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Maloofs Show Support of Local Skate Shops
Posted by bk - December 2nd, 2010 11:37 am
Maloof Skateboarding seeks to support local skate shops with its 12 Days of Skate this holiday season. Drop on over to their site for more info and your chance to win gear from your wish list at your local skate shop beginning December 11th.
“We think this is a great opportunity for us to highlight these local skate shops out there that are the driving force of the entire industry,” said Joe Maloof, “We’re encouraging everyone to support their local skate shop this holiday and encourage their friends and families to do the same. Skateboarding started with the skate shops and the integrity of the industry is tied with their success. Now, more than ever, it’s crucial that we support them as they are the key drivers of skateboarding’s progression. Although this is a Christmas promotion intended to highlight local skate shops during the busiest shopping season of the year, we hope all consumers will continue to think of them year round.”
Nice to know some people still care! Thanks Maloof’s!!
Geniuses… use local skate shop hype to promote crappy MMC decks and the skate brands that they have on their eCommerce
Peter,
There is a big difference between caring and good marketing/publicity.
If the Maloofs buy 500 bucks worth of stuff from local shops for 12 days they have spent a whopping 6K. Not to mention the money the Volcom and other companies might have put in. And who counts as a local shop? Does Active? Does Industrial? It doesn’t say.
This isn’t to say the idea of supporting a shop isn’t good, but the motive and level of help matters as well. The end goal here isn’t to make sure the “local” shops stay in business, the goal is to make the Maloofs’ seem core. If they really wanted to support local shops Wells Fargo (owned by the Maloofs) would offer small business loans with special rates to small skate shops, etc.
They are following Nike’s footsteps in order to create an image of being core. I’m not trying to get into Nike, but the facts are it took multiple tries for them to be accepted, and on the attempt when it finally worked it was done with a lot of social science and marketing, not altruism or care. Their tactics were first to study (they had hired anthropology PhD students to study skaters, like you would a tribe in the rainforest), and then market according to these findings, while using Robert Cialdini 6 aspects of marketing persuasion (reciprocity, commitment and consistency, social proof, authoriy, liking, and scarcity). With large companies like this, you need to remember it isn’t run by one person, but by teams of well educated people who’s goal is to get you to consume, watch, etc.
And you need to look where the profit goes. Sure there are a few people in Nike SB or with the Maloofs that are skaters but the majority of the profit is being funneled back into Phil Knight and the Maloof Bros pockets and their shareholders.
If skateboarding is a community the bulk of the money should stay in the community not with outside businessmen, their marketers, and a very small percent of skaters. And we need to be able to see the difference between a company really caring/understanding/being skateboarding and worthy of our support and a company that simple sees us as walking dollar bills.
Luper hit the nail on the head. Perception is reality.
I like the idea of making people aware of the big role our local shop play in local scenes. If it gets a couple kids hyped on their local shop and gets a couple more kids into their local shops rather than shopping on the web or going to the mall shops then I would say it is worth it.
Economics, the dismal science.
Lurper, you really believe the Maloofs own Wells Fargo?
I’m not opposed to everything you say and I am in full agreement about supporting local skate shops. In my home town I have seen way to many fall to the mall giants.
It seems like the Maloofs are trying to do some good atleast. What other billionares or multinational company do you know of that built a skatepark and left it for the community, and plan on building more?
Lighten Up
I agree the Maloofs are doing some good, but I believe they are doing more harm than good and part of a fundamental shift within skateboarding.
Skaters have always been weary of “the little leaguing of skateboarding” and there have always been aspects of it within the activity, but in recent years it seems skaters don’t mind the “little league-ization” and our core values of creativity, cooperation, and autonomy (and, i suppose, rebellion as well) are losing ground. More and more we are being directed to and by large scale companies/competitions that contain values directly opposed to the traditional skateboard ideology (post-Dog Town, prior to that skateboarding was compared to the hula-hoop or a teetor-totter on wheels). Large corporations and large competitions that only pay out to a few skaters will change skateboarding into a sport. It still amazes me that Lizard King can be voted TWS Readers Choice and the Maloofs can be looked up to as pillars of the community.
And for the sake of argument, no the Maloofs don’t technically own all of Wells Fargo but they do own a large percent of Wells Fargo’s stock and in-turn have a great amount of influence within the company (Wells Fargo owns a lot of stock in private prisons by the way). “The Maloof Companies also is one of the largest single shareholders in Wells Fargo Bank, which operates banks and branches in 23 states throughout the Western United States with over $200 billion in assets and 15 million customers.”
Source: arcoarena [dot] com/default.asp?lnopt=4&pnopt=0
As for other companies that have built parks, the Tony Hawk Foundation has built many parks and plans on building many more. THF parks are usually built within low-income areas. SoleTech has built a park, DC has built a park (parks that were arguably designed much better than the Money Cup park in NYC) and offered a million to the city of Philadelphia to keep LOVE park open, and for other charities Blueprint went to Azerbaijan to go skate with the local kids there, BlackBox is a major sponsor of Skateistan, Delux has been involved with charities for various skaters, and none of these companies have their hands in the pocket of a company that has assets of 200 billion (Billion!). Not to mention the other businesses the Maloofs are involved with (i.e. the Palms Hotel, S. Kings, etc.).
The Maloofs saw skateboarding as a new place to make money, just like their other ventures with the UFC, NASCAR, etc. and anything they do is for publicity not because they or their advertising department care. This doesn’t mean some of their publicity stunts aren’t somewhat beneficial to the community but their overall presence is harmful. Its like Wal-Mart giving to charity. Yea, it’s nice Wal-Mart gave some money to charity, but they only give to avoid paying taxes and hopefully to get people to ignore all the other problems Wal-Mart makes in the community. The Maloofs’ and their advertising department are no different.
If the Maloofs wanted to help the core, with all the money they have and influence they have, there are many other ways they could actually help.
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