be sold to support teams etc…Asia is so tempting as the profit level are high….and Hayden, well he’s built a great reputation on looks and fashion….but technically as a shaper, ah, he’s pretty average!
Actually MC I ride a Matt Crisp board. I just don’t like how everyone throws mud at one person. Throw it at every signal one and name and shame them all in the media and tell everyone to buy only Australian.
Yes he may be pretty average in your opinion. I am not a shaper and was only a glasser of many brands years ago.
ha , there’s a thing called tall poppy syndrome in Australia….buying only Australian is the big con , because as you said most of the components come from china…all smoke and mirrors…..
Hopefully no-one works out you are from that famous Bay up North,LOL.
yeah my opinion of shapers is often colored by how original and forward thinking is their product…I am just an older and have a different take on design etc…afraid I am one of those 1 percenters!
My last comment was in no disrespect to you MC and yes that good old tall poppy syndrome is full on in this country. You still shape a great board and it is a credit to you that you still have the passion for the game and surf when the body allows it.
no disrespect taken at all……I have had that much mud thrown at me in my life , I feel like a mud pie sometimes ,LOL!!
Tall poppy syndrome….hmm …an ugly side of Australia, but trying to take it as a compliment and feel sorry for the people who need to denigrate for the sake of!
Met a teacher in the late 90’s in Jardim De Mar.. from your area. You wouldn’t have stumble through there once upon a time?
If there was anyone that followed, to a T, my video on How to Get Rich and Stay That Way, it would be my friend H Cox. Patent, book, maximize market presence, minimize cost structure, target high earners … I could keep going but some of you might start a search on Aliba to do the same without consulting our new partnership and .org, How to be a Surfing Millionaire. Ten easy steps and ten small tax deductible donations, the advantages of your own charity is another series, and you’ll be well on your way. Mahalo
I will send you my hard back first edition signed (!) copy of The Manual by Bill Drummond. It’s not yet made good on the promise but it is a lot cheaper than the cost of getting annual access to the Kingdom Hall!!! What’s yer postcode, for shipping. Doctor Whooo, oo; Doctor Who.
So avoiding the question. You do understand that most boards are made of materials from China. Cloth, hardner, resin, sandpaper, electric sanders, paint and even fin boxes all come from Asia. I also hope that you do not buy any products such as clothing, electric household items from China.
Surfer is the dude that’s always bummed because everyone calls him Kook. Imagine how giddy he got when no one else on Discus had taken Surfer as their profile.
Interesting… The building was for rent about 1 – 2 weeks ago. They were on the move.
so it was an insurance scam?
Fire forensics are extremely advanced now days , you need to be pretty technical to pull of a large scale industrial burn and leave no evidence.
Curious what brand board do you ride?
Massive insurance payout and off to china to
” rebuild “would be my prediction on outcome of this story
Burning down his factory is minor compared to the damage he,s done to surfing with ” his shapes”
Nonsense. What do you think was happening in that factory that burnt down?
As for his boards made in Thailand, they are not cheaper than a locally made board and it’s not secret where they come from. People can choose to buy it or not.
Why? Because he is a successful shaper and businessman?
I swear i thought this was gonna be that old parable about the rich yank telling the poor mexican fisherman drinking beers on the beach with his mates to work harder.
Mecican works harder amd harder only to finally ask the rich yank why do it, only to be told so can retire and sit around and drink beers with your mates.
Nice guy on a Ments boat trip arrived with 2 Hayden’s.
Not going to say he ruined his own trip, will suffice to say he was begging to ride one of my Merrick’s.
Begging. DR could have turned that offer into a great story, dude was that despo, would have done anything to switch. Good looking kid too. Oh DR.
Anyhoos, I’d forgotten about Tim’s indiscretion because another kid on the charter brought 3 Tomo’s. The only reason Timmy got away with lugging Hayden’s along was he was shaded by this other guy bringing the worst pieces of shit I have ever seen all the way to the Ments.
Have seen very good surfers absolutely ripping on haydens boards and loving them. Especially the hypto. Mostly purchased by kooks though.
That is what we are missing round here…. surf talk.
Attaboy MC.
Aaaahh, good old insurance, it’s definitely helped the balance sheet in many a failing surf adjacent business.
…”defiance in the face of unsupportive parents”…
Really ?
In which short period did that happen ?
Wasn’t his mother a marketing whiz (as well as his wife) who got him off the ground with professional advice and a swag of his old man’s bucks ?
At least that’s what I recall of the story last time it was told a few years ago…
A certain shaper from Byron Bay that used to own McTavish burnt his factory down.
Reports say one of the employees was injured. Whatever you think of HS boards, your comment is cunty.
EPIC!
I wonder what your karma will be for making a snarky comment over someone else’s misfortune? A stubbed toe? A door closing instead of opening and that setting of a chain of events changing the very core of your existence on this planet?
A back yarder mate and myself computer shaped a blank over a few beers styled off a picture of a Crypto from a Surf magazine. Turned up in the mail and he finished it off for me.
I loved it for way too long.
Not sure what I’m trying to say. But man, fires are heartbreaking. All the best for all involved.
I’m quite open in saying the fibreglass hypto I bought as new off a mate who had it shaped custom was one of the best boards I ever owned.
Snapped my leggy surfing it at shipwrecks in nusa Lembongan and never saw it again.
That’s a decent swim!
Just now, 180 strokes paddling to the beach….the boat guy didn’t come back for us on dark.