Comments on: Do Blank Decks Hurt the Skateboarding Industry?

By: anthony

anthony — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 17:38:09 +0000

blank decks are affordable and dont support the cooperate big wigs that now run most major deck companies. blank skateboard capture what skateboarding used to be. not what you skated but HOW you skated.

By: Administrator

Administrator — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 13:11:52 +0000

Well, let me play the devil’s advocate.

1. What about blanks being sold by the local skate shop? That’s supporting the local skate scene, right? After all, blanks put a lot of money in the skate shop owners pocket which he can use to invest back into the shop in ways that help skaters. By contrast, pro decks hardly put any money in the shop owner’s pocket. BTW, when I talk about “blanks” I’m generally lumping shop decks in the same category.

2. My friend owns a company that makes blank decks, but he’s not an exploiting businessman, he’s a skater. His customers, as far as I know, are all small, locally owned skateshops. Is he hurting the industry?

And just for the record, China is a complicated place and to say it has been exploited is to misunderstand the details of what’s going on there. China actually is becoming one of the richest economies in the world, growing faster than any other economy (about 10% annually, compared to 2-3% in the US). Of course there is exploitation going on, but most of it is probably the Chinese exploiting the Chinese. It’s not American businessmen who go in and pay very little for Chinese goods, it’s the Chinese themselves who keep the prices low so that everyone has to go to China or risk being uncompetitive and going out of business.

By: Daneil

Daneil — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 11:59:26 +0000

I’m trying to set up a skate company at the moment with my friends. Our aim is basically to have fun and learn about business, not huge profit. We have all skated for years so we know the difference between blank and pro boards. Even if good blanks were manufactured and sold cheap we would still by the local skate shop boards as they are skater owned. Everyone i know believes that supporting a skater owned company is more important than inviting sportswear big names such as Reebok, Addidas etc. Although I do not intend to gain masses of profit i do intend to get enough to start buying camera equipment and eventually support a team for small tours and other such events. A lot of pros earn enough/too much money, and I believe that the money should go towards supporting all those who are dedicated enough to the sport/artform (don’t get me started on that debate), instead of business men trying to exploit it. This could be compared to China and how it would have a very rich economy had the rest of the world not exploited them. My main point is that the argument shouldn’t just be ‘are blank decks good?’ but should be ‘are blank decks sold by sports giant or exploiting business men hurting skaters that intend to start up a company for little or no profit?’ to which the answer is of course, yes!

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 22:11:50 +0000

I know that graphics are useless after 5 minutes,(if you grind anyway) and that it really doesn’t matter what they say, but the industry sure makes a hell of alot of money of having a skaters name on the bottom.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 15:40:29 +0000

#$#% that dude who emailed you just for the fact that i push mongo and i do know where to go and i think blank decks dont hurt the industry as i have bought many of them in the last 8 years and im going to be selling blank decks in my shop so i think its a good deal good deck for less who cares if there some cool grapgic if your going to grind it off soone or later
Kevin

By: gioforeal

gioforeal — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 05:18:46 +0000

Well can I at least wear blank shoelaces?

By: DEVEN

DEVEN — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 22:03:41 +0000

Blanck decks are a great thing,without them most kids wouldnt be able to skate.not everyone can efford a pro deck. As most of the skateboarders say its about the passoin the love of the sport. So if they are pissed they are not real,they are a comersial.Some of thies kids that can only efford the blanck deck they might be the next pro.

By: cube

cube — Tue, 06 Feb 2007 16:33:46 +0000

Ben, I tried to point out that while the industry (pre-retail level) sets its sights on blanks as the death grip, that it was indeed, necessary, even vital, that the skate shop owners like yourself, need that business in many cases to keep the door open every day.
Actually, I agree with everything you just said Ben.
You made my point about there being too many places to buy a skateboard, in every possible way, i’d expect, when skating is at it’s current size, that the specialty stores should be seeing the benefits having been there for all the right reasons from the outset.
So, I was far from saying you should give up, more trying to point out just how necessary the product is to stay in business, once again, for reasons you point out.
My closest ties have always been with independent stores who do one thing, sell skateboards. It will always be that way, so many friends of mine in europe have had to close their doors because of multiples who were allowed all the same product and more often than not, even got it first.
One thing we’ll never know (at least this time around) is whether skateboarding would be at its current level, if the existing independent stores, and those now out of business had remained the only places to buy product. I’d like to think so, but that’s another debate.
In the battle for business against the giants I think the front line is the most important, the guys actually on the floor are the ones who can make a difference, you can do all you want to offer the right stuff to compete, but if the customer doesn’t have a good experience while in the store, it’s unlikely they’ll complain, they just won’t come back.
If you have the right people on the floor, you’ll have nothing to worry about from the mall.
What i’m trying to say is that it’s not what you have as much as how you sell it, which goes back to the ‘thriving community’ feel of the successful independent.
I’m still getting my head round the whole blank issue, just like everyone else. I’m straying from the point in hand too, but the reasons this has come about reach pretty far and deep.
Keep keeping the dream alive Ben, I wish you all the very best.
C.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 23:01:34 +0000

Here’s the problem from a shop owner’s perspective. When every Tom, Dick and Harry is selling product and the manufacturers (contrary to what they apparently belive) don’t support “core” shops very well, why in the name of all that is sacred should I close my doors because I refused to sell product that could have kept my doors open? Everyone forgets about shops like mine that struggle to stay open and get little support from suppliers, reps and the industry as a whole. Explain to me, if you would, Cube, why I should give up on my store because you and others feel that I should only sell branded product (for the record, I do not sell blanks, just shop branded product)? Is it that everyone loves to buy from CCS so much that it doesn’t matter if there’s a shop in town keeping the dream alive? I don’t get it - maybe you can help.
-Ben

By: cube

cube — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 18:18:37 +0000

ahh, the old blank deck debate, while good points are made on shoes, clothing etc.., i’d have to say that my problem, despite the fact that kids often ‘grow out’ of riding blanks as they become less desirable as they become more brand aware, skateboarding ultimately does not benefit from the dead-end market of blanks. There’s none of that money going back in to benefit skateboarding in any way.
Of course it brings more people to skateboarding, or at least, more people own one, we all no doubt had to start somewhere in the realms of bad product.
The problem is the ridiculous amount of companies producing the blanks, a ridiculous amount of shops buying into that combined with too many places where you can actually buy a skateboard. Skateboarding’s growth is hurting specialty retail rather than benefitting it.
As I said at the beginning, I understand that a kids first couple of boards may be the low quality kind, but how do you educate when everything is so price driven?, it’s a huge mountain to climb, it comes down to dollars, everyone wants a cheapboard, not a skateboard.
Buying better quality from veteran experienced manus for sure lasts longer than newer ‘we got ‘em’ suppliers.
On top of this there’s the grey area of shop boards, a lot of which don’t come from good , known woodshops either.
Due to distributors selling wider as skateboarding grows, shop boards have become a means to compete somehow, with the malls, sports shops etc, with buying power to cut pricing to improve their margins etc, etc..Having said that, there are also shop boards which are used to fund events, demos, movie premiers etc, all things which do good to keep the community around an independent store thriving (not to mention keeping the door itself, open for business)
So the grey area is a whole other debate..
There’s obviously points on both (or all) sides of the blank debate.
In skateboardings highs and lows, the industry has upsized, supersized and downsized and only the strong survive, but imagine a world where no one company is willing to take all those chances all over again and we’re all riding product no better than the first board we ever had and even that is in short supply..
Then some guy suddenly says, when all the world is blank, hey, maybe we should put a graphic on these to make them more interesting, or, even better, we should start a team and give our riders a dollar a board……….
While I appreciate what has been said about plenty money to go round, in my own time skateboarding, it’s all disappeared more than once…..
I’m sure I speak for every side when I say that skating has been/is a great friend to us all, so if you see a hand round your friends neck choking them, what will you do?….

Cube.