Last summer, out at the beach in Northeast Tacoma, wandering around with my digicam, I met a bunch of kids skimboarding, which involves dropping a board atop the surf (as opposed to waves), from just a ways out, hopping on and hydroplaning back toward the beach. Works best when the tide is out. I took some pictures, part of the mix in this blog post I put up shortly thereafter. Naturally I first explained to them what I was doing, and mentioned the name of my blog.

Apparently, that made an impression. Now there is a skimboarding team started by some of them, called Team Rosenblog. Here's their Bravehost site, if you scroll down, you'll see a link to "Team Rosenblog" history (scroll down again to see the text). I'll let them explain.

It was an ordinary Summer afternoon, and group of friends were out skimboarding at a beach in Dash Point State Park when a man that must have been his early to mid-thirties (ed.--you're too kind, really) aproached them. He was dressed for the beach, but there was a hint of success to his wardrobe (ed.--What can I say? I owe it all to my wife). He asked the friends if he could take pictures to put on his website, rosenblog.com; named so because his last name was Rosenberg and it was a blogging site. The friends, mildly confused, complied.

A few days later, they each received a link the the man's site, where they found pictures of themselves skimming and serene beach pictures. Much of the events were forgotten but the name lived on. It became an inside joke as a word that could replace any noun in a sentence. For example, "Yesterday I was walking home from the school bus when I saw a rosenblog run across the street and get squished by a really big rosenblog." Eventually, the friends decided to form a skimboard team, and naturally they agreed to call it "Team Rosenblog"

So, any youth-oriented brands out there (energy drinks, instant messaging services, Apple) looking for some cool sponsorships, check these guys out. If you wanted to get started on skimboard market research, some links are here, here, and here. Wikipedia provides some background, and notes the sport has roots in Malibu. It's most popular in Hawaii; California; Manzanita, Oregon; Florida; Australia; Portugal; and France. But don't forget Northeast Tacoma.

If you land some corporate sponsors willing to fork over five figures or higher, well, guys, we'll all take a meeting with my intellectual property attorney, OK? I labored long and hard to come up with that brilliant name, and have been building the brand with my incisive and sideways bloggage.

A skimboard team named after a gen-yoo-wine Northwest blog. Hard to beat, eh?

Skim on, dudes.

TECHNORATI TAGS: SKIMBOARDING, TEAM ROSENBLOG, SPONSORSHIPS, TACOMA

Posted by Matt Rosenberg at February 22, 2006 05:58 PM

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