Behind the Brand: 1031 Skateboards

Interview By: Brian Blakely



The fact that it’s rare to have a skateboarder control the ins and outs of a skateboarding company puzzles me. A lot of people don’t put into perspective the reality of skateboarding and the industry that backs it. So many of these “hardcore” dudes are merely just puppets being controlled by a figure in the shadow and dollar signs. But there’s always that diamond in the rough, that one person or company that sticks out because it’s naturally sick. It’s real and it’s respected. It’s a company that you’d want to back not only because of the team and advertising; yet because of the simple message behind the brand is so raw and easy to grasp that you’re forced to like it. Krisian Svitak of 1031 makes his message clear and simple: 1031 is strictly skateboarding with no rules. Two skateboarders run this BUSINESS. Two skateboarders pay THEIR employees. And two skateboarders made it happen with the money out of their pockets for the simple love and respect of skateboarding, during a time when many were doing the exact opposite. Svitak says that when the company started, the only thing he heard was “when’s it going out of business?” Now, five years later, we’re here talking with Kristian about the brand during a time in which he calls, “it’s greatest milestone.”


How old are you and how long have you been a professional skateboarder?

I just turned 36 years old and I’ve been pro since I was about 24.

What made you want to start 1031?

(Laughs) Stupidity? I don’t know man. Like, I never really had an ambition to start my own company you know, and all of a sudden I was put in this situation where I had ideas and my partner (with 1031) and I both just kind of have the same outlook on skateboarding and how we think a skateboarding company should be. So we just sort of started talking and we were like man, like this could be really cool so it was like lets just do this. Another big part of it too is that when it comes to skating, I relate it to like music or anything else... and I hate having to answer to somebody when it comes to something like that. I just didn’t want to answer to anybody you know? I knew with him and I together we could really do something cool... on our terms. It was like screw everybody else... we’re gonna do it our way you know? Do what makes us comfortable.

Did you have any experience in running a company prior to the birth of 1031?

(Laughs) Hell no. No way. No experience... and it’s honestly like every day is just a learning process. But it’s cool though. It’s really surprising, like I mean my partner has experience in it. He started a distribution company back in the 80’s and had a skate shop in the 80’s. So he’s known it for a long time. But yeah no experience for me, but it’s cool how much you learn when you’re just thrown in the fire, you know?



When it comes to a “skate” company, do you feel a skateboarder should ultimately be the one behind the brand? Is there room for corporate, businessman vibes in a skateboarding company? Or ultimately—do you feel that being a professional skateboarder overlaps the actual business of skateboarding? Basically... Does your opinion (as a skateboarder) matter more or less when it comes to running a skateboarding company compared to someone with say, a business degree?

You know honestly, I don’t think it matters---I know this is going to sound completely weird to people, but I don’t think it totally matters if the person is a skater. I believe you can be a “fan” of skateboarding and not actually skateboard. And I know some people cannot fathom that but lets just say, for example: My parents love skating... they don’t skate but they’re down for it. You know what I mean? They support me and any other skater that would come to their door for help they would be down. You know? So I do believe that as long as peoples’ intentions are good and they truly like skating, even if they maybe don’t actually skate, that they can be involved.

So what about the corporate side? Pretty much every skate company has that dude hiding in the shadows investing money into the brand even though they’ve never even owned a skateboard in their life.

As far as it gets into corporate stuff... you know that’s a whole different deal. That’s maybe a person who doesn’t necessarily care about skateboarding but they see dollar signs. And you know what? Whatever. That’s a whole different deal that I don’t care about. But at the same time if these people are there then I’m grateful that those businessmen will share their money with my friends. I just feel that if these guys are sponsoring my other friends, or like fellow “pros,” and like kicking them down money so they can keep skating, then fine... you know what I mean? Sometimes things get really kooky and there’s a lot of weird shit out there
I feel that there’s no black and white about it. As long as there are good intentions and no ones taking advantage of the skaters its cool. I will say this though: There ARE certain decisions that do require a skateboarder.

What do you feel separates 1031 from all the other board companies out there right now? Why should kids buy and support 1031?

Well I mean I’m not gonna sit here and say they should buy us over everyone else. All I can say is that we definitely do things differently than other companies but I’d say a major thing is that people are drawn into things by image—whatever—people buy into image all the time and sometimes that sucks because the fact of the matter is that a lot companies put on this image that aren’t it behind the scenes. These guys think they’re hardcore and this and that and sometimes I’m just like “Really dude? I know what goes on... I know who owns this shit,” but anyways... We are genuinely 100% skateboarder-owned. And I mean don’t get me wrong, other skateboarders have started companies but they have started companies with an outside investor. They have gone and found some dude with a lot of money to spend and got them to front it.

Yeah.

We truly are two skateboard guys that took the money from our wallets and started this. There’s no mystery guy, you know? And my friends and I were sitting around thinking about it the other day and really no one that does that. I think Swank was the last one? Foundation in the early 90’s, right? I don’t know if he had any investors behind him or not. So I mean, the base of it is that we don’t have any outside investors. We don’t have to answer to anybody but ourselves. Our stuff is made in America which is weird these days too... I don’t know. There’s just no bullshit. So you’re into it, or you’re not. And we’re not putting out some image like we’re this or that and then behind the scenes there’s some weirdo running the show and paying us to be the clowns to run it. We’re the clowns. There are no other clowns (laughing). Just us.

Do you work from home or does 1031 camouflage itself in an industrial building somewhere in a business park?

We have two business locations. I’m here in San Diego and I have an office here, and half my garage is converted into a mini warehouse. I do the team and promotions stuff and promotions, like shipping out the rider packages and stuff that goes to magazines. And my partner runs our warehouse up in Milwake. Our stuff gets made in Wisconision and goes about an hour down the highway to milwakie and we do all of our sales and shipping and stuff in milwakie. I’m on the phone and computer with my business partner basically all day.

How important is it for a business to stay true to its roots as apposed to “selling out?” What line do you feel has to be crossed to make your brand a “sellout” brand?

I think it’s all just opinions, really. I’m really into music so I feel that skateboarding and music have this really big similarity... I don’t care what anyone says, it’s like as soon as you’ve crossed that line—like even if your a skater and you cross that line and say, “I want to accept free skateboards to be a flow rider to represent this company.” Well... you sold out. You know what I mean? You just sold it right there. You’re taking your gig, your thing you do, I don’t’ care if you wanna call it your art, your sport... whatever, and you just put a price tag on it. You just put a value on it. And I don’t care if its for “hardcore” skateboards or “ding-dong” skateboards in K-Mart. It doesn’t matter. You just crossed a line and you’re putting a price tag on it. Skateboarding is really bad with it. Skateboard companies, or well the whole industry, they just don’t really get the whole big picture of it. As soon as you cross that line, I don’t care who it is—you just put a price tag on it. Like if you’re really concerned about selling out than don’t get sponsored you know? That’s just how I kind of see it.

What happened with Raybourne?

Ben’s been a part of 1031 forever. He’s one of the oldest riders, you know? I found him when he was like 12 or 13 or something like that and I love ben and hes one of my favoirite skaters but it’s just one of those things. I know ben truly loves 1031 and he’s got history with it but it really just came down to one of those things where you know... he skates for iPath and he skates and is good friends with Danny Dicola and like Jon Goeman and they skate for slave and I talked to ben a lot about it and it just really came down to like hey I love 1031, it felt really torn, but at the same time he’s got these new friends that are like, hey you should come skate for slave and right now whatever, I guess he probably sees dollar signs in his eyes which is understandable too and I hope that all pans out for him and really ultimately it came down to that. He’s 18. He’s got new friends, he thinks what they’re doing is cool so you know. Nothing was bad... but whatever you know? I’ve been doing this long enough. I know how it goes. I know what runs through an 18 year olds head. I hope, and I’m sure everything will be fine for ben.


What do you feel has been the brands greatest milestone up to this point? And how’s the future looking?

You know I honestly feel like we just hit our milestone. We just hit our 5-year mark. I mean, shoot man... I’ve been around skateboarding since 1988 and I’ve seen so many companies come and go, like even the biggest companies. When we started 1031 all I heard was like “when are those guys going out of business,” even though I knew, like the way our business is structured, we don’t ever really have to go out of business you know? We’re running the numbers... we don’t have any debt. And a lot of people don’t realize that a lot of these huge companies come out with the biggest riders and the biggest everything but those companies come and go just as fast because they come out swinging and dig themselves in this debt hole and then they realize you know, skateboarding doesn’t sell like they expected it to and it’s gone, or they have financial backers and the backers realize their 3 to 5 year return doesn’t come so they pull the plug. That’s why you see so many skate companies come and go in 3 to 5 years. So hitting this 5 year mark is like, yeah, that’s huge for us because it’s been US doing it, no other dudes, no anything, and even with the little money we’ve had we’ve been able to pull all this stuff like touring and videos and advertising and it’s all paid off because now we’ve hit this 5 year mark and we have all these dudes like Jason Adams on the team and all these dudes hitting up my email showing interest and the company as a whole has just moved up to a new level so that’s huge for us. And for the future, it’s like I don’t even worry because it’s never going to get worse then it was day one. You know what I mean?

Last words:

Well just kind of going off of that... Ben leaving is a bummer. I think people or some of my friends really get worked up over it but in my eyes its like you know... I was talking about it with Jason Adams and we were just like whatever... dude, all this shit changes so fast, people are always going here or going there or getting kicked out or like whatever. That doesn’t stop anything that WE’RE doing and it hasn’t and it hasn’t slowed anything down and it kind of goes into the whole “Whats next for 1031 whats for the future” and the fact of the matter is just like, no matter what guys leave or get kicked off or whatever goes on theres always these dudes: You know like we got like Fritz Mead and Nepscha... we got these other guys that are like getting coverage and ripping it and killing it and that’s how it goes. All you can do is be like alright well, these are the dudes who are down for it and you just keep feeding into that. You just keep moving forward and staying positive and it really helps to separate yourself from all the skateboard bs because theres a lot of it and people get really wrapped up into. It’s like jesus christ man. do yourself a favor and get out... I don’t know man. I guess that’s it.