Fancy a Magic Quiver? We talk to the boss.

What do Josh Hall, Neal Purchase Jnr, Rich Pavel & Ryan Lovelace have in common? Bear with me and I will explain.

It was a cold, rainy day in Ericeira as I went slipping and sliding through town and being a bit late and anxious about my meeting with the guy that built the best surf shop in town. It would later turn out that in fact time, in Portugal, is more of a rough guide line.

Magic Quiver is one of those shops that leaves you feeling all warm inside after you spend money. You know the ones I mean, the ones that still provide actual customer service while not trying to jump on you and shove stuff down your throat. To top of the friendly, relaxed but informed vibe in the shop they also have THE best coffee I have ever tried in the world. I do not say this lightly as I love all different sorts of coffee. I will not try and put this experience into words but instead insist that you take my word for it and try some yourself.

Why was a surf shop in Ericeira so interesting and why did I want to talk to the owner? The truth is I did not know why, I was just following my nose at the time but it turns out my nose is a good one.

I had just finished an Interview with one of the most talented surfboard shapers in the world today, Nico from Wavegliders, and he mentioned there was a shop in town (Ericeira) that stocked a lot of his boards and maybe I should check it out. I did and wanted to share what I found out with you. Rui, founder and joint owner agreed to sit down with me and go on the record...

SB: So this is the coolest shop I have ever been in Rui, where and when did you have the idea?

Rui: Thanks a lot. Magic Quiver started life in 2007 as a blog. I had finished surfing one day and was kind of fed up with the boards I was riding at the time, the standard short board shape. I had been reading a lot about different boards you could ride in forums etc and I wanted to try something different. The fish shape caught my attention and I wanted to try one. The trouble is, what was available in Portugal then was really really bad, that’s when I started the blog, to talk about different surfboards in Portugal and different waves and all sorts of stuff, back then no one was doing this.

SB: How did it transition into the shop?

Rui: Well as I said I really wanted to ride a proper fish and I could not get one in Portugal back then. I decided to get one from Rich Pavel (San Diego) which turned out to be pretty much impossible, you had to order by email and you got an automated response saying he was not taking any orders for 18 months. After a number of failed attempts to contact him I decided to write him a letter and fax it instead. As luck would have it, Rich was just coming into work to start shaping at 6am Californian time and saw the fax come through. No one else was faxing at that time on a Saturday morning, so he read it and 5 mins later Rich Pavel was calling me on the phone. The order time was still too long so he put me in touch with Rainbow who where making boards for him at the time. I ordered four boards to make the shipping worthwhile, one for me and I sold three to friends. That’s when I decided to make a business out of it and Magic Quiver was born.

SB: Any plans to expand now that the shop is booming?

Rui: Oooohh yes, we had a pop up store in Lisbon, it was only supposed to be for a couple of months but it went so well we decided to keep it until the end of the year and then open a street store there. It is really exciting for us to expand into Lisbon as that will be a bit more all year around.

A little video of the Electric party at Magic Quiver this summer.

SB: I see you have Wavegilders boards for sale in the shop, how did you come to know Nico?

Rui: Well thats a long story. Nico first contacted me in early 2009. He has just moved from his old job and he was starting Wavegliders. Nico was having a hard time getting his boards on the market, he was a good shaper but had only sold boards to friends and someone gave him my number to help him with the rest of the process. In the end I was involved with every part of Wavegliders apart from the shaping and glassing, from graphics right through blog, emails and selling. For the first year and a half Wavegliders was just me and Nico, I had the technical information from talking to the other shapers online and Nico had the raw talent to make it a reality. I really was just doing if for fun.

SB: Did you guys have any outside help at all with Wavegliders?

Rui: We where very lucky with the timing because later that year we had Josh Hall come and stay for 6 days, I was chatting to him online and it turned out he was on the way to see some friends in Salamanca in Spain where he went to University. He agreed to stop for a week with us and you could see the difference that made, just loads of talking about design and how little differences changed everything. It was like having access to a walking encyclopedia for building surfboards.

The next year Ryan Lovelace was becoming really popular, there where a lot of his board shapes flying around online. I was joking with him about coming over because he was just a kid back then. He said yes lets do it and so he got on the plane and came over to Ericeira, his first trip outside California. With his input too, you could see Waveglider boards just getting better and better.

SB: I have got a Waveglidders board, the 'Picky' model, I understand that has something to do with you?

Rui: The Picky was born around the time I was selling a lot of boards online, in 2009. I was getting boards from the US and from France and all over, I learnt a lot about the difference between a good and a bad glass job. At the same time I was getting boards from another Portuguese factory in Ericeira and I was picking them up saying, look at this glass job, no one will buy this, just taking note of all mistakes and I became know as the 'picky' guy. It was a little time after that at Wavegliders that we talked about making a new model for the winter waves, something that would hold in the pocket a bit better so we came up with this round tail quad that was based on the fish design, when I cam to pick up the first one, it was named the 'Picky' as a joke and it stuck.

SB: Changing the subject, could you explain what it feels like to catch a wave to a non-surfer?

Rui: What. No, it's impossible. Well, I was hooked from the first moment I caught a wave. Surfing is more about moments, you know. Moments that stay with you forever.

SB: Would you like to see Kelly Slater win another world title?

Rui: Yes, of course, because for me its making a point that the old guys, the old power/rail surf, still the best and specially when the waves are big its about experience, not jumping like a skater.

SB: Well I did have a lot of other questions for Rui, mainly about the shop and how he managed to get the formula so right but (and this is a testament to how cool the place is) we just ended up waffling about waves, surfing, stories and before I knew it my time was up.

If you are in Lisbon or Ericeira I can't stress enough the need to experience the right formula in a shop, something that perhaps is lost these days. A good surf shop can be like the centre of a surfing community, a place to get help, a place to have a chat, a place to have the best coffee if your life or maybe even buy something.