Tech Talk: Why are boards so expensive?
30.05.2022
What’s up guys. Welcome back to another Appletree Surfboards tech talk video. My name is Wieger, co-founder of Appletree Surfboards and today we’re going to talk about: Why are boards so expensive.
Boards are build to order
So this is always a funny one. I know the boards are not cheap and there’s a reason for this. We’re not making tons of money. The boards are just very hard to produce. We are one of the few brands that actually have everything in house. We own our own production facility in Portugal and we do the whole production ourself. Each board is actually produced to order. We have a few boards in stock, but we do a lot of boards that are only built when they are ordered. This is also because of environmental reasons. We want to avoid overproduction, because this often leads to a throw-away society. But this doesn’t fully answer the question yet. How can we justify the sales price of the boards? There are a few reasons.
Shaping boards is a lot of manual work
Number one, there’s a lot of manual labor going on in the boards. Which makes boards more expensive. The initial rough cut of the blanks is done by our CNC machines. But everything that follows is handwork. From precise shaping to hot coating and final sanding. It’s a lot of manual work.
Produced in Europe
Producing in Europe is not the cheapest. It’s not cheap like as it is in Asia. But this has been a conscious decision on our part. Not only do we like to keep the production in Europe and source the materials locally. We also want to comply with European working standards. The Appletree factory looks almost like a lab, extremely clean and organized. We like to take care of our people. Besides that, the people that work for us are actual surfers. They like what they do. They are passionate about surfing, about kiting and that comes at a price.
Well sourced (bio) materials
Secondly, top quality materials. So carbon fiber, the type of foam that we use, the type of epoxy resin that we use, it’s all bio based. It’s well sourced. I know people say, this is carbon fiber and then that’s it. But within carbon fiber or even glass fiber, there are so many different types. At Appletree we always try to go for the top quality ones. And unfortunately they do come at an extra cost. We only use eco based epoxy resins. They are slightly more expensive, but they’re way better for the environment and they’re also way better for the people that work with them. So it’s the choices we make that make the board a quality product. But unfortunately also a little bit more expensive.
Build by surfers, for surfers
I hope that this explains a little bit why the boards are not the cheapest, but you get what you pay for. You won’t have people who are far out of touch with the product, that don’t have anything to do with surfing, producing your board in an unhealthy environment. We try to take care of our people and we try to give you a board that is the actual quality that you want to have and will last as long as possible. Which actually makes them less expensive in the long run.
That’s it for today. Hope to see you next time in a new tech talk video. Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel, so you don’t miss any of our future updates and we hope to see you again soon.
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