Their Take: Ellis Snowboards

-So these were some of the issues we faced this year and some of our projected solutions. Hope it works….

You cater more to the park oriented riders with your twin shapes, various park flexes, and softer strapped unibody bindings. Who in this category would you say is the ideal market and what is the image your trying to capture with your brand? Does being more park specific have its disadvantages with marketing?

I guess our ideal market in the segment of park riders would be everyone. We never target our audience based on music preference, fashion preference or personal preference. We are trying to target and make something for everyone in the park world to enjoy, that’s one of the reasons we have such a wide variety of product options all with park preferences in mind. The transition into park riding is natural and almost inevitable in our sport. We feel that park riders are a special breed, most have evolved from your novice rider and have seen or experienced some interesting things along the way. Underneath there story lies an artist and that’s also what we are trying to capture with our brand, the artist in us all. And to help tell there new tales in snowboarding, we would like to provide the pen.

As far as having any advantages or disadvantages with being park specific, it seems like there are some significant disadvantages with marketing. Being park oriented, many people base your brand on the riders that ride for you. Without some big names that are inventing new tricks or seriously taking down some big comps, it’s hard to get in the minds of park riders. There are so many crazy shredders out there in the park world and many are set in their ways and are pre-branded already. The other thing about marketing as a park specific company is that people are often expecting to see the next best shot or trick in the park. Many people don’t know that it’s timely and costly to do those things. The other disadvantage we have experienced in our marketing as a park company is that we have cornered ourselves into a widely niche market. The others do real well by not telling you whether its park specific or not, ( then they sell directional boards as park boards, etc.) We just feel there are bigger advantages to park boards then people think and it’s only a matter of time for the rest of the market to catch on. I must say we have experienced some challenges in marketing such a tight knit segment.

You have a lot of younger riders on your team who are still relatively unknown. There seems to be an underlying theme in snowboarding to drop older more established riders from teams and to pump up the young bloods. What’s your take on this trend, do we need to keep the old guys around to keep the youngens in check?

Yes and no, I think most of the old guys that are still around are around for a reason. They’re there to not only keep the new booties in check, but also because they know the system and how to work it. That’s one of the most important and valuable things they bring to the table. It takes a while for the rookies to learn that and when they finally do they are keepers. As far as the trend to drop the older dudes, I think that’s usually due to other reasons. The problem with older guys is that you do begin to deal with their issues, anything from their huge salary demands to ridiculous accommodations, sometimes it’s too corporate and we lose the soul of the relationship.

We feel that the younger guys (for us at least) are the way to go. We want the new young-bloods, but we want them to grow old with us until they are that over the hill old guy and hopefully then they have learned and experienced enough to help in other ways. Truth is, that some of the riders will find different paths to take along the way, the ones that are still around should definitely be kept. That’s usually when their work really starts to pay off anyways. The pro rider world is a brutal savage nonstop atmosphere where only few survive. If they can survive this brutal onslaught and stay close to the pack, they are keepers for sure. We aren’t just about buying up an old timer to say we have experience. Lots of those old timers are over the hill label-hoppers that wouldn’t really be bringing us much, as they would be draining what we have. Nor would they invest the time to check and guide the new guys..

There’s a huge rocker/reverse camber revolution going on right now. I know you were just up at Mammoth trying out some new shapes with this tech, once you have it dialed in what can we expect to see from you? Will it be a 3 stage rocker styled version or a true reverse camber from the center of the board? Also what’s your take on this revolution is it just a passing trend or the next evolution in board construction?

You will be seeing a rocker from us shortly! After doing some extensive testing with it, we have determined that for our purposes we will be using the rocker construction in our first free ride big mountain board. Next year we will be transitioning the very green “eecco line” into the all mountain freeride board. With both rocker construction and green technologies, this is granola by the stick. After our tests we quickly realized the benefits of the rocker in significant powder conditions and for those reasons we have decided to implement them into our line. Many market and promote the rocker as a benefit in the park, but we stay firm believers of “pop” in the park. Our rocker will be a true reverse camber shape, that starts from the center, have 3 new selected sizes to choose from, and they will all still be on a true twin shape (directional optional by setting screws). We will be using our green technologies as well, including the bamboo-tri-comb-core and the basalt weave. A truly green board to enjoy in the trees.

-Our take on the rocker trend? We feel that the rocker construction has some significant advantages in particular terrains, primarily powder. For that reason alone, we feel that this is a lasting construction in our industry, but a niche segment to say the least. We don’t feel its the next revolution in board construction, but more of a lasting evolution. However, we do feel that the promotions and marketing of this product in the park is one of the worst trends ever. If people actually took the time to logically think about some of the stupid pitches they are using for it, they would realize the truth. These things aren’t designed to help make you better in the park let alone help in avoid catching edge. At the end of the day, people are going to love what they get used to, whether its a rocker, or a camber, and we will have the options for them.

You have boards and bindings down, any thoughts on expanding into the footwear sector or are you going to keep concentrating on what you’ve been doing?

Yeah, we are going to keep it simple for now, at least for the next couple of years. We already expanded quite a bit with the acquisition of Kave Industries the bag company from SoCal. We are planning to really re-vamp our bag and travel line this next year with the inclusion of new board bags and backpacks styles. Our other mission is the development of our soft goods line in the next couple of years. So far its consist of t-shirts and beanies but we will soon be seeing the addition of hoodies, more women’s selections, and more overall styles and colorways. Besides, with the economy the way it is, its really time to buckle down and focus on what we do well!

There’s no denying it that snowboarding isn’t an easily accessible sport. What is Ellis doing to attempt making snowboarding more accessible by getting and keeping people interested in snowboarding?

That has been one of our biggest challenges out in the California region. It’s hard to preserve the attention of riders, especially during the off seasons. We seem to get that a lot here. What we have consistently done was focus on strategically placing our events throughout the season to keep the steady stream of interest in the sport. With produced and co-sponsored events we are able to promote not only our brand but the sport through various daytime to night time events(concerts, store sales, to clubs and bars). Besides the constant promotion to the majority of the snow industry (alcoholics), we do participate in a series of co-ops that range from corporate ventures to charity type events that increase the exposure of our brand and snowboarding. From a co-op marketing venture with the Icee corp, to donated products, and lift tickets at particular school charities, we have done a decent amount of street promotions to try to bring awareness of the sport. We know that getting lower income families up to the snow is the challenge and we plan to tackle that in the future by working with some charities that provide trip services for lower income households. We have been talking about it with some of the resorts here to provide discounted lift tickets for these trips. We were going to provide the demo equipment for them to use. It’s still in the works but we are trying to bring new awareness the sport.

This is an ongoing battle that we are constantly fighting.

You’ve been doing a lot of “green” initiatives since you started whether it was bamboo in the core or replacing fiberglass with a Basalt weave. What other steps are you taking to be “green” and what’s your take on how the industry as seemingly jumped on the bandwagon for this?

There are companies on both sides of the spectrum here. We have seen some companies seriously take charge in the green initiative and implement some awesome techniques and practices ( Arbor ) to both use more economically sound materials, down to reducing their carbon footprint. We applaud these companies and strive to follow their lead. Then you have other companies that are seriously using this initiative to capitalize on the situation by claiming some bogus green products. Now that’s sad and pretty shameless too.

Being that we are all from the snow industry, we see the effects of global warming first hand. With that in mind we need to seriously take charge in being environmentally responsible for our actions. Here at Ellis the green initiative is very important to us. We have been taking conscious steps to reduce our footprint. Besides the use of more earth friendly materials like the bamboo and basalt, we are constantly thinking of ways to reduce our waste materials. That’s why on a production level, we are looking into recycled sidewall materials, recycled base materials to use on newly produced boards, Not to mention we are looking into co-ops for recycling the used and returned defective materials with other factories. Our other main concern is our daily waste. That is also one of the reasons we are transitioning online, to reduce the use and waste of paper. Paper is a big amount of our waste as a supplier and business. Next year, we are also replacing hang tags on products with stickers, so they can be used instead of thrown away. We reduced printing this year with the introduction of our digital catalogs and next year we plan to release online catalogs with high res photos. This will save over 240,000 printed pages let alone the ink. Reducing our waste and taking care of our environment is and will remain a high priority for us. We understand that it’s a bit harder for other more established companies to implement, but something needs to be done.

If people get one thing out of what Ellis Snowboards is doing and represents what would you wish that to be?

For the riders by the riders, and for those who want to know more.