A-frame

Aaberg, Denny

Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

Abbruzzi, Sid

Abellira, Reno

Abubo, Megan

academia and surfing

Adler, Tom

advertising and surfing

Aeder, Erik

aerial

Aguerre, Fernando

Aichner, Scott

Aikau, Clyde

Aikau, Eddie

Aipa, Ben

air-drop

airbrush

Airshow

Ala Moana

Alabama

alaia board

Alaska

alcohol and surfing

Alexander, Kala

Allen, Chuck

Alms, Paige

aloha shirt

Alter, Hobie

Alvarez, Pepe

Ancell, Kevin

Andaman Islands

Andersen, Lisa

Anderson, Craig

Anderson, Simon

Andino, Kolohe

Angel, Jose

angle

Angola

Angourie

Antarctica

Apocalypse Now

Arabian Sea

Aragon, Janice

Arakawa, Eric

Archbold, Matt

Arena, Eduardo

Ashton, Juan

Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)

Atlantic Ocean

August, Robert

Aurness, Rolf

Auster, Ken

Australia

Avalon, Frankie

Azores

backdoor

backside

backside attack, Pipeline

backwash

bail out

Bain, Rob

Baja California

Baker, Bernie

Baker, Grant “Twiggy”

Baker, Tim

Bali

Ball, John “Doc”

Ballard, Bill

Ballard, Rochelle

balsa

Baltic Sea

Banks, Jim

Barbados

Barilotti, Steve

Barland, Michel

Barreda, Sergio “Gordo”

Barry, Michael

Bartholomew, Wayne

Baxter, Jackie

Bay of Bengal

Beach Boys, The

Beacham, Debbie

beachboys

beachbreak

Beachcomber Bills Grand Prix

Beachley, Layne

beavertail

Becker, Phil

Bedford-Brown, Stuart

Belgium

Bells Beach

Bendall, Ma and Pa

Bennett, Barry

Benson, Becky

Benson, Blanche

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

Bertlemann, Larry

Mass-producing surfboard company headquartered in Manly Beach, Australia, with a main manufacturing plant in Thailand. GSI was founded in 2002 by longtime surf accessories retailer Mark Kelly who marketed his fledgling company to entry-level surfers wanting inexpensive, no-frills surfboards. The company found a ready market, grew quickly, and by 2012 was pumping out surfboards for 15 different labels and selling them in over 70 countries worldwide. Along the way, the GSI design philosophy shifted from user-friendly beginner shapes to high performance shortboards and longboards, many constructed with advanced, eco-friendly materials. Several marquee surfboard shapers--including Greg Webber, Steve Walden, and Tom Wegener--have moved their businesses under the GSI company umbrella to take advantage of GSI's worldwide distribution network. Wegener and GSI are set to release the world's first mass-marketed alaia--a thin finless surfboard of ancient Hawaiian design--in 2012.

GSI produces all of its boards in Bangkok at a mammoth 180,000 square foot factory owned by Cobra International, one of the world's largest manufacturers of watersports equipment. Construction techniques and methods at the factory vary widely. Many of GSI's models are run-of-the-mill, traditional polyurethane foam and fiberglass productions, while some are machine-molded, exotic epoxy compounds. GSI maintains no central corporate office; the company's 16 full-time employees live all over the world and communicate via Skype and weeklong retreats near Kelly's Manly Beach home. Critics of GSI abound, many of whom are suspicious of machine-produced surfboards, especially from overseas Asian factories, considering them a soulless affront to traditional shaping methods. "You can find them for sale in surf shops owned by people who forgot why they started surf shops in the first place," dismissed a prominent mom-and-pop San Diego surfboard retailer. Nevertheless, GSI has succeeded wildly where most assembly-line, machine-made surfboard companies have failed, and remains a producer of fairly reliable, occasionally inexpensive equipment.

Global Surf Industries (GSI)

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Encyclopedia of Surfing

Encyclopedia of Surfing