Your Board Quality Surfboards

Surfers tend to be a somewhat fanatical bunch, and that’s putting it lightly. How else do you characterize someone who, in the dead of winter, wakes up before dawn, drives to a beach thirty minutes away, struggles into a cold, sandy wetsuit, and braves freezing cold, shark-patrolled waters, all just to catch handful of waves? And that’s just scratching the surface. Truly die-hard surfers, also known as “core-lords”, are prepared to go to even greater lengths in their quest for the next thrilling ride—hours spent pouring over swell maps and buoy readings, militant strength and mobility training exercises, working nights, not working at all—some salty shredders out there have even sacrificed their marriage(s) in the name of riding waves. 

Santa Cruz is home to many such surf fanatics, but few have done it with such success as Adam Replogle. From pipsqueak prodigy to established business owner, his life has been dominated by riding waves. He travelled and competed extensively for decades as a pro surfer, with his most notable achievements including qualification for, and a full season on, the ASP World Championship Tour, as well as a hometown hero victory at the 2002 Cold Water Classic at Steamer Lane.

Replogle also frequently appeared in surf media during his long career, such as the cover of Surfer Magazine, as well as feature parts in films from the likes of Tony Roberts and Josh Pomer. Surfing helped him buy a house and raise two daughters, even carrying him through life post professional surfing as co-owner of Billabong Surf Shop on 41st avenue. To this day, he spends more time surfing than most kids half his age. All those years spent eating, breathing and sleeping surfing has served Replogle, also known by “AR”, or “Rodie”, well, and will continue to do so in the future, especially considering his latest business venture, selling used surf boards at his new shop, Your Board Quality Surfboards, also located on 41st avenue. 

As one might guess, it’s likely that someone who’s career relied on their deep understanding of their equipment might know a thing or two about the tools of their trade. That’s what makes opening YB Quality Surfboards such a genius move. The friendly and witty pro has years of customer service experience from running Billabong, an indisputable expertise of surfboard mechanics and technology, and lives a mere Joe Montana football pass from the shop’s location, directly across the street from Buell Surf Shop.

Another thing that’s so cool about Replogle is his willingness to chat and open up to journalists such as myself whenever prompted. With that being said, I was stoked when the mild-mannered board slinger made time to chat with me outside of Billabong last week. Enjoy!

Congratulations on opening Your Board Quality Surfboards, Adam! What spurred this shift in your professional life?

About a year and a half ago, Billabong was acquired by a new company. At that point I went and got my real estate license. I thought I would try something a little bit different —if the wheels were gonna fall off at Billabong, I wanted to be prepared. So, I tried that out for about a year and I realized, just putting my toe into it a little bit, that it was going to take a long time to get going in that industry. 

My fiancé and I Maia, we studied really hard for it— she really helped me get through that process of studying and passing the test. And then nothing really happened with real estate or with Billabong. Billabong was here, and we were chugging along, but we weren’t doing really well. I know that we were probably breaking even so it much of a surprise that Billabong was going through a foreclosure on the retail side.

How did you get wind of the space opening up and had you had any aspirations to get in the used board biz before this?

Zach Boon, a good friend of ours for the past 30-40 years, had been talking to Bud Freitas about getting a used surfboard shop going here, and asked if I too, wanted to get involved. At one point there were four people involved, which is a lot of heads in one kitchen, you know. Bud backed out but we were able to focus on it and find a spot on 41st avenue for it. We put the word out about what we were friends and family—Your Board Quality surfboards—a used surfboard shop, but only good quality, secondhand boards.

My motto for people looking to sell their used boards at YB is, “if it’s tanner than you or me, we’re probably not gonna take it” (laughs). But, as of today, we’ve already taken over 130 boards. Right now, it’s a relatively small space, so we’re pretty full at the moment. We have been doing pretty well so far—selling boards, getting awareness out there, letting people know what we’re doing and how we’re doing it. 

It’s nice to occupy this new space. I sold new boards for a long time at Billabong. The hardest thing about selling a new board is that they’re pretty expensive. But to me, they’re not that expensive, you know, 900 bucks for a good, artisan shaped board that has been touched by four or five people’s hands over a months at a time, to me, doesn’t sound very expensive. But, when you’re buying a secondhand board, you really start seeing the person who really benefits the most because if they bought a second hand board they probably didn’t pay the sticker price or have to convince somebody else or break the bank to get it. They’re not gonna lose that much money on that turning it over again—they might buy it for $450 or $500 bucks but if they sell it for $350 bucks it’s not the biggest risk in the world.

I do try to educate people when they come in. The best type of marketing for your board is price, you know, so when people come in, I tell them, “look the boards between $475 and $400 seem to be the fastest moving bracket of boards.” There are some unicorns out there, you know, where you see an incredible board for relatively inexpensive. You never know until you look!

Then you see some boards that are completely overpriced for what they are. We’re trying to stay away from those boards. We wanna work with people who have high quality boards for sale, it’s that simple. Three or four boards to be sold before you can buy a new one—it’s a fact.

I’m just trying to help educate people over the process and say, “if you don’t like the board after a month or so, you’d be doing a disservice to yourself by letting yourself just sit on it, you should try to get the most out of it by selling it and get another one.” Sometimes it’s wiser to cut your losses and move on.

I hear you I’ve currently got a garage full of boards that I’ve been planning to sell for years now, but if you don’t jump on it, they’re just going to collect cobwebs in your garage like mine

I look at boards like I look at women. I like to keep them! I keep my old boards around. Sometimes I like to lay on them to see if it’s good still in relation to what I think is good now— boards that I once felt where magic that I realize I’ve grown out of or the emotional value is sort of gone. I’m more into collecting somebody else’s boards and hanging onto my own (laughs).

How do you think your life has informed and prepared you up to this point to make a stab at selling used boards for a living?

For twenty years or so, I sold surfboards here at Billabong Surf Shop. Prior to that, I worked for NHS with Santa Cruz Surfboards, and that was a ton of fun, working with Novak and those guys. We had Haut, Chris Gallagher, Eric Arakawa, Cole Simler, Matt Archbold—a lot of really good people trying to take that technology to the next step.

You know, looks like Fireire sort of nailed that technology. Looking back in hindsight, they did pretty good about designing a board that was stronger than a polyester and still performed well. Something that had a pretty good balance of performance and strength. The boards we were working at at the time with Santa Cruz were really strong, but they didn’t perform that well, so there was sort of a give-and-take. You had a board that lasts forever, but that was probably sales prevention in the long run because you didn’t get that repeat customer who’s board fell apart (laughs).

What do you think somebody should look for in a good used board?

While you want to do your due diligence when buying a new board, of course, you’ll also want to be educated on what makes a good secondhand surfboard. In the secondhand board market, you should educate yourself on the integrity of boards and sort of get yourself in that mindset, so when you do see that unicorn or really good deal you can jump on it without hesitation.

Sometimes you have boards that already match someone’s physique. For example, I try not to get a lot of of these taller guys to have extremities hanging off their boards so if it’s a tall guy, I try to find a taller, leaner one. I ask people to look at the integrity of those fin boxes, really look closely to identify any type of discoloration or color on the deck, indicative of delamination or if somebody painted their board to cover up a buckle or a broken board. I do my best to try to vet the boards prior to when they come into YB to make sure that they fit the five-star qualities that we’re looking for: deck and rail integrity rail, lack of discoloration, and nice, healthy fins boxes. 

Then you wanna do an overall inspection of the board, looking at its curb appeal. How well does this board look? Could I flip it without hassle should I not enjoy the performance? These are the questions you be asking yourself.

The beauty of a second hand board store is that you can take more risks with trying different boards. Take a risk! You won’t lost that much- just chew off a couple hundred bucks when you sell it again, versus $400-500 for one that’s brand new.

The majority of the people that we see are coming off 80 liter soft boards, so, that’s pretty challenging task when it comes to educating that customer. 80 liters is a lot of board. I like to be truthful about what I do. The task for that person is going to be a little harder than someone with years of experience. Even when someone’s set on a board, but then tells me their ability level and the types of waves they’re looking for and it doesn’t match their experience level, I’m gonna say, “wrong board”, every time.

With that kind of integrity it’s going to create a lot of legitimacy, and return customers for your operation. People really appreciate a straight shooter. Looks like to me you might be able to change a lot of people’s minds about the value of a quality used board!

I have five boards in my quiver that have someone else’s name on them. I got a board that says, “Sebastian Zietz” on it, that I bought for a pretty penny on Craig’s List. I’m a firm believer that your favorite board could potentially have someone else’s name on it. I always like trying other people’s boards. If you go surf with other people, you want to ride other people’s boards. You might think it’s a hideous shape, but then after a few laps on it, you might realize that you were blinded by your bias. It could be your magic board, you just didn’t know it yet.

For more from Adam and Your Board Quality Surfboards visit their Instagram page @yourboardsc