Steve “Birdo” Guisinger is a visionary in skate shoes.
Long before chambers of commerce adopted the “buy local” slogan, before slow food and farm-to-table entered the popular lexicon, Guisinger, founder and co-owner of Consolidated Skateboards, battled mega-corporations and made it his mission to educate skaters about the importance of supporting their local skate shops.
It’s paid off for the skater-turned-businessman—so far. Consolidated currently sells its boards in about 30 countries and online. But the war’s not over, and Guisinger marches on, reminding folks about the role independent skate, surf and snowboard shops play in the industry. They’re the ones sponsoring up-and-coming rides, pushing for public skate parks and sponsoring competitions. And Guisinger argues they’re also the best bet for a thriving skateboarding industry that remains healthy and vital no matter what’s happening economically.
He cites a lesson learned from Discovery’s Planet Earth series. “The healthiest and most successful ecosystems are the ones that support the most diversity,” says the 44-year-old Guisinger. “As humans, business is our ecosystem, and our distribution systems are the mom-and-pop, core shops. If one goes out of business, the other ones can fill in.”
That works until a Great Recession comes along. Like other small businesses, mom-and-pop storefronts feel the economic downturn more acutely than a huge corporation with the wherewithal to simply ride it out. What would happen if the mom-and-pops went extinct due to economic pressure from the recession and powerful corporate competitors, leaving the market to, say, Foot Locker?
“It’s so fragile,” Guisinger continues. “If the core shops go out of business and if Foot Locker decides not to carry skateboards—if they decide it’s no longer profitable—then skateboarding just disappears.”
Garage To Globe
Like most forward-thinking, influential companies, Consolidated has the sort of origin story that has become almost mythic.
The year was 1992, a transitional time for skateboarding. In the early 1980s, skating was a fringe sport dominated by rebellious youngsters who didn’t have the means (or the work permits) to make and sell their own products. So it was primarily non-skaters running the skateboard shops and manufacturing companies.
But by the late ’80s and early ’90s, those young skaters were growing up and entering the workforce. “People like me,” says Guisinger, “who thought, ‘I could do this on my own.’”
After five years working for Santa Cruz Skateboards, Guisinger and co-worker Steve Keenan, a skate photographer, decided to start their own company. Four team riders left their endorsements to skate for the young upstart. It was a classically humble beginning. “We were working out of a garage in Pleasure Point,” Guisinger recalls.
Guisinger and Keenan set up shop and started making skateboards. Guisinger also became an advocate of sorts for decriminalizing his sport with the “Plan,” step-by-step instructions on how to legalize skateboarding and build public parks. Skate shops across the U.S. distributed the Plan, Guisinger mailed it out to kids who sent him a buck and a self-addressed, stamped envelope and he publicized it in skate magazines. The concept was simple, he explains: “Make it more expensive for your city to ban skateboarding than to build a public skate park.”
The Plan included steps like: when you get ticketed, always fight it in court. Do not waive your right to a trial. If you are found guilty, choose community service work instead of a fine. In other words, it aspired to prove that skateboarding isn’t the problem, banning skateboarding is the problem because it costs cities money. The Plan also told young skaters to encourage their parents and local shop owners to go to city council meetings and push for public skate parks.
Meanwhile, Consolidated was growing. The company started selling directly to retail stores instead of only to distributors, and soon Keenan’s garage wasn’t big enough. In 1994, the company moved into its current digs, a warehouse on Center Street.
About a year later, Leticia Ruano, Guisinger’s then-girlfriend, started working for the company selling skateboards while she earned her MBA from Santa Clara University. In 1996, Keenan and Guisinger decided to part ways in what Guisinger describes as an “amicable separation;” Keenan was married, he and his wife had kids and she wanted to move to L.A. Guisinger took over the business with more than a little help from Ruano, even though the two had broken up. In 1998 Guisinger offered to make her a partner.
Business was booming. But by the mid-90s, as skateboarding became more popular, big companies like Nike, Adidas and Puma began to notice. So did mall shops like Zumiez, which in 1998 decided to shift its focus to exclusively surf, skate and snowboarding gear and clothing. The chain now operates more than 170 stores in 20 states.
“We had a battle because, as something becomes popular, corporate interests want in, and mall chains owned by people who aren’t skateboarders start popping up,” Ruano says. “I talk to shops on a daily basis, and they suffered and are suffering because of it. I saw core shops close—and these skate shops are the lifeblood of our industry.”
Consolidated refused and still refuses to sell to the chains. “It potentially stifles our growth because we won’t sell to sporting goods stores, mall chains, but we want to have our cake and eat it, too,” Guisinger says.
Adds Ruano: “We’re willing to take the risk that people will understand the importance of supporting your local skate shop.”
For the first five years Consolidated’s business grew steadily in spite of the onslaught. Then the 800-pound gorilla entered the room.
Just Take It Over
“Recently there have been a few big companies who are very involved in basketball, baseball, football, golf, tennis, etc., and are trying to break into our industry by slinging a lot of money around, running some pretty cool TV commercials, and trying to endorse the pros,” begins an ad written by Guisinger. “Where were these companies for the last 20 years when skaters were fighting just to legalize our sport? Now that skating is more widely accepted, they want to jump on the bandwagon, portray themselves as alterna-heroes and take over.”
Nike first attempted to enter the skateboarding industry in 1997. Guisinger responded with the Don’t Do It campaign. He bought advertising space for the aforementioned ad in Thrasher magazine and Transworld Skateboarding magazine, made posters and sent them to shops.
The message was never intended to be anti-big business or anti-commercial, Guisinger says. Rather, it was about opposition to the co-opting of a grassroots movement. “You can’t wait for this to get big and then try to cash in on something that you didn’t build,” he says.
In order for Nike—or any other major company—to make it into the industry, it had to sell its products in core skate shops, which would allow it to gain credibility among skaters.
So Consolidated distributed literature and ads to mom-and-pop shops and explained why letting big sporting goods companies come to the party was a bad idea: They have distribution sites that don’t necessarily include skate shops. They have the deep pockets to put skate shops out of business. They will destroy skateboarding’s soul.
It was an easy sell.
“It went over well,” Guisinger says. “Nike pulled out. Don’t Do It went into hibernation.”
Nike, however, didn’t. The company came back in 2000. This time, it launched an all-out attack. The first volley came under the name of Savier shoes, sold at core skate shops. The second happened about five years later, when Nike entered the industry under its own name, buying big, flashy ads in skateboarding magazines, wining and dining industry reporters with lavish press trips and selling Nike SB shoes “exclusively” to mom-and-pop shops, while selling a similar skate shoe, Nike 6.0, in mall retailers. The company also sponsored top skaters, including Paul Rodriguez, Eric Koston and Brian Anderson, and hosted competitions.
“The truth is,” Guisinger admits, “I have to applaud them on their military strategy.”
Now there’s a new generation of skaters who don’t know what a Nike-free skate industry looks like.
“The older age bracket, 19 and older, what they buy is more influenced by the politics of it as opposed to just who rides for a particular company or ‘What did I see in a magazine,’” says Jason Strubing, owner of Santa Cruz-based Skateworks. “And with the younger kids, so much of it is peer-driven. You get a group of kids that decides, ‘This brand is cool, this brand sucks,’ and that carries a lot of weight.”
The Pacific Avenue shop has two other locations, one in Redwood City and another in Santa Rosa. Santa Cruz skaters are more conscious of buying locally and supporting local business, Strubing says, adding that it may be because of the city’s reputation. “It’s renowned around the world as a skateboard mecca,” he says. “It’s really steeped in skate history.”
Strubing says he prefers to support local and independent companies like Consolidated. But he admits it wouldn’t be financially feasible for him to just say no to carrying Nike.
“It’s kind of a tricky one to work around,” he says. “If a company like Nike is throwing money around and bringing money into the stakeboarding industry, there are some benefits to that.” Besides, he adds, “We carry Nike because I feel like if a kid has chosen Nike as a brand he can identify with, then who am I to say no because of the politics behind it?
“It’s more of a precautionary message: Don’t forget that a brand like this doesn’t come into an industry like this with a motive that isn’t profit-driven. And Nike is the scapegoat for all of the other brands that have similar agendas, whether it be Vans or anything else—you’ve got to hold your nose when you’re turning in the order form.”
These days, all the skate shops in Santa Cruz County that carry shoes sell Nikes.
“Nike is probably the best-selling shoe in the industry,” Guisinger says. “It puts us in a hard place because we want the shops to strive and do well, but they need to carry what people want. So we’re trying to educate people to not want Nikes.”
Passion Play
This brings him to Consolidated’s latest project: the Don’t Do It Foundation.
The skate company recently started the nonprofit. “It’s message,” Guisinger says. “’Keep the surf skate and snowboard industry in the hands of those that are passionate about it.’”
Consolidated is currently revamping its company website, which will include information on the Don’t Do It Foundation in the next month or so. As of now, the site encourages visitors to support their local skateboard shops.
“If all you have is a mall or sporting goods chain in your town, we ask that you don’t support them, and instead order from a skater owned, online store,” it says.
Guisinger sees it as a simple choice. “The only way for local stores to survive is to drive mall chains out of business,” he explains. “So we want people at whatever cost to not support the mall chain. You vote with your money. If you go to the mall chains, you’re only empowering them. Go to your local skate shop. If you don’t have a local skate shop, buy online from a local company.”
To further encourage local support here on the home front, Consolidated recently started its “Thank Local” program, under which it sells boards to Santa Cruz area skate shops at cost, which allows those shops to turn around and sell Consolidated boards to consumers at a steep discount.
At Skateworks, a sign is posted on the wall alongside the Consolidated boards explaining “Thank Local” and telling buyers they’ll save $20 if they purchase one.
“The response is almost disbelief,” Strubing says. “A lot of kids are overjoyed. ‘Wait, these are only 30 bucks?’ They almost do a double take.”
It’s a way of giving back to the community that has supported Consolidated for 18 years, says Guisinger, and hopefully a means to educate a new generation of skateboarders.
“You see sporting goods stores: How many are owned by football players? Soccer players? Basketball players? They can’t compete with the major companies. We don’t want that to happen to surf, skate and snow. That’s why we keep fighting.”
He thinks there’s a strong chance it will work. “Look at family farms, farmer’s markets growing all across the nation. People are starting to realize and think local, and that gives me hope that it’s not a lost cause.”
