Robby Naish needs no introduction when a story fell through this issue a throwaway email on the off chance of an interview led to one of the most candid chats Rou Chater has ever had with the legend himself. You don’t want to miss this one, and you can also hear the whole interview on Rou’s podcast.

If ever there was a man who needs no introduction, it’s Robby Naish, he’s been the undisputed king of watermen for longer than I can remember. A hero of mine since I was a 7-year-old windsurfer and someone I’ve had the fortune of meeting on several occasions. Always down to earth, always humble, we thought we’d catch up with Robby to see how things were going in the midst of the craziness and chat about the last 25 years of making full production gear for windsurfing, kite, SUP and now Wings…

First up, I guess we best ask how are things going for business during these crazy times?

Surprising well, knock on wood! We have managed to position ourselves, timing-wise, better than most of our competitors. My plan for the season was to launch earlier than we ever had in the past. As a lot of our production comes from China, the Chinese New Year is always a factor, the date changes and the time that it affects production seems to get longer and longer. As a result, I had moved a lot of stuff forwards this year. The idea was to get the samples done, get the photoshoots done, to have a lot of our products in stock, and ship before the Chinese New Year.

The Chinese New Year went straight into COVID-19, which shut down China, shut down the factories and stopped anyone from going there. A lot of brands hadn't signed off on product at that stage, and so they had no production and no stock, but fortunately, we did. In that sense we were good, we knew, of course, that business would be dead for a while, but at least we would have stock.

Then, people stopped travelling, they were sat at home while the government gave them money, and everyone was buying things because they had cash and time. We did a lot of direct to consumer business, but also, we were seeing a lot of our dealers doing exceptionally well. In fact, we are exponentially up on our sales from last year domestically, Foiling, wings and SUP were way up, as well as our kites. Stand up paddleboarding has been going down for years, and it shot back up to being as good as it ever was for us, locally.

When COVID-19 hit, we were talking to the industry about the action plan and what the brands would do with their teams; it was pretty much doomsday. A lot of brands were laying off staff and dropping riders. I didn't know what direction things were going, but I knew I didn't want to do that, so we kept all our staff, kept all our riders, and kept paying all the salaries. We kept our fingers crossed that the riders would find a way to promote themselves and the brand and people would be stoked on that, and in the end, it worked out, and we made it through just fine. 

The European market was utterly dead during the lockdown, with all the beaches being closed. But once the restrictions were lifted, and even though people weren't allowed to travel, they were at home and had money and so they started spending on gear instead, and Europe bounced back quite strong. 

Overall, things were horrible for everybody, but from a business standpoint, it really has not been too bad for us, in fact, we are going to be well ahead of pre-COVID times.

And how has it been on Maui, were you guys stopped from kiteboarding or surfing at all?

No, we've been pretty lucky on Maui and have been able to kiteboard and surf throughout it all. There was a period when they closed the beach parks, but the lifeguards were still there, and you could always go to the beach, but you couldn't use the parking lot, so you had to park across the street and walk over. That was as bad as it got. In fact, it's arguably been better than usual because it has been uncrowded, to a degree. It's been jam-packed with locals as no one's at school or working, so the surf has been heaving with surfers, but in terms of windsurfing, wings, kiteboard and foil it's been perfect. It's been strange having no tourists here for this long, there are thousands and thousands of rental cars parked everywhere, all around the whole airport it's just rental cars! And the roads are quiet because we don't have any tourism!

In terms of being able to get in the water, ride, and develop product and do photoshoots, it's been incredible. At the beginning of COVID-19, we couldn't really post anything online as people were freaking out if we shared a session. We would get loads of hate mail from people saying we were taking hospital beds. It felt like "I can't eat ice cream, so therefore you can't eat ice cream either" attitude. Out of respect, we stopped posting, as obviously elsewhere in the world it was much worse, and they couldn't get to the beach. 

Here on Maui, we had no cases, maybe one at that time, so it was a different situation. In fact, it's worse now, we have about 100 cases, but we have strict quarantine rules for anyone coming to the islands. People can't just drive here; we know when people have landed and how they got here. The sad result for the economy is that it is wholly f**ked, but we don't have many COVID-19 cases. I'm not sure which is better, but it is what it is. It's really catastrophic for the economy here, tourism is how we pay the bills in Hawaii. Businesses are closed, hotels are closed, the rental car companies are closed, and the restaurants are closed. Most of the places here in Paia are still boarded up, and those are people who have no means to make any money at all. The pain and impact of it may have been kicked downstream a little with the government payouts, but it's not good.

I think the economic impact will be felt and will be far more reaching than the initial impact of the disease. We just need to be smart, conservative and flexible, and that's what we are, we don't have giant aspirations of conquering the universe by selling more gear than the other guy.

This year marks Season 25 of the full production side of the company. Obviously, the custom business has been going for years, but that's a huge landmark to reach. What's the proudest moment of all of that do you think?

We've been creating custom gear since 1979, but Nalu Kai was the company I started 25 years ago to make windsurfing gear on a full production scale. The fact that we made it this long is what I am most proud of. I don't know what I am doing, haha! We've had a lot of fun, we've learned a lot, we've made some cool stuff over the years for a lot of different sports and been in the right place at the right time. I have been fortunate many times over, whether it be with windsurfing or kiteboarding and then SUPing and now foiling and wings we've been at the leading edge of a lot of fantastic stuff. Not only do I enjoy riding it, but it's been great to touch a lot of other lives too.

I'm proud we haven't tripped over our own feet so badly that we didn't make it back up and I'm proud that we made it this far being independent. Undercapitalised, cash base, never asked for money, never borrowed money, and never sold out. It's been an exciting journey, not always pleasant, but it's been rewarding and right when you think it's getting a little stale something new comes along.

There are always new challenges, but we are still loving getting on the water and playing with all the toys we make, that's the main thing!

Has the company structure changed much over the years?

You know we are still pretty small, we come across as a huge company with all these sports and products, but at the base, it's a small team working really hard in Hawaii and around the world to make the dream a reality. We've grown, we have more people on admin, as we sell more gear, more engineers to develop it and the design department has grown too. We still do all our own graphics and handle pretty much everything internally. We're a tight-knit team, and a lot of our people have been with us for a long time. We have a good mix of new blood and old guard; obviously, I'm always there as the spine behind the operation, steering it in the direction I want it to go.

You're obviously a master at so many watersports but how do you decide what to do when you hit the beach each day?

It's usually led by the conditions, but also by work. I still love to ride Ho'okipa on my windsurfing gear, but the conditions haven't been that good lately. I've actually haven't ridden there in several months, as it's been crap, so I've been slalom sailing and kiteboarding a lot on flat water. We've also been working on the kites a lot lately, so that's been dominating my time in the water.

Testing this kite against that kite and getting as much feedback on this year's S25 gear as at the moment we are well into testing for S26. I've also been loving wingsurfing. My progression in that is so fast, and I really enjoy it. I'm pulling tricks and moves that I didn't think I would be able to do a few months ago, so that's exciting. I'm spending a lot of time on the water doing a bit of everything at the moment.

I test every kite, every bar, and most people don't know that I actually design all the directional boards for kiteboarding too, so I spend a lot of time working on those. A lot of people don't know how involved I am with the process of testing and developing the equipment, but I'm there at every step. I don't do the twintips as I don't ride them anymore, but everything else I'm working hard on. The testing schedule often dictates what I do when I show up to the beach.

Where you do feel that wingsurfing fits in with kiteboarding and windsurfing, is it there to complement it do you think, or will it take a lot of riders away from one sport and into the wings?

I look at it the same way I did with kiteboarding and windsurfing and SUP to kiteboarding and windsurfing, they all compliment each other, and to me, they are all surfing. For the people that have the means, they will add wingsurfing to the list of things that they do. For people that don't, it's a great addition to what they can do on the water. 

The Maui wingsurfing market is the most developed and mature market in the world. To start with, no one was doing it aside from me, people thought it was a bit whacky. Now you go to the spots, and there will be wingsurfers everywhere you go. With no tourists around at the moment, just locals, if you go down to Kanaha at noon on any day, there will be 10 -15 kiters, 5 -10 windsurfers and 15 - 30 wingsurfers. Sometimes it's all wingsurfers, a lot of them are coming in from non wind sports too, surfers and kids are getting involved who haven't played in the wind before. My daughter and her friends are really into it as well. The windsurfers and surfers are crossing over, but the kiters seem to be the last guys to cross over. If you're already kiteboarding in a place where you have the conditions, and you have space, you are already out there, and kiteboarding is pretty dam rad. Wingsurfing feels like you're mowing the lawn compared to that!

It's kiteboarding simplified to a certain extent, you are never going to get the massive air that you get from kiteboarding or that feeling that you get, but there is beauty in the simplicity of wingsurfing. If you're just a back and forth kinda' guy, this is so compelling, and you can do it in really lightwind. For places with access issues where kiteboarding isn't that great, this is better for sure. I think wingsurfing in the future will be huge, but the sports go hand in hand, you'll have guys like me who still do everything, but then there will be people for whom wingsurfing is everything.

You've been at the front of the Naish brand for so long now, and you've had to master all these sports over the years, do you ever get tired of being Robby Naish and having to be that persona on the beach, or is it still just as much fun for you as it was in the early days?

I think it is every bit as much fun as it ever was, I get tired of the business side, I get tired of having the underlying stress, but I never get tired of riding and going to the beach and sharing the stoke with people. I'd like to, at some stage before I'm too old, get back to where I'm not really stressed on the business side at all.

To me, it's about riding, I love taking my 10'8" Nalu single fin paddleboard and going to the south side and riding waist high waves; there is such a rush to me in that. I love just being out on the water onboard and sharing that stoke with people, and I think I'm pretty good at it, I don't know if I'm any good at anything else! I'm not a great businessman, I don't have any other great skillset, socially I’m not that gifted; I'm kind of a loner! But I love to share the stoke of surfing with people, whatever craft that is on and I'm good at that, and I still love it.

It's the reason I'm still doing it, that has never changed, I was never doing it to be the best, I never had some goal to win some title, I wasn't out to make a million dollars and then become a motorcycle racer or a golfer or set up a plumbing business one day, this is what I do, and there has never been a plan, it's just been continuing to travel down that path. So far, my body has allowed me to keep doing it…

Thanks for taking the time to catch up with us Robby! For the full interview un-edited check out the Intriguing Beings Podcast with Rou Chater.

 

Videos

S25 Naish Kites
S25 Kite Foils
A Kiteboarding Adventure with Nico Gambier
By Rou Chater
Rou has been kiting since the sports inception and has been working as an editor and tester for magazines since 2004. He started IKSURFMAG with his brother in 2006 and has tested hundreds of different kites and travelled all over the world to kitesurf. He's a walking encyclopedia of all things kite and is just as passionate about the sport today as he was when he first started!

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