Though I still skate no better than the day I started, I’ve spent quite a few summers bombing hills and racking up scars. I honestly can not count how many guys I’ve met over the years totally set on starting their own board company, only to lose the dream before it really began; they’d draft up a dozen designs, get all their friends pumped — and then have absolutely no idea what to do next.
Zazzle.com has gone and made the rest of the process dead simple with the launch of their brand new custom skateboard deck shop, a product of their partnership with artist/former pro skateboarder Andy Howell’s ARTSPROJEKT. You take your design, throw it into Zazzle’s customization system, and they’ll print it up and have it out the door within 24 hours.
As a canvas, you’ve got your choice of standard decks, mini decks, and the oldschool fishboard decks. All of the boards are offered in a variety of widths, so the boat-feeted amongst us are good to go. As far as we can tell from the press release, these aren’t trashy little K-Mart boards – nothin’ but good ol’ seven-ply maple, just as it should be. At a base-price of $60 bucks, you’re getting a one-of-a-kind custom board for just about the same price you’d pay for any old off-the-shelf deck.
As long as the boards look good and ride well, I can’t come up with a single negative thing to say. I’m hoping to get my hands on one of these decks sometime in the next few days, and I’ll report back as soon as I do. In the mean time, go play with the deck designer.
Sounds interesting but will likely go unused pretty soon. One major drawback could be that their boards are likely made in China. Although this isn’t explicitly stated on the site, the fact that they don’t say otherwise is reason enough to think this as other skate companies that do make their boards in the USA make sure you know about it.
As a disclaimer I’m an intern at Zazzle so take my word for what its worth…
I’ve been skateboarding for a really long time and I can vouch for the quality of these boards — i’ve skated enjois,elements, Zero, birdhouse, etc. and these are around the same quality.
The board is Canadian 7-ply maple and manufactured by a well known deck manufacturer (very well respected in the skateboarding world) — so these decks are the same quality as what you’d find from a real board company (not cheap wal-mart decks!)
well actually lemme clarify — The wood quality seems to be at least as good as major deck manufacturers… BUT the graphic is way way way better. I don’t really care about the graphic since I scrape it off anyways but for those who do these decks have very vivid printing.
More and more china manufacturers are using 7 ply Canadian maple. They love to say 7 ply Canadian maple because it makes it look like it is made in the USA. If it does not say made in the USA then it is made in China. Support your country buy only USA made product. Make sure that you know the deck you are buying comes from a USA manufacturing company not some company that is buying from some other manufacturer and slapping some graphic on it for you.
The ‘old school’ model is not a fish by the way, it is more of a zip zinger style.
I called these guys to find out how the graphic is applied.
They beat around the bush when I asked if it was a sticker but when I aksed them if it was like a wrap they did agree.
If you want a sticker on a board go to these Zazzle.com or skateboardwraps.com
There are skateboard manufacturers out there that will make one deck with your graphic at half the price without using a wrap.
Yes? And your alternative ’skateboard manufacturer out there that will make one deck with your graphic at half the price without using a wrap’ is… ? Who?
Yawn.
I’m not sure what a “wrap” is, but here are some close-ups of one of the boards. Maybe someone more knowledgeable than me can tell.
http://blog.zazzle.com/2008/09/02/mohawks-and-the-first-skateboards/
I purchased 3 decks for skate team I’m sponsoring.
The quality of the boards seems to be decent enough according to one of my guys and printing held up good enough against grinding.
I had major issues dealing with zazzle and do not endorse them in any way.
Which is too bad considering i was satisfied with most of the merchandise I recieved. In a tough economy you can’t go treating your customoers like shit!
With reference to Jim Wright’s and Kiz’s comments on decent skateboards at half the price. I agree 100% with Jim. It is obvious that Kiz has not got the faintest idea about what is available out there from Wholesalers and manufacturers.
We currently have somebody who imports very decent skateboards from a USA manufacturer (Quality any day on par with Element, plan B, Zero, Birdhouse etc.) at 200 boards a time. After his profit mark-up, I can still buy a board from him to the the USD equavalent value of $27.
Mimic Skateboards in Huntington Beach has a factory tour on their website. Check it out they have tons of photos of how they make the boards in USA! You can also design the board on their site.