SkunkWorks are the kings of soft tops

Tell me something cooler than surfing, I double dare you. Our beloved pastime is everywhere, has backing from huge multinationals under the guise of the 'surf cool' umbrella. Everyone is selling the lifestyle, driving the price of being a 'surfer' up. This year's stuff, bio this, eco that, buy my boardies, my t-shirt brand to the point that we now have brands that are not brands. Too not be a brand is the new cool. The laboured point is that there are those who are here to make a fast buck off the image of being a surfer, and those who are offering products with a difference. The market is saturated and it is confusing, so how do you know what to think, what to research and what to believe.

Well it just so happens that at Surf Bunker we hold no allegiance to anyone. Our mission is to tell it how it is. In an industry that is crying out for credibility, we want to be a truth.

There, now I have the juices flowing in the right direction, I would like to veer this conversation to a product that gets little press and perhaps should as there are more of them than any other surfboard in  the world. The foamie.

Yep, that's right there are now around three times as many soft and foamie surfboards in the world than any other type of surfboard. Surfing is booming, more surf schools, more surf camps and more foamies. It is the silent market and one that buys in bulk.

There are lots of directions that we could go from here but today I would like to take the moral high-ground. I would like for us to think eco on this one. The whole surfing world is trying so hard to steer the ugly bus without power steering around to get on the eco-highway with boardshorts made from old fishing nets to recycled plastic bottled leashes. It might seem that soft top surfboards have been forgotten about. As by far the biggest selling, most used surfboards in the water today, soft top surfboards are about as eco-conscious as the oil and gas industry.

Most soft tops are made from polyethylene or polypropylene and are not recyclable in any way, they have a certain shelf life which depends on how much they are used, left in the sun and just treated generally then they need to be replaced. There must be a an alternative and there is. A few companies have started to make more eco conscious surfboards and we were lucky enough to catch up with the co-founder of one for a bite to eat and a beer. What we found out was eye-opening to say the least.

Ricky Martin and his brother had a dream of a greener future that is based around honesty and credibility, something that has been long forgotten in this wild west cuthroat world of spreadsheets and balance sheets. The surf industry today is all about taking your cash, and when you are dealing with large orders, surf schools, surf camps and alike, price is important, but at what cost.

Ricky's company is called Skunkworks Surf Co and they make a different sort of soft top surfboard. The two brothers want to make longer lasting, better built, eco friendly soft top surfboards. Having been through the design and testing phase, their board technology includes using recycled aluminium double stringers and a custom made recycled foam. Every detail of Skunkworks surfboards has be re-thunk from the ground up to give improved performance, a stiffer more responsive ride, improved durability, locally sourced materials, and the whole construction process takes place under our very noses in Europe. In Northern Ireland to be precise.

Rather than bang on about the substantial benefits of changing the way the world works on an eco level and the superiority of the Skunkworks surfboard we thought we would fire some questions at Ricky so you can get an expanded vision of the possibilities.

SB: Hey Ricky, great to meet you, thanks for your time. When did it all start for you guys. What made you realize there was a need for Skunworks Surfboards?

Ricky: It started about four years ago in my garage. I had asked my brother Chris to come and help me repair all the boards I had for my surf school as they had fallen apart - we were discussing how bad it was from a business perspective and for the environment so we decided to try and do something about it.

SB: In a nutshell, what is better about your soft tops from an eco standpoint, durability and performance?

Ricky: From an eco-perspective we try to have the environment at the core of our decision making process. We use as much recycled material as we can (for example our stringers are 100% recycled aluminium), we investigate the businesses which we partner with to make sure that they have strong eco-values, and in-house we have a target to be waste free by 2020. We are far from perfect but trying our best... even little things like switching a light off when you leave a room - it all builds up!

From a durability point of view we decided that we needed to eliminate glue from our process - all of our materials are heat-bonded. We also designed our board from the perspective of a surf school owner and have done our best to make it as durable as possible, but we will always be improving, this is why we insisted on manufacturing ourselves in Northern Ireland rather going to China.

From a performance stand point we wanted a range of boards to suit everyone - our 8ft for example is nice and wide with loads of volume, it is a wave catching machine! Because it has the extra width it allows everyone from kids to really big guys to get to their feet easily. Our 7ft is a great board for both kids and surfers who feel they are progressing to intermediate level - again it catches everything and excellent manoeuvrability, it is the board of choice now for most of the SkunkWorks factory! All of our boards are designed by Rosy (Rosy Surfboards) who is Ireland's top shaper and can hold his own against the best of the best.

SB: We hear you guys have been involved in a project with Jaguar Land Rover to make surfboards out of old cars. How did that come about?

Ricky: JLR approached us to see if we could make high-performance surfboards from their waste material and obviously we said yes! The foam is a bi-product from their prototyping process and usually ends up in a landfill. Partnering with Rosy we have now made ten boards, five of which I brought to LA last week for the LA Auto Show and had a great day surfing them at Manhattan beach!

SB: How much has Rosy brought to the table?

Ricky: Rosy is quite simply Ireland's number one shaper - we have all admired his work for a long time. The combination of SkunkWorks technology and engineering coupled with Rosy's knowledge of shapes, dimensions, materials and everything else he is an essential part of our team.

SB: We love the fact that you are all about transparency and honesty, what benefits would this have to the customer?

Ricky: It means they never get bullshitted, even when things go wrong. There is nothing that infuriates me more than being lied to, we have had a policy from day one at SkunkWorks, nobody tells a lie ever, either internally or externally. It sounds like a very obvious thing but in reality few businesses play by this rule - if our customers ask us something they get told the truth and it is a very liberating experience! We have such a close relationship with our customers and consider them a really important part of our team.

SB: A little bird told us that you have had some help from a NASA scientist, is that true?

Ricky: Ha ha yes, believe it or not! When we started out we had a mentor Ronan Cunningham from Galway, who, along with some of the world best engineers, started a company called ATA Engineering in San Diego - they do lots of testing for NASA's rockets etc. As well as being engineering geniuses they are fanatical surfers and were stoked to hear what we were doing, Chris spent hours on Skype with them in California going over our machinery and processes... pretty cool! We even went to meet them in 2016 in San Diego, we owe them a lot.

SB: What do you see as future projects for Skunkworks?

Ricky: We have just released our leash which we think is one of the strongest in the world. It was designed in Belfast and is patent-pending... our team rider Al Mennie is giving it some punishing testing in huge cold Irish surf! Al is one of the top big wave surfers globally so to have him endorse our product is amazing, having a leash that holds is no joke in these conditions, it can save your life.

We have also been testing it in Belfast Met materials lab and it is kicking some serious butt against the biggest brands in the world so watch this space! We also have several other products in the pipeline but they are a secret for the moment!

SB: A great thanks to Ricky for his time as we know he is one of the busiest people on the planet at the moment. SkunkWorks is the real deal, there is literally no bad side to it, just a massive win so why not think about your next soft top (or squabble of) being from them.

The new SkunkWorks leash is coming to the review part of our site and Cei will be testing it in decent sized Portuguese waves. We hear great things so lets see how they go.