Hamboards
Hamboards manufactures and sells rail-to-rail Surfskates, SUPskates, Paddles and Accessories. Most Hamboards are longer, wider and sit higher off the ground than conventional skateboards and longboards. Hamboards also turn much more than conventional surfboards. The enabling technology are the patented Hamboards Surfskate Trucks (HST), featuring 30 degrees of roll (in each direction), which allows these huge boards to track and pump aggressive surf-style carving maneuvers. The patented Street Sweeper SUPskate Paddle flexes significantly, allowing the user to spring themselves along with comfort.
Private | |
Headquarters | Huntington Beach, California, United States |
Key people | Pete Hamborg Don Sandusky Yusuke Nick Imamura Abraham Paskowitz Robert Herjavec |
Products | Surfskateboards SUPSkateboards SUPSkate Paddles |
Website | Hamboards.com |
Hamboards are intended to be ridden barefoot, like surfboards. Most promotional materials, such as videos show barefoot riders[1][2]
Pete Hamborg, a Huntington Beach Fireman and father of five boys, created the first Hamboards as a garage hobby to allow his sons (and their friends) to surf the pavement on days that the actual surf was too big or too small. Years of tinkering and optimization led to the first Hamboards assembled in bulk. The design comprised bamboo or birch decks, fitted with commercially available branded trucks, wheels and bearings. For the next several years, Hamboards were assembled by friends and family from a small shop in Huntington Beach where they were also sold locally. This configuration worked reasonably well, at small scale, except for the nagging design flaw inherent in the trucks which were never designed for the enormous loads imparted by the huge and wide Hamboards decks. Years later, as the demands of running a small business became burdensome, Pete enlisted his east coast cousin Don Sandusky who was an experienced entrepreneur, engineer, inventor and sporting goods executive. An asset purchase agreement was executed between Pete and Hamboards Holdings, LLC. Within a year of forming the company, Hamboards was featured on Shark Tank on ABC,[3] Season 5, Episode 4, which aired on October 12, 2013. Businessman Robert Herjavec offered $300K in exchange for a 30% stake in the company.[4] The terms of the actual arrangement is bound by confidential terms. Notwithstanding, the television segment was popular and enjoyed multiple reruns, launching the brand around the world.
The conversion from garage hobby to business was a challenging scale exercise. Hamboards started as a local specialty skateboard shop and rapidly transformed into an international direct to consumer online business[5] , that produced several variations of the longboard and skateboard, including The Classic, Pinger, Logger, Fish, Huntington Hop, Pescadito, Biscuit and Street Sweeper street stand up paddles.[6] During the following five years, the company derived mass produced manufacturing, its own online retail sales channel, contract fulfillment and contract e-marketing.
Hamboards is led by Don Sandusky, Abraham Paskowitz and the e-marketing team at Yusuke's Design.
External links
References
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=69&v=pBL2iEbxlV4
- "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2015-06-21. Retrieved 2015-06-20.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
- "Success Story: Hamboards". ABC.go.com. ABC. Retrieved 13 March 2015.
- Connelly, Laylan (5 May 2014). "'Shark Tank' gives H.B. skate company extra bite". OC Register. Retrieved 13 March 2015.
- Carpio, Anthony Clark (5 November 2013). "Board maker riding wave of success". Huntington Beach Independent. Retrieved 13 March 2015.
- "Boardshop". Hamboards.com. Retrieved 13 March 2015.