Interview with Andy Wirtz from Norden Surfboards

🎙️ ANDY WIRZ – ABOUT TRENDS, THE INDUSTRY AND THE FOUNDATION OF WATER SPORTS 🎙️

Anyone who talks about surf culture, SUP and foiling in Germany cannot get past Andy Wirtz. With his Norden Surfboards brand, he has been shaping the scene for many years – not only as an entrepreneur, but also as a passionate water sports enthusiast, columnist and critical observer of the industry. We spoke to Andy on the phone – a conversation that would have worked well as a podcast – and then took some time to capture the most important thoughts ion “paper”.

The result is an honest interview about developments in the water sports market, the emotional ups and downs of recent years and the question of why surfing will always be at the heart of everything for Andy.

Aloha Andy, thank you very much for your time. Our regular readers know your brand Norden and have always enjoyed your columns in the print magazine. You’re one of Germany’s veterans in surfing, stand-up paddling and foiling. There is no trend that you have not been part of.

We recently had a phone call and that alone would have made a podcast. There are a lot of problems in our industry at the moment, but also a lot of positive things.

Tell me, where do you get the energy to actively participate in every trend, go through the down turns and then come back up again?

In the beginning, I was driven by curiosity to discover new surf sports and to find opportunities to ride waves with different equipment. The idea of using this for business only came later, and that’s a good thing. I can’t sell something that doesn’t excite me personally. Business is, so to speak, the bottom of the trough, “We are selling the dream but working in depression”, probably best describes the current mood in our industry. But since I am a surfer with heart and soul, I always return to the place of origin, to the beach, and always rediscover why I do all this, and then I get back to the top.

You told me on the phone that you often go SUP surfing and have a lot of fun.

I still like to go SUPing in the waves as often as I can, it’s the easiest and most effective way to get waves, even in marginal conditions. Many people have forgotten this and now try their luck at surfing.

But it also seems that a lot of people are increasingly buying your mini Malibus and then prefer to sit in the water for hours instead of surfing wave after wave on a SUP. Is there a trend reversal going on? Does everyone just want to be cool and carry a surfboard around?

Surfing has a great advantage over other water sports, it embodies a lifestyle that the industry outside the surfing sector has also recognized and is therefore constantly taking up in order to give its products a positive image, young, full of energy, adventure, etc. An image that everyone likes to adorn themselves with. An image that everyone likes to adorn themselves with. Sports such as windsurfing, kitesurfing, SUP etc. have never managed to do this, they were trendy for a short time but never like pure surfing. So yes, the attitude to life that something conveys is the most important thing first, then the performance on the water. That’s where the mistake lies in our industry, the focus is on the hardware and not the lifestyle.

Speaking of a trend reversal, we can also clearly see how the former surf sport is becoming a canoe sport in SUP races. It may have taken a good 15 years, but we’re here now. What are your thoughts on this?

SUP racing has moved so far away from its SUP origins, it almost deserves a new name now. It has become a pure competitive sport. If you’re not training hard, competing or at least competing with others, there’s no other reason to do it, there’s no time to enjoy nature and the water.

It would be hypocritical not to talk about the problems in our industry. The sales problems are “for real”. But we recently had an article where we reported that Boards and More is launching a new Fanatic iSUP.

Are we missing out on something or are they producing something that misses the market? How do you see it?

“If you don’t bring something new, you won’t get rid of the leftovers from years gone by.”

That probably explains this situation. Some companies are planning to get out of the SUP sport but are still sitting on mountains of goods that they have to sell. Only when all this has happened will we see who stays and who goes. Customers are interested in something new, only to fall back on a special offer in the end.

Speaking of the market, you’re based in Kiel, the California of Germany. We hear how many people are wingfoiling at your place, yet the prices are falling and the warehouses are full. What are you hearing in the scene?

You meet a lot of people who haven’t done anything for years and are now starting to wingfoil because it’s just the right thing to do in our area. In addition, many companies and employees from the industry are based here and bring a lot of people on board, i.e. onto the water.

In the foil business, you can currently ask yourself “how much loss can you afford and not how much profit can you make with it”! The sport is developing rapidly and so is production, with more goods coming onto the market than can flow out the back. The prices are so low that the customer profits from the special offers and the seller pays a lot more. Nobody buys anything new at list price, the latest equipment goes to store employees and team riders and ends up on the second-hand market in discontinued offers.

There are so many brands, product lines, construction methods etc. that you can’t see the trees for the forest.

We’ve seen it all before with windsurfing, kitesurfing, SUPs, etc. The industry is running away from the mainstream with its high-tech and in the end is surprised that no one is joining in.

My motto would be “slow down” and market the sport, develop good beginner equipment at fair prices, because that still doesn’t exist. Wingfoiling is still too difficult to learn for the general public to participate. Instead, more and more high-tech equipment is being built to make the pros look good on Instagram.

But what I found interesting is that there were probably thousands of spectators at the California Wingfoil Masters on Sylt. Numbers we can only dream of for SUP. Were they all just vacationers? How do you see it?

Unfortunately you have the wrong picture, 95% of people come to party and consume, they have nothing to do with surfing and never will. Sylt has the talent to make money with everything to do with surfing, but not with surfing itself. Sylt is an island, it’s expensive to get there, apart from the cost of accommodation, food and the poor conditions on the water, the wind is mostly onshore and the shorebreak breaks on dry sand.

In general, where do you think our journey is going? We’re all in the same boat, you as a brand and me as a medium.

I think we are in a demographic change, the active water sports population is getting older and older and the young people want short, fast experiences and then move on, nobody wants to invest a lot of time and money in a sport that they will only master in a few years at a level where it becomes exciting. I think the market will shrink massively and split into many small fringe sports, which will always cater to the same people who were already on the water before, their families and their personal environment.

But you shouldn’t get bogged down in the “crisis in the industry”, people who don’t work there don’t care, they want to be on the water, they want to have fun. That’s why it’s good to join them and do the same.

Which of your products are doing the best and will help you through this difficult time?

Surfing is the roots and foundation of norden-surfboards, that’s where it all started, everything else was added to find more opportunities to go surfing in a different form, even in places where there are no real waves. I think that will always be the case. We’ll see if SUP comes back, if you can ever make money foiling or if kiting is less about the height of the jump and more about the spray when you cut back on the wave. Surfing will always be the foundation of norden, no matter what form it takes, everything for the wave and a wave for everyone, regardless of the conditions and skill level.

Which products do you still see opportunities for growth?

I don’t currently see any growth in areas that have already experienced a boom. Foiling is still in its infancy, so logically there will also be growth, but even there the peak will soon be reached. Instead of worrying about growth, we should be thinking about how to preserve the surf sport in all its facets.

Downwind foiling is only just arriving in Germany. How do you assess the situation?

Kiel is always far ahead when it comes to water sports and there are currently around 20-30 people here who do it regularly and have mastered it. I think it still needs to be much easier to learn so that more people will be interested in it, it’s still reserved for experts. But I’m already working on boards that make it a bit easier to get started. Wingfoiling is much easier and therefore has a lot more potential.

And your closing words?

I can relate to a quote from Robby Naish, who once said, “It doesn’t have to be the biggest sport to be fun”. It only makes sense to work in this industry if you still enjoy surfing, there is no other sensible reason for it.

Very wisely said, thank you for your time.

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