Archive for January, 2008

Grain Home Grown Surfboard kits have been in growing demand from our friends in the UK and Ireland since we first started shipping them over a year ago. As a first step towards getting surfers across the pond hooked up with Grain, we’ve recently signed Magicseaweed on as a European Distributor.

Check out HomeGrown Kits at their online store here.

One of the core values at Grain Surfboards is to operate with as little impact on the environment as possible. We think of our relationship with Magicseaweed is a great step in reaching these goals, allowing us to offer kits on a more practical level without having to ship one kit at a time.

Our long-term goal is to offer our boards and kits in primary surf regions around the world using woods that are not only local to the region but sustainably managed as well. While we haven’t found that resource in Europe yet, we’re certain that the opportunity will present itself. The best of all worlds would be to find a type of wood that was light, rot resistant, strong and beautiful to look at that was in close proximity to the waves. The world would be a great place!

Magicseaweed has become one of the best online resources for surf news, wave forecasts, surf products, photos, travel news and more. Click here to check out the site.

Grain Surfboards was recently given an ESM EMMY by Eastern Surf Magazine and we’re super proud to be named Enviro Hero for 2007 in their recent issue. Here’s the rest of the article with a scan of the article as well.

“With everyone and their sister lining up to claim “green” status in 2007, it was hard to separate the real enviro deal from the growing hoard of eco-johnny-come-latelys. And while plenty of East Coast companies (including Homegrown Foam and Greenlight Surfboard Supply) stepped up to fulfill the growing need for environmentally friendly products, Mike LaVecchia and his company Grain Surfboards garnered attention for different reasons: Mike started handcrafting wooden surfboards purely for fun (after several years involved in snowboard design and boatbuilding); he was a relative newcomer to surfing; he lived in the frigid isolation of Maine; and he didn’t get into the biz with any real hopes of success. In fact, it wasn’t until an Associated Press article (focused on Clark Foam’s shutdown) ran about Mike’s efforts that he received any business at all. Once word of Grain’s efforts got around, so many orders arrived that the company was forced to expand.

LaVecchia and his team of builders get Grain’s wood from a nearby family of growers, who harvest their stock of cedar and spruce at a sustainable pace. And aside from a milling machine and power sander, all of Grain’s work is done with hand tools. National attention from NPR and the AP helped LaVecchia’s cause, but his company remains a local force employing local workers; they just so happen to operate within an increasingly profitable international market. Hailing from their secluded pocket of the East Coast, Grain Surfboards and Mike LaVecchia were an easy choice for our Enviro Hero of 2007.”

Grain Surfboards has been concerned with reducing the environmental impact of our surfing since the beginning. Our green ethic has become integral, not incidental - and resulting in action, not hype. It started with the simple choice of wood over other, toxic alternatives and has continued through our apparel product line.

Those humble beginnings were the roots of what would become a top-to-bottom commitment to reducing impacts at every level of our operations. We expect 2008 to bring with it a series of exciting new developments in this area that we will be pleased to share.

A first is our new partnership with Capeboatworks. Starting this year, Capeboatworks will be milling and packing Homegrown surfboard kits for us – in New South Wales, Australia. You might ask: Why is a boat shop in Australia an exciting new step for us in protecting the environment?

The answer is “carbon”. Carbon emissions account for 72% of the total effects of global warming. The greatest contribution Grain could make in slowing global warming would be to reduce or eliminate carbon dioxide emissions. Well, it also turns out that 14% of all man-made greenhouse gasses are cranked out by transportation fuels. (Click for Data: Global Warming Art Project)

So it stands to reason that getting Grain Surfboards and Home Grown Kits to one of the largest surf markets in the world - which is also pretty far from Maine – is the best place to reduce transportation impacts. So instead of shipping kits with wood from our local forests in Maine all the way to Australia, Capeboatworks will save literally ten-thousand miles worth of carbon emissions from transportation by using farm-grown Paulownia from their own neck of the woods.

A wood originally native to China, Paulownia makes great surfboards. Like our own northern white cedar, it has not been in common use for hollow boards, but has the properties needed - it’s lightweight, and can be harvested at a sustainable-yield rate, all of which make Paulownia a great choice for a greener alternative to foam.

If you live in or around Australia you should be able to get a Paulownia Home Grown Surfboard Kit from Capeboatworks in the near future. Watch this blog for news, or subscribe to our newsletter at the bottom of this page.

Though we still have a long way to go, we are excited about all the opportunities we are uncovering to lessen our impact on the planet as we build and surf wooden surfboards. The partnership with Capeboatworks is just one more step forward, that gets us a great, new friend “down-under” and a way to do better for the planet.

Clean, green machine: the oceans absorb 33% of man-made atmospheric carbon

To see just how far Australia is from York Maine… and how fast global temps are hitting the roof lately, check out this animation. (Watch the years scroll by at the top-left, and the how fast things happen in the last couple of decades.)

We’re excited to announce a partnership with Wooden Boat Magazine to offer a wooden surfboard building course from June 22-28, 2008 at Wooden Boat’s campus in Brooklin, Maine.

This one-week class will be taught by our own board builders from the Grain Shop. Students will learn basic surfboard design concepts, the simple application of steam to manipulate wood into shapes, adhesive applications, glassing, and effective use of epoxy. Fiberglassing demonstrations will be held in the evenings to help students with the basics. At weeks’ end, each student will take home his/her own brand-new Grain Surfboard with the skills and confidence needed for fiberglassing and finishing (epoxy and glass are included with the course.)

Brooklin, Maine offers everyone who arrives an unbelievably rich environment for learning and relaxing. Located in a breathtakingly beautiful region of the Maine coast (a five-hour drive north of Boston, MA), their 60-acre “saltwater campus” encourages both faculty and students to feel at home and happily immerse themselves in a world of woodworking.

Find out more by clicking here.

If you’re in the metropolitan Philadelphia area and are looking for something to fill your quiet winter weekends, check out the Philadelphia Wooden Boat Factory’s course offerings. They will be offering a wooden surfboard building class starting in late January and running for three consecutive weekends. Find out more about this class by clicking here.