{"id":21649,"title":"VeeBom - the fuse is lit...","description":"July 2022 - welcome to the first edition of the VeeBom blog. The genesis of VeeBom Skate Supply. Our journey so far.","content":"<h2><strong>July 2022<\/strong><\/h2><p>OK. This is it\u2026 \u201cby the time I'm 35 I'll have started my business.\u201d A more than generous timescale, an optimistic and naive version of myself thought.<\/p><p>WELL GUESS WHAT GENIUS\u2026 You're 35.<\/p><p>What have I been doing this whole time, dude?<\/p><p>Since the age of 15, and the depressing realisation that there ain't no way I'm gunna be a pro skater, I've known that I'm gunna sell skateboards. So how does it take 20 years to do something about it?<\/p><p>I'll list a few reasons:<\/p><ul><li><p>There's this little thing called skateboarding.<\/p><\/li><li><p>Looking for love? Why not spend three years studying a skill you'll never use - chicks dig that\u2026<\/p><\/li><li><p>\u201cAh man, I've got loadsa time, pass me them whatsits. It's party time!\u201d<\/p><\/li><li><p>Two turn tables but no microphone.<\/p><\/li><li><p>\u201cYo Dave, I've got an idea for a comic book you should write, it'll be the nuts!\u201d<\/p><\/li><li><p>Nah\u2026<\/p><\/li><li><p>Better sink some time into this life mate thing.<\/p><\/li><li><p>Nah\u2026<\/p><\/li><li><p>\u201cHere Dave, I've started a skate company. Can you do me some deck designs?\u201d - this is it, the gateway to my career in skateboarding.<\/p><\/li><li><p>Nah\u2026<\/p><\/li><li><p>Career? What career? Oh\u2026 snap.<\/p><\/li><li><p>If you wanna be the bizness, you better know the bizness, ya dig?<\/p><\/li><li><p>Nah\u2026<\/p><\/li><li><p>Bill, meet Ted. Ted, Bill. You're welcome.<\/p><\/li><li><p>Bouncing baby Bomb!<\/p><\/li><li><p>Oh dang. We're gunna need a bigger boat!<\/p><\/li><\/ul><p>So that pretty much brings you up to speed. Everybody knows that, to measure success, your targets should be SMART. Well, time bound was no problem, that's for true. But, while I knew I'd never be a pro skater, there was one thing I could definitely be a pro at\u2026 crastinating.<\/p><p>So here's the 4-1-1, selling skateboards has always been my ultimate goal. Over the past 20 years I've, at least, managed to fine tune my idea to such a point that you could poke a hole in a stale bread loaf with it.<\/p><p>I've bounced from the classic local, to deck manufacture, to running a park. Being a rapper (yeah, different dream). Something called the intuhnet(??). Triple stacking with my other great passions - comic books and djing (decks, decks and dex, mate, nice one!). And my final stale bread stab at a solid escape route from the world of the water cooler..<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/wgwxjxk4iq0aytvysyks9bpz1hkei6d26lobgwcgrcfboqdz.png\" alt=\"wgwxjxk4iq0aytvysyks9bpz1hkei6d26lobgwcgrcfboqdz.png\" \/><\/p><h2>Circa 2000<\/h2><p>For as long as I can remember, I've had a fascination with branding. Wanting to create an identity\/logo\/slogan for almost everything I've done or had an interest in. Call me a sodden bi-product of the capitalist societal waterfall, if you will.<\/p><p>Aged around 13 or 14 I was daydreaming of owning some kind of skateboarding brand. Fantasising on something called \u201cThe Meaning of Life\u201d. For a year or so, in my school design and technology projects, I obsessed on this. My design was a faceless stick man holding a skateboard with the phrase \u201cThe Meaning of Life\u201d underneath. To me, at that time, there was no better way to describe skateboarding and a brand that exemplified that was exactly what I wanted to see. Anyway, much like a serial killer, I surpressed my desires and just moved on with being a skanky, misguided, desperate for acceptance teenager. Equally like a serial killer, surpressing my desires didn't last\u2026<\/p><p><\/p><blockquote><p><strong>NB to clarify, I am not a serial killer<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/cyjimxs4b9nibuwbvrrx9tvbf60cba9jvdc7rktuhrmxtbw9.jpg\" alt=\"cyjimxs4b9nibuwbvrrx9tvbf60cba9jvdc7rktuhrmxtbw9.jpg\" \/><\/p><h2>Circa 2002<\/h2><p>When I was around 15 MSN messenger was starting to explode for kids like me all over the world. I felt like I needed a piece of that so I could keep in touch with the various people I met at, like, Jesus camp and so forth. As it happened, though, I didn't know the first thing about how to get a piece of that MSN action. I didn't even know how to sign up for an email address. A far cry from the computer geekery I seem to have achieved in my adult life. Anyway, my saviour came in the form of one such person that I met at Jesus camp - surprisingly, this was not Jesus. She asked me what I wanted as my email address. I instantly opted for \u201cDave Wonder\u201d, with a view to using it in my future planned rap career where my nickname would be WonderBomb. And so, a MSN handle was born as well as yet another potential idea for a brand.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/mwq4w0dvcwr2r6kxxt0aqyghjujjll5zuq6dyu8dyzrzeqfr.jpg\" alt=\"mwq4w0dvcwr2r6kxxt0aqyghjujjll5zuq6dyu8dyzrzeqfr.jpg\" \/><\/p><p><em>Album dropping 2025 - minidisc release only<\/em><\/p><p><\/p><h2>Circa 2003<\/h2><p>Now, as a 15\/16 year old dude, my next brand \u2018victim\u2019 took shape and for some reason I was weirdly drawn to the name \u201cBrackeTskateS\u201d aka BTS aka B-Skates.<\/p><p>What the f*ck? What does that even mean? Why are brackets relevant to skateboarding? Why is that a cool name? Well, it's not. But in my adolescent brain, the answer to all of those questions was \u201cthe answer's in the middle\u201d. Nice one, Dave. Way to keep the skeptics at bay.<\/p><p>I put some graphics together and even managed to sell <em>myself <\/em>on the idea that the answer actually was in the middle. I guess my point here, though, is why is any brand called what it's called? Well, check out this super interesting <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/uv7H31DhPZ0\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>video about skate brands and how they got their name<\/strong><\/a>. As you can see, \u201cit doesn't really matter, we're still going to create cool products\u201d is a valid enough reason for a brand name. Though, back in 2003, other than a couple of drawings and graffiti generator mock ups, I didn't have that.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/glkg3zrromzojbnqm3vupux3tlxq8pwbustjjri1tlisiiio.jpg\" alt=\"glkg3zrromzojbnqm3vupux3tlxq8pwbustjjri1tlisiiio.jpg\" \/><\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/jv25deym3onyw0qgul0otllpjvjtpuvlqmatnnsokybjtpt4.jpg\" alt=\"jv25deym3onyw0qgul0otllpjvjtpuvlqmatnnsokybjtpt4.jpg\" \/><\/p><h2>Circa 2008-2021<\/h2><p>Some years pass and I was still hung up on BrackeTskateS as being the answer in the middle of a field of questions about my brand.<\/p><p>Nah, it's just not cool enough. I don't like it. WHAT THE F*CK DOES IT MEAN?!<\/p><p>It's time to go back to the drawing board. Reinvent. I'm in my 20s now and just can't get on board with the brackets. I want something edgier, something that sounds cool. Something more relevant to me, right now. How about WonderBomb?<\/p><p>Well, let's face it, WonderBomb is lame as hell.<\/p><p>Do you know what isn't lame as hell, though? Things that sound German.<\/p><p>Right?<\/p><p>Vunterbomben then takes up the mantle as my pet identity and with Vunterbomben I settle for the next few years.<\/p><p>But there's more! I don't just wanna sell new skateboards. Remember that qualification I studied for, for 3 years, that I'm probably never gunna use? Yeah, I didn't impress any chicks with it, but I think I've got a use for it now. I HATE the amount of waste we skateboarders generate, through our passion. It is obscene. There must be something I can do there. Totally. We've all seen the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.diys.com\/upcycled-skateboards\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>cool things people have built out of skateboards<\/strong>.<\/a> You guessed it. Why can't I build that into part of my business model? I f*cking can! And guess what? I will.<\/p><p><\/p><p>Be it lame or not. Edgy or not. Cool sounding or not. Vunterbomben, when trying to carve an easily identifiable and locatable presence on the internet, is probably not gunna work.<\/p><p>As I start to think about things like how my future customers are actually going to find me, URLs, search engine hits and all the rest of it, I come very quickly to understand that there is no way people are easily gunna find me. A top priority for any online store is to be easily searchable. \u201cVunterbomben\u201d is not conducive with that priority.<\/p><p><\/p><p>So, I'm pretty sold on the identity I've imagined for Vunterbomben - kind of like a military theme, but with a street edge - Pop Art meets propaganda. <em>Propartganda? <\/em>I dunno.<em> <\/em>F*ck it, I'm coining that. One thing I do know is that Vunterbomben is likely one of the least searchable words on the internet and, more likely than not, a ridiculously difficult brand name to market. Can you imagine a session down the park and you bump into a humble skate shop proprietor who wants to sell you some sh!t from their stupidly named store? Well, it'd go a little bit like this:<\/p><p><strong>Parkbeast: <\/strong>\u201cAh, f*ck, I snapped my board!\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Humbleprop: <\/strong>\u201cYo, dude, no bother. Check it out, I own a store. We've got tonnes of awesome boards. Hop online, browse our lines, hermano, here's a discount code\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Parkbeast: <\/strong>\u201cSweet, thanks man. What's your store called?\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Humbleprop: <\/strong>\u201cAh yeah, it's Vunterbomben, bang it in your search engine.\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Parkbeast: <\/strong>\u201cErrr. Y'what? It's called what?\u201d<\/p><p><strong>Humbleprop: <\/strong>\u201cSozza, dude, it's Vu-\u201d<\/p><p>Anyway, you get the picture.<\/p><p>That. Sh!t. Won't. Work.<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/9kwnyjsbowtml7zznu7ofvldhc7klhfqk7lpquqatavubsdu.jpg\" alt=\"9kwnyjsbowtml7zznu7ofvldhc7klhfqk7lpquqatavubsdu.jpg\" \/><\/p><p><em>\u201cBang it in your search engine, yeah?\u201d<\/em><\/p><p><\/p><h2>Circa 2022<\/h2><p>So this is it. The final stale bread stab. VeeBom. Simple. Six letters, easy to pronounce and not too confusing for the search engines. My already imagined branding still intact, I'm pretty sure I can start thinking about dropping.<\/p><p><\/p><p>Somewhere along the line, something that became a lot more important to me than just selling skateboards was the impact that being a skateboarder has on our environment. Knowing that the Canadian maple tree is the main source of skateboards around the world and how long it takes for a maple tree to grow to full maturity, before it is lumbered for skateboards, hit a nerve for me.<\/p><p>There must be a more sustainable alternative to maple. Here's the good news. There is. But it ain't really news anymore. Bamboo skateboards have been around for a while now, but there just aren't enough of them.<\/p><p>So, where the most important thing to me, once upon a time, was to sell skateboards. That has now been usurped by the overarching desire to sell sustainable skateboards and chip away at the maple market one deck at a time.<\/p><p>Not only that, but I love the inclusivity that the skateboarding community has and want to promote that for everybody on this planet - robot, alien, boy, girl or however <em>you<\/em> identify.<\/p><p>Why stop there, though? We, as skateboarders, have an inordinate amount of consumables in our sh!t: decks, trucks, wheels, garms, shoes and so on.<\/p><p>Our mission statement at VeeBom is to get sustainability sussed in skateboarding, foster a #SussedainableSkate culture and tell the world that #WeAreWokeboarding.<\/p><p><\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/ntsmy6nmh4mgebn8rcu6npltl8drb70uphwtmp1kmmiee3ej.png\" alt=\"ntsmy6nmh4mgebn8rcu6npltl8drb70uphwtmp1kmmiee3ej.png\" \/><\/p><p><\/p><p>What's that I hear you ask?<\/p><p>\u2018Where's all your skateboards, Dave?\u2019<\/p><p>Yeah, about that\u2026 I've got a plan. And it starts right here.<\/p><p><\/p><p>So, here I am, 11 months left til I'm sellin\u2019 skateboards.<\/p><p><\/p><p>The fuse is lit\u2026<\/p><p><img src=\"https:\/\/images.teemill.com\/bmubcmri3dd7l0lwkjygchwcijjym8wards2v2chazxfjjwb.png\" alt=\"bmubcmri3dd7l0lwkjygchwcijjym8wards2v2chazxfjjwb.png\" \/><\/p>","urlTitle":"fuselit","url":"\/blog\/fuselit\/","editListUrl":"\/my-blogs","editUrl":"\/my-blogs\/edit\/fuselit\/","fullUrl":"https:\/\/veebom.teemill.com\/blog\/fuselit\/","featured":false,"published":true,"showOnSitemap":true,"hidden":false,"visibility":null,"createdAt":1665442516,"updatedAt":1667141386,"publishedAt":1667141386,"lastReadAt":null,"division":{"id":245302,"name":"VeeBom"},"tags":[{"id":1951,"code":"vee-bom","name":"VeeBom","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/vee-bom\/"},{"id":1965,"code":"sussedainableskate","name":"Sussedainableskate","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/sussedainableskate\/"},{"id":1978,"code":"we-are-wokeboarding","name":"WeAreWokeboarding","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/we-are-wokeboarding\/"}],"metaImage":{"original":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/iqgjlspol2fx0dk4zbhyrkanyvzzhwwuk9r2kipl7hwd6z64.png","thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/iqgjlspol2fx0dk4zbhyrkanyvzzhwwuk9r2kipl7hwd6z64.png.jpg?w=1140&h=855","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/iqgjlspol2fx0dk4zbhyrkanyvzzhwwuk9r2kipl7hwd6z64.png.jpg?w=1920&h=1440"},"metaTitle":"VeeBlog","metaDescription":"July 2022 - welcome to the first edition of the VeeBom blog. The genesis of VeeBom Skate Supply.","series":[],"similarReads":[{"id":22005,"title":"VeeBlog - tick tock","url":"\/blog\/vee-blog-tick-tock\/","urlTitle":"vee-blog-tick-tock","division":245302,"description":"Month two of getting my sh!t together, to realise a dream and end a nightmare.\nTime flies when you're dropping Boms. One month down, in which I made the decision to 'actually do something'. Let's see if this month is any more productive","published":true,"metaImage":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/1y2eifxy8bcy7rg87lnzybim9jmfoqpwqe47g6alxiz6lxpm.png.jpg?w=1140&h=855","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/1y2eifxy8bcy7rg87lnzybim9jmfoqpwqe47g6alxiz6lxpm.png.jpg?w=1920&h=1440"},"hidden":0},{"id":23093,"title":"VeeBlog - Vee came to drop Boms","url":"\/blog\/word-to-ya-moms\/","urlTitle":"word-to-ya-moms","division":245302,"description":"The third instalment of our story. On the face of it, not a busy month but enough loopy fiascos to kick and push VeeBom to the next stage.","published":true,"metaImage":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/bdbohsw5fqaucgcvuun8unxcbovclqvqsxkhiohuoekev5kp.png.jpg?w=1140&h=855&z=1.4549601080112&fx=0.50387790008312&fy=0.65634796634841","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/bdbohsw5fqaucgcvuun8unxcbovclqvqsxkhiohuoekev5kp.png.jpg?w=1920&h=1440&z=1.4549601080112&fx=0.50387790008312&fy=0.65634796634841"},"hidden":0}],"labels":[]}