Wipe Out
Dec 21, 2005 |
Image: Chris McDonough
Pono Warner and Trevor Moore were sitting in an office at Clark Foam Hawaii talking with big-wave gun shaper Owl Chapman when the phone rang on Monday, Dec. 5. It was their boss, Gordon ‘Grubby’ Clark. According to Warner, this is what Clark had to say: ‘Three hours ago, Clark Foam poured its last blank ever. I really messed up. I could be going to jail. You have to shut the doors right now. There’s going to be a man walking through the door, and you have to listen to him. I’m sorry. I can’t say anything else.’
A few minutes later, Ted Wilson, the president of Fiberglass Hawaii, and his sales manager Louis Melton arrived at the inconspicuous Clark Foam warehouse in Wahiawa. Along with Warner and Moore, they took inventory of the blanks that were left. Meanwhile, Clark faxed a seven-page letter to customers and distributors explaining that due to pressure from ‘the government,’ namely the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Orange County Fire Authority, Clark Foam was closed for business effective immediately. With no further explanation, the company that had supplied the blanks for an estimated 80 percent of the world’s surfboards for the last 45 years ceased to exist.
No blanks means no new boards. The bad news spread rapidly.
Not surprisingly, panic ensued, especially in California where some stores jacked up prices $100 or more per board. In Hawai’i, there is alarm. Besides Town & Country Surf, which gets their blanks from Australia, almost every other surfboard manufacturer relied on Clark Foam. So far, Hawai’i retailers have not resorted to price gouging, though they will likely feel the pinch when supply runs short. ‘We’re going about it as business as usual. I don’t plan to raise my prices unless it’s sold to me at a higher price,’ says Joe Green, owner of Surf N Sea, Hale’iwa’s oldest retail surf shop.
There are currently two containers of Clark Foam at the docks and a slew of blanks left at the warehouse–about 3,200 blanks altogether, though they’re almost all spoken for. (This is a month’s supply for Clark Hawaii’s 60 regular customers, from the backyard shaper who picks up one blank at a time to those who might cut 50 or more a week.) Meanwhile, new shipments of blanks from smaller foam suppliers who are already operating at capacity in other parts of the world–South Africa, Brazil, Australia and China–won’t reach the islands for at least two months.
Industry insiders view the situation as a hiccup, a temporary upheaval that will reconcile itself in a matter of months. These same insiders say that ultimately the upheaval will increase competition and bring about products. ‘It’ll shake itself out, and the void will be filled by a conglomeration of suppliers,’ says longtime shaper and Vans Triple Crown of Surfing Director Randy Rarick.
EPA spokesman Mark Merchant makes it clear that the EPA did not shut down Clark Foam. In 2004, the EPA did issue a notice of violation to Clark. ‘They were essentially paperwork violations,’ Merchant clarifies. ‘They had nothing to do with air emissions of TDI, nothing to do with TDI getting into the water.’
Clark corrected the violations–which had to do with having an emergency response plan in case of an accident–by the May 2004 deadline, and the company has been in compliance ever since. But questions remain. Why did Grubby shut down so abruptly if he wasn’t forced to? Is there pending litigation behind the scenes? The response from an instructive FAQ sheet from Clark Foam headquarters in Laguna Niguel, Calif., is, ‘I do not know. Until Dec. 5 everything was okay. (Say anything you want at this point.)’ In other words, any answer is purely speculation. It would seem that Clark doesn’t care what people say.
‘When you’re at the top, everyone wants to get you. What he could be doing is giving the ultimate middle finger to the industry,’ suggests Clark Foam operator Warner, who was confounded that his boss refused to offer an explanation to his own staff. ‘He basically put us all in a van and drove us off the cliff, and he’s the only one with a parachute.’
Victim or villain?
The legacy of Clark Foam began in 1961, after Gordon Clark and Hobie Alter figured out how to produce uniformly expanded, molded polyurethane blanks. The process was a hazardous one, the main culprit for environmental violation being a toxic chemical called toluene diisocyanate (TDI).
In Clark’s letter, he admits that his ‘official safety record as an employer is not very good,’ with three ex-employees receiving workman’s comp for life. He also cites one claim filed by the widow of an employee who died from cancer allegedly caused by the chemicals.
For 45 years, Clark has monopolized the business, which prompted Surfer Magazine to name him the second most powerful man in surfing in its August 2002 issue, saying, ‘No man has singularly wielded more power in our sport.’ And he was very powerful indeed. Although Clark stayed out of the public spotlight and kept his production numbers a closely guarded secret, guesstimates indicate that Clark Foam may have sold some 300,000 blanks a year at $50-$150 each, while annual revenues may have reached between $20-$30 million. Surfer ominously predicted: ‘If Gordon Clark, long since a multi-millionaire, decided to shut down his Laguna Niguel plant tomorrow and move permanently to one of his holdings in Baja or Oregon, virtually the entire surfboard industry would shut down with it. And would he care?’
John Carper, who shapes for Big Island surfer Shane Dorian, recalls a visit to Clark’s SoCal plant. Grubby was alone in the bowels of the factory, shirtless and shoeless, jeans full of holes, ass-crack showing, hanging upside down with a monkey wrench tightening a pipe that had some black goop oozing out. Using rags and acetone, he wiped the goop off his arms and then–sweaty, dirty, dusty, sticky–was ready to talk business.
Carper says he begrudgingly gives his fellow workaholic a degree of respect. And there is plenty of reason to do so. Grubby is a hands-on guy, a chemist, an engineer and an ingenious entrepreneur who drives a beat-up truck. The 72-year-old maverick is also the largest private landowner in Oregon with a 50,000-plus-acre ranch where he raises Black Angus cattle and 3,000 sheep tended by Peruvian shepherds. He also owns 400 acres on the Big Island, a place he called home in the ’70s and ’80s.
Personal friends in Kamuela, where Clark keeps a house with a garage full of vintage gear that stayed after he moved to his Oregon ranch in the early ’90s, won’t say much out of respect for his privacy. But it seems Clark had a special appreciation for the Big Island. During his younger days, he’d surf secret spots along the Hamakua Coast that he accessed by helicopter. In 1986, the avid dirt-biker helped carve out Mud Lane, a roots-rock-mud track in the lush Kohala Mountains above Waimea that offers the most technical single-track, jungle riding in the state. Bikers have since dubbed the trail ‘Grubby’s.’
Maybe his fondness for Hawai’i was derived from a love of open space–the same open space that used to surround his Laguna Niguel factory where development relentlessly encroached.
Long live the shapers
Some shapers who have dealt with Grubby for decades say he’s a strong-arming, master manipulator. ‘He’s been a benevolent dictator, but a dictator all these years,’ says Carper, who’s been in the business for 40 years. ‘He stated many times that if he ever had any competition, he would walk away. So he had the monopoly, and he realized the backyard guys are 85 percent of his business, so he gave everyone these little cake crumbs–like thousands of individual rocker choices. Shapers have sensitive egos, and stuff like that makes you feel good. So you think he kind of cares. Some of those guys are super craftsmen. They do it for the love of it, not for the money.’
‘What’s sad is, those were the guys who supported [Clark] the most,’ Carper says of the hand-to-mouth, board-by-board backyard shapers, glassers, sanders and airbrushers who are now out of work. ‘But this industry is way more resilient than people think. Now the people who weren’t really serious will go on with their lives.’
Shapers are a unique breed of artistan. Most are experienced surfers who have carefully studied the dynamics between the rider, the board and moving water. The boards they craft have evolved to push the upper limits of the sport in both performance and accessibility, essentially bettering the lifestyle for which they live and work. Their business is built on reputation–much of which comes from the frequency of their logos flashed on the boards of high-profile team riders.
According to Mililani shaper Darin Tatsuno, who custom shapes for a handful of hot, young groms, some independent shapers might be in a better situation than those who shape for bigger companies and have to fill quotas and keep up with overhead. ‘We can afford a little vacation,’ Tatsuno says. ‘A lot of companies are going to step up to fill the gap. This was a lesson for us not to put all our eggs in one basket.’
Smaller shapers who didn’t have the cash flow or space to buy and store large quantities of foam will be hurt the most. The trickle-down effect will affect hundreds if not thousands, from the kid who sweeps the floor to the guy who drives the van, not to mention the consumers who buy the boards.
‘It’s shocking for people to hear, ‘No, I can’t make you a board right now,” says Jon Pyzel, up-and-comer John John Florence’s shaper. ‘Imagine being a contractor who builds houses and all of a sudden there’s no more wood. Then the plumber, the roofer, everyone else is out of work, too.’
Pyzel has 25 blanks left. When he checked with a South African foam provider, the cost of blanks was triple what it was two weeks ago, before Grubby shut down Clark Foam. ‘I’ve told people who have ordered boards that I can’t start on those yet, and I don’t know when and how much they’ll be.’ He adds, ‘Shapers have been underpaid for a long time. Maybe now people will appreciate their boards more.’
Some shapers fear that big orders will now go to foreign shapers or that cheap imports will flood the market. While some people simply want a board that floats–what seasoned surfers would dismiss as a junk board–customers who trust a label will be all the more adamant about having one when the value of those boards are elevated. The price of boards varies according to material (polyurethane, epoxy, balsa), design (length, rocker, rails, tail, stringers, fins, glass job, airbrush) and the brand (the shaper or the company for which he shapes). It’s like shopping for cars–there’s a big difference between a Geo and a BMW.
As for the death of custom shaping, it’s unlikely as long as there are serious surfers who know that, like in any sport, their equipment directly affects their performance. There’s a lot more soul in a board that’s hand-shaped than machine-pressed. For purists, there’s no substitute.
The aftermath
Gordon Clark has sealed all the tanks in his factory and will hire a hazardous-materials firm to dispose of all the resins and resin-handling equipment. He will retain ownership of his machinery and methods, and personal liability will keep him from selling them, so his magic formula will remain a toxic treasure. Up until now, there has been no real impetus for the industry to look for alternatives to polyurethane. The few that exist–like carbon-fiber, epoxy and extruded polystyrene–are more costly but stronger and made in a more eco-friendly fashion–are seeing a surge of interest.
‘Our phones have been jammed,’ says shaper Randy French, founder of Surftech and innovator of Tuflite technology, a new epoxy standard. ‘Urethane is just nasty stuff. TDI is a nasty compound. There are alternatives. Hopefully, this will make shapers re-evaluate how they’ve been doing it and make them go through the learning curve and adopt some of these methods.’
with a parachute.’ –Pono Warner
Hawaiian shaper Tom ‘Pohaku’ Stone, who is known for shaping wood boards out of balsa, wiliwili, koa and mango, explains that different materials facilitate different styles of surfing. Surfers appreciate the flex and feel of traditional foam boards that enable high-performance surfing. Stone adds, ‘It’s the quality of foam that Clark is renown for. People will still use polyurethane, but it’s not going to be blown in the U.S.’
Carper agrees, adding that surfers are picky about cosmetics. ‘Polyurethane boards are just beautiful. Hand-made epoxy doesn’t look quite as pretty. The last-minute emotional sale goes to the polyurethane board.’ So the production of the industry-standard polyurethane boards will continue, not in the U.S., but rather in countries with more relaxed environmental regulations and cheaper and more efficient labor.
A couple of days after Clark’s closure, Wilmington, Calif.-based Walker Foam, announced the acquisition of a 32,000 square-foot facility in China, where they plan to manufacture up to 1,000 boards a day within two months. That would make Harold Walker the likely successor to Clark’s throne. According to master shaper Gary Linden, who is now managing Walker Foam’s operations, the company has been in south China for six months. Coincidentally, Walker was there with his son Joe when they heard the news. They jumped on the opportunity to expand their business.
Some have criticized Walker Foam’s decision to outsource to China. Linden responds to the complaints, ‘Right now people want foam. We’re not making surfboards there. We’re making blanks there. The surfboards will be made here.’
Meanwhile, his message to shapers is to be patient: ‘I keep telling everyone, ‘Do all the little projects you never had time to do and get organized, so when the foam comes, you’ll be ready to have your fair share of the market.’ The glass is half-full.’
The glaring irony of the whole fiasco is the reliance of the surf industry on a manufacturing process that harms the very environment in which the sport thrives. In his letter, Clark pointed his finger at the Surfrider Foundation, a leading advocate of legislating storm-water runoff, saying, ‘The Surfrider Foundation would have us closed down.’
In an online response, Surfrider Foundation President Glen Hening comments, ‘He’s gonna take his football and go home because, in the end, it just became too much of a headache to run a factory using dangerous chemicals. And as of last Monday [Dec. 5]Ö2,000 pounds of poison will no longer be released into the atmosphere, so what’s not to like?’
For now, Fiberglass Hawaii, which supplies polyester and epoxy resin and all the other supplies necessary for board production, will manage the distribution of the remaining 3,200 blanks. According to Louis Melton, any remaining blanks that aren’t already pre-ordered will be divvied up using a shapers’ wish list. ‘Ted [Wilson] and Gordon have had a business relationship for the last 40 years. He asked Ted as a favor to distribute those blanks to the right people. We were never in the blank business, but we’re the most impartial and we’re trying to be as fair as we can,’ Melton says.
What’s next for Grubby? In his letter, Clark says, ‘There is a very good chance that I will spend a lot of time in courtrooms over the next few years and could go to prison. I have a tremendous cleanup expense to exit my business. I have the potential for serious fines. My full-time efforts will be to extract myself from the mess I have created for myself.’
Few are shedding a tear for Clark, though many acknowledge the end of an era. ‘It’s definitely a sad day for the surfboard-building community,’ says Surftech’s Randy French. ‘But what people may not realize is that the board-building community is a close-knit community all over the world. Even though we compete, we look out for each other. It’ll bounce back. In the long run, it’ll be a good thing.’
