Bong in big trouble

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Nick Carroll
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Nick Carroll » Thu Feb 23, 2012 3:52 pm

^^^reminds me of some stupid arse Hollywood Old Man Epic

"Surf Takedown"

starring Clint Eastwood, Jack Nicholson, David Carradine et al as a bunch of old Army buddies who decide to tear apart the corrupt Surf Industry Corpos with their aging bare hands and old school military knowhow

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Grooter » Thu Feb 23, 2012 4:22 pm

Anyone here read this?

Image

Good read.

A few months ago I noticed, get this, Quiksilver prescription glasses. :?

I mean seriously what the hell?

Fcuk them all.
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by robzig » Thu Feb 23, 2012 5:42 pm

:|
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Nick Carroll » Thu Feb 23, 2012 7:18 pm

That's funny, I ran into a guy I know who works at Hurley only a few days ago, his name is Evan Slater and he works out of the CA office in a fairly senior role, and he doesn't seem even remotely worried.

You don't just throw away highly successful brands just 'cause it's not neat or whatever. Nike tossed 6.0 because that was their true lead-in to surf, not Hurley. 6.0 cost money.

I dunno what everybody is so afraid of with Nike et al, I can see how the surf co's view them as potentially scary competition but if you're like most people on this site and aver contempt for the surf brands, then what of it?

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by MXNDOG » Thu Feb 23, 2012 8:08 pm

did a few repeat plays...think he was just tired

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Hollowed out » Thu Feb 23, 2012 8:30 pm

Doubt if any one of the wankers who have raided surf companies would ever go close to qualifying for a VC (the bravery type) as they are chicken shit with no guts...just money, and that is not even theirs but some fool who invested with them.
A book....A book, now that is far to much flattery than one can accept, the only copy that would sell would be the one I was forced to buy to pay back the publisher...unless NC was the presenter , then all cred would be restored and success a no brainer.
But to digress, real lives, real surfers, real future of the sport is being controlled now largely be greedy wankers...I care because it is wrong, I care because they do not...should you care, hey, up to you

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Skipper » Thu Feb 23, 2012 9:58 pm

Dig your passionate analysis and understanding of these shennanigans Hollow'd but..... 'They'.... these faceless men perhaps? ...can control all the sport side of surfing they can squeeze a buck from. Can't say it really has any impact on my passion for doing it. If you wanna keep it real, there's no real problem, aside from crowds and crap days. There's ways and means of avoiding these.

Sure, the commodification of surfing annoys me. I'll bitch about it. Slag em off at any opportunity. Bemoan the whole corporate circus. And feel generally despairing about what surfing, as a way of life, has/ will become. Try not to stress about it. There's enough of that just living. Surfing assuages this.
But care? Dunno. Pro'lly not much.

After all, They can't take my stoke away.

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Nick Carroll » Fri Feb 24, 2012 5:55 am

Well I care. I think most of the surf cos were built on solid foundations from cool small to medium sized businesses, who made shit I was stoked to buy and wear when I was a kid. A lot of the guys who started them and worked for them were as into surfing as I was, and a few of 'em still are. Those days might be hard to recall now but they were as real as Morning Of The Earth, Free Ride, 5'10" twinnies and the Coke Surfabout in their day. The companies gave good jobs to a lot of my friends and paid quite a few more of 'em just to go surfing, which I always thought was the best rort you could ever manage. The great danger to all that was the co's would grow too big and lose touch with their roots -- as cliched as that sounds -- and in some cases that seems to have happened, with all the attending corporate strife etc, but you can't just divorce yourself from that sort of thing and pretend you're above it, we all work for various businesses etc and we have all made various compromises at times just to get on with life and be somewhat effective. I can't say I'm busted up by worry over the crew at Bong right now, they're all well paid and whatever happens they'll be fine, but I still don't like watching part of my culture -- however spavined -- in the throes of being dismantled by a bunch of chicken shit money rinsers who as hollowed says aren't even playing with their own cash.

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by swvic » Fri Feb 24, 2012 8:10 am

Agree with how cool all that shit once was Nick. Those businesses (most prob weren't companies yet) seemed a real part of the whole thing. I realised things had changed when middle-aged fat bastards who'd never surfed began dressing in my uniform. Excepting the necessary surfing accessories, I don't give my custom anymore so I don't give a shit about what happens. Just part of the corporate world. I do however, care about the likes of Base. Despite suits in offices, the crew producing the boards on the floor are the ones potentially losing a livelihood. Hopefully most of them have been reabsorbed by the industry
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by crabmeat thompson » Fri Feb 24, 2012 8:53 am

As many have pointed out elsewhere. Everything which is wrong with the surfing industry was on offer last night on the gold coast.

While the pros and their industry cohort indulged in a $300 per head, dressed to the nines, blue carpet banquet ... shapers from the length and breadth of the country had a sausage sizzle and conducted a forum on how they can not just compete with rising costs and foreign imports, but how they can just stay in business.

After watching Chris Garrett have to move to Indo to keep shaping, after his accountant told him to close his doors, go home and receive the dole, he'll make more money, you know shit is fcuked up in 'our' industry.

Been getting boards off Chris since I was 13. Not anymore.
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by steve shearer » Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:04 am

Appreciate your candour Nick but I'm with Skipp and I strongly believe that unless you work for a surf corp or are a pro surfer that is the prevailing view amongst the mass of rec surfers who do it for the love of it.

The Big clothing corps built vast fortunes on selling over-priced gear with huge mark-ups based on overseas production and "brand" value built on surf celebrity.

A long time ago they lost the affection and loyalty of core surfers. It was commonplace for Pro surfers and photogs etc ect to refer to Rec surfers as "donkeys" and treat them as nothing more than a hindrance to their core task of capturing themselves surfing and getting in the magazines. That kind of open arrogance and hubris generates it's own blowback.

Now, in these troubled economic times they find themselves friendless amongst what should have been their core markets and prey to money which they courted so assiduously when it seemed the feast would never end.

Observing the vast wealth and personal opulence displayed by the scions of the industry makes it impossible to feel empathy.....they are simply so far in the stratosphere how could they possibly understand the concerns of everyday surfers?

In a sentence, they very clearly made their own beds and now they have to lie in it.
Last edited by steve shearer on Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Beanpole » Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:05 am

Don't forget pumping sand around the corner from badly eroded Fingal to puff up the sand banks for the comp.
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by crabmeat thompson » Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:13 am

ˆˆ I'm inclined to agree. Am I nostalgic about my surfing roots and what they meant to me? Sure, and that includes the logos I use to wear.

But ... the companies I once thought much of and probably borderline loved, are so far removed from who and what they were, there is little room for sympathy for them.

Another great story about Billabong and Gordon Merchant.

He builds the world's biggest weekender at Angourie. Cost 15.6 million. This year rates are due to hit the 4 grand mark and the in the coming 12-24 months exceed $5000 per year.

A guy like Dahlberg who's lived most of his life at Angourie shaping some of the best boards on the east coast has now reached critical mass where he can't afford his yearly rates bill and is now looking to have to move.

Dahlberg told me Gordon's mansion was the tipping point in land rates for the area to explode.
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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Skipper » Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:57 am

Well I detect a wiff of eu de nostalgia  Nick. You mellowing?
Surely your not suggesting it was better in the 'old days'....
Don't  you think that same 'rort' of paid (free) surfing has simply been taken to it's ultimate capitalist expression  with the dismantling of the culture by greedy money men.  Funding that rort comes at some cost . Sure, it's minuscule compared to the excesses of the CEO's etc....But as a symbolic expression of the value of the industry to a handful of chosen ones?
Like any business, a grass roots surfers' industry has to return something to its stakeholders.  I'm not so sure that a rort for a select few's 'stoke' is it. You can only get off on the pics and vids to a limited degree. 
But maybe that's the trade off.  If I wanna see great surfers in great waves..(when I'm not getting my fill in mediocrity)..how should this be financed without compromising the needs, wants and integrity of the greater surfing population. ?

As far as this  current situation goes,  I've  never been attached to it,  so divorce doesn't figure. And  I've stopped being a part of, or amongst it.  So feeling 'above it' isn't necessary.  I haven't had an investment in the industry since '77. 
I'm past wanting individualistic apparel to identify me as a surfer. Yoof of today feel different no doubt. But the mindset of the average yoof surfer is shifting all over cultural and social opportunities, and hence the current growth in 'return to roots' style' industries. 
Perhaps this shifting IS a sign of a return to some of the values of yesteryear, albeit with a digital savvy.  
We don't have to pay the piper directly for our vicarious amusement.  Plenty of free thrills on offer across the web.

What about Smorgasboarder  as an example 
of contemporary grass rootsness. ? Relevant, informative,  knowing to its readers  needs and expectations.... what else? Oh yeah  it's free man.

How can other small- medium businesses in other areas of surfing's industry offer the same without compromise to appease capital investment that demands high returns? 
Not saying free, but value for dollar. Like the good ol' days. 

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by alakaboo » Fri Feb 24, 2012 10:23 am

Managed to get 'spavined' into another post, Nick.
Braithy wrote:Dahlberg told me Gordon's mansion was the tipping point in land rates for the area to explode.
Sorry Braithy, but in the valuation process it would be regarded as an outlier. Won't have any impact on general rates.
The amount (% wise) of rates increases is actually restricted quite heavily by DLG and doesn't keep up with the increasing costs of service provision.
Which, in a roundabout way, is why massive inappropriate coastal developments get approved in the first place, they need the cash.
Remove the reliance of local councils on development income, both from developers and subsequent rates, and you'd go a long way to reducing the impacts of coastal sprawl.

Most of you blokes have at least 1 if not 2 decades on me, so my perspective is a bit different.
Pro surfing and the growth of the companies involved, apart from providing entertainment, has had very little impact on me. Though my brothers all worked in surf shops so I got cheap stuff and they could tell me what got returned or was made better.
I've never really been into wearing logos, anything that has pictures was more my thing.
Used to like SMP, MCD and Ben Severson Designs, they seemed to be made properly.
The few times I have surfed with pros, they've been perfect gentlemen.

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Wingnut » Fri Feb 24, 2012 10:37 am

skipper wrote: What about Smorgasboarder  as an example 
of contemporary grass rootsness. ? Relevant, informative,  knowing to its readers  needs and expectations.... what else? Oh yeah  it's free man.
I really don't give a crap if the surf industry folds, as long as I can still buy a wetsuit and a board from my local shaper...

I like where you are going with grassroots skipper but...Smorgasboarder...Really? :shock:

It's no different to many of the mags on the market today, other than being free...little reading content with substance, numerous ads and entrepreneur's sprucing their getaways under the pretence of appealing to surfers!

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by Nick Carroll » Fri Feb 24, 2012 10:43 am

skipper wrote:Well I detect a wiff of eu de nostalgia  Nick. You mellowing?
Surely your not suggesting it was better in the 'old days'....
Fcuk no! I'm just putting forth my point of view.

Actually I am probably mellowing a bit

But when I say "you can't just divorce yourself" etc I do mean it in a more general sense, I bet almost everyone on this forum has worked for some corpo or other at times, some might have built good businesses and some shithouse ones, some might even have done things they shouldn't have! we are all stained by the dirty brush of Commerce, so trying to act above it where surf companies are concerned is a bit rich IMO.

Like there but for the grace of god, etc. Schadenfreude is best indulged in cautiously I reckon.
Last edited by Nick Carroll on Fri Feb 24, 2012 10:50 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Bong in big trouble

Post by crabmeat thompson » Fri Feb 24, 2012 10:47 am

saltman wrote:
Rates are based on unimproved value of land so its hard to see how the size and cost of your neighbours pad would have a substantial effect on your rates.
Is this australian legislation? ie can individual councils add or subtract to rates as they see fit? RD was adamant, the recent building of the palace had everything to do with his current problem.
Kunji wrote:
Wed May 27, 2020 8:09 am
Would you mind throwing in a little more homoeroticism

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