Local inventor’s GripBoard brings surf something new
It’s said that some of the best ideas are born of despair. For Thorpe “Sharky” Reeder, that expression is all too true, and the Capistrano Beach inventor-artist-fisherman hopes one day that the resulting idea will one day pay off in financial success.
Reeder is the inventor of the GripBoard, a wave riding device that fills the void between bodysurfing and bodyboarding. Reeder invented the concept when in 1979, two years after moving to California from Florida, he suffered a vicious skateboarding accident that made standing up on a surfboard too difficult. A lifelong waterman, he started looking around for other wave riding products after trying bodyboarding and disliking it. He couldn’t find anything, so he made his own device. His first crude model was fashioned from a serving tray from McDonald’s onto which he shaped and screwed two teak fins (he was building a boat at the time and had extra teak lying around) and glued a handle made of rubber hose. That model morphed in 1982 into a form made of foam and glass, like a surfboard, that looks much like the GripBoards of today.
The board’s evolution took a break as life intervened, but following a breakup with his wife, Reeder started working on the board again in 1996, finally getting the handle the way he wanted it and naming it the Surf Squirt Bodyboard. The board was shaped like a mini surfboard complete with twin fins on the bottom and had a rubber handle that worked much like a joystick. In 1998 he made his first production model of molded plastic injected with foam with the rubber handle, and in 2000 earned a U.S. patent for it. In 2005 he focused on building the business, perfected his rubberized joystick handle, and got a line of credit to start mass production. Last year he took on a partner, San Juan Capistrano businessman Davis Goodman, who is helping market the product they renamed a GripBoard. There are two versions of it—a 23-inch model and 31-inch model. The boards list for $79.99 and $89.99 respectively.
To date Reeder has sold around 200 boards, but he hopes to grow the business to where he’s selling upwards of 3,000 a year. He’s marketing the boards at key industry trade events, and big name surfers such as Greg Noll, Tom Curren, Corky Carroll and Jeff Clark have recently bought them. A handful of surf shops nationwide carry the boards, and that number is growing.
“Last year we showed the boards off at the ASR [Action Sports Retailer] show in San Diego and Tom Morey [the inventor of the Boogie Board] said that the fins and grip handle were the most innovative improvements to wave riding he’d seen in years,” said Reeder, 50, who assembles and distributes the boards himself out of his trailer home in Capo Beach. “We’re marketing it primarily on the Web site but are looking for investors so we can take the business to the next level.”
With the new branding in place, Reeder is encouraged by the response to the product now that he has all of the kinks worked out. “The handle was the hardest part, because it had to be flexible but also safe,” said Reeder, who is also an artist. He mainly paints marine life, including sharks. His nickname “Sharky” was given to him when he was growing up in Florida; he had earned quite a name for himself by hauling in a hammerhead shark on a hand line while fishing off the Long Key Bridge. Still an avid fisherman and hunter, Reeder has big hopes for his innovation.
“The board is just so fun to ride,” he said. “It’s way faster and more fun than a bodyboard. You’ve just got to try it.”
HOTLINK: www.gripboard.org When posting comments please be courteous. No bad language, vulgarity or racial slurs.
Vol. 4, Issue 1, January 1–7, 2009
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