Filling in the blanks

With the world’s largest maker of foam surfboard blanks abruptly closing, many board shapers are left scrambling for the materials needed for their craft, livelihoods.A sudden shortage in the foam blanks used to make surfboards has forced dozens in the Orange County surfing industry to rapidly evolve their businesses or close up shop.

Shapers have had to switch to new Styrofoam blanks, glassers have switched to new epoxy resins, board shops have jacked up prices and professional surfers have started to look at riding carbon-fiber and Tuflit boards made overseas.

The dramatic change comes because one man who controlled more than 90% of the world’s urethane foam decided to call it quits this month and cut off hundreds of shapers from their supply chain.

Citing an environmental crackdown from the federal government, surfing pioneer Gordon “Grubbie” Clark said he was closing down his Laguna Niguel plant and getting out of the foam business. Environmental agencies denied any crackdown existed, but the closure set off a massive panic in the surfing industry.

“The sky is falling in the surfing world,” said T.K. Brimer, owner of the Frog House surf shop in Newport Beach.

While the crisis set off an unprecedented panic, it forced surfers to adopt new technologies that have been evolving for decades and to master them practically overnight

Huntington Beach shaper Barry Vandermeulen said he has started looking for alternatives and is using epoxy. Unlike normal urethane boards, epoxies are shaped from Styrofoam and then sealed with epoxy resin. Many shapers have resisted the switch because the Styrofoam is lighter than other materials and the epoxy resin is more difficult to apply than traditional fiberglass.

“It’s so new, I don’t even know how I’m going to sign this thing,” Vandermeulen joked while shaping a short board in his studio.

Despite the headache, the result is a stronger, thinner and more buoyant surfboard that can move faster on steep waves. Vandermeulen said the foam and resin material used in epoxy boards don’t give off the toxic emissions that traditional foam does.

“I’m being forced to make this switch, but when I told my customers about epoxy, almost 75% of them said they wanted to switch too,” he said.Other shapers are holding out to find more foam and conserve what they have left. Sean Hagar of Hobie Surf Boards in Laguna Beach said he had enough foam to last the company through Christmas, while Huntington Beach longboard legend Robert August said he could keep going for a few more months. He said he expected dozens of enterprising surfers to try and jump in and fill the gap.

“It’s a business and it isn’t exactly rocket science to create a foam blank,” August said. “There’s 1,000 people that want to buy surfboard blanks tomorrow.”

But that means shapers are going to have to start looking for foam on their own instead of relying on Clark Foam sales reps. August said he has spent many hours calling Australia, Asia and South Africa looking for factories that produce urethane blanks.

Unlike Clark, which allowed customers to buy a few boards at a time, shapers are now going to have to purchase boards in large volumes and ship them in from around the world. Vandermeulen said before he would buy about 10 boards at a time; now he’s had to front $80,000 to import a container of 600 blanks. Shapers who can’t come up with that kind of cash are in trouble.

But even with the difficulties, many in the surf industry believe a shake-up to de-concentrate the foam blank business isn’t all bad.

“This is a major bump in the road, but something we need to shake everyone up,” Hagar said. “We were operating under a monopoly.”

* DAVE BROOKS covers City Hall. He can be reached at (714) 966-4609 or by e-mail at [email protected].

20051215irgs0tknKENT TREPTOW / INDEPENDENT(LA)Surfboard shaper Barry Vandermeulen works on an epoxy blank at his shop in Huntington Beach on Tuesday. Vandermeulen and other shapers are having to turning to epoxy materials during the foam shortage caused by the closing earlier this month of industry leader Clark Foam.