STILL MAKING WAVES
Shaun Tomson on the $7bn surfing industry
TWO decades after former professional surfer and 1977 world champion Shaun Tomson moved to the US to pursue a new career, South Africans still remember his name.
The story of the Durban boy who made it big achieved enduring fame, even in landlocked Johannesburg.
The early part of Tomson’s surfing career coincided with the seminal point in the arc of professional surfing. The surfing and apparel industry is now worth an estimated $7-billion.
Tomson was one of a new breed that came to realise surfing could become more than a hobby for dropouts — it could be a career and a business.
His successful stint as a professional surfer evolved into developing his own clothing labels, Instinct and Solitude, which the former top surfer plans to resuscitate.
Tomson won the first of six Gunston 500 titles while doing his national service.
“There was very little money back then. I think I might have won R1 000 for that contest. Luckily, I had a father, Ernie, who really supported my career and knew how much I loved to surf,” said Tomson last week from his home in Santa Barbara, California.
His father’s ambition to become an Olympic swimmer was cut short when a shark attacked him. “His dream didn’t come true,” said Tomson. “He wanted to make sure mine did.”
His dad’s support paid off. “I ended up winning the biggest contest in the world in Hawaii in 1974, the Hang Ten Pro.”
Tomson delayed his return to university and went touring instead. At the time, there were isolated contests in South Africa, Australia and Hawaii.
“After I went on the tour in 1975 and spent that year travelling I still didn’t feel there was going to be anything more.”
But, in 1977, a surfing circuit took off, providing him with the platform to launch his career.
“That year I won the world title, and I asked myself how I was going to make a business out of it.”
The prize money remained small — Tomson said he won about $10 000 in 1977. Sponsorships were in their infancy, and there was no time to do other work, but he and cousin Michael Tomson hit on the idea of selling the surfing lifestyle through clothes labels.
“He started Gotcha and I started Instinct with partners in South Africa. We could both see it was a lifestyle people aspired to, not just for surfers.
“It wasn’t like we had a grand plan — it just happened as a result of our passion. It came together along the way.”
If there is a lesson he drew from operating the brand it was that business degrees can get you only so far.
“If you get a bunch of passionate people together, that is when it will happen. Our passion fuelled the businesses that came out of it. It was the love for surfing, being stoked.”
The brands were started within a month of each other, although Gotcha grew to be the bigger company.
“They were both selling globally. I sold my interest in Instinct when I retired from the world tour in 1990, but I bought it back a number of years ago.
“I haven’t done much with it yet. It doesn’t include the South African rights, which belong to Foschini,” Tomson said.
World champions Tom Carroll and Barton Lynch were both team riders for the Instinct label in its heyday.
In 1998, Tomson and his wife Carla started the Solitude clothing brand and later sold it to Oxford Apparel, which grew it to a $50-million label, before the Tomsons bought the brand back months ago.
“We are going to relaunch it, to get back into the market, but there’s no date set yet.”
Tomson completed his degree before moving to the US in 1995, when he was offered a job with Patagonia, a company Tomson said he respected for its outlook on environmental causes and corporate social investment.
“I’d never worked for a company, so it was a great experience to see how this amazing company operated.”
Everything changed for Tomson in 2006 when his son Mathew died accidentally while playing something called “the choking game”.
“My life took a dramatic turn. Since then I realised it’s my mission in life to inspire hope and positive choice. I’m lucky in that I can make a living by doing that and helping people and organisations.
“Through my surfing career I had the opportunity of making a living out of my passion, and I’m doing the same thing now with speaking, books and making films,” he said.
“I speak to the largest corporations in the world, about 100 000 people a year.”
Before Tomson hangs up the phone he turns back into the surf kid from Durban.
“I’m still a super-stoked surfer. When the surf’s good I’m out there for hours. I really have a great life surfing. I still surf really hard and push myself. It gives me so much satisfaction. It’s brilliant,” he enthuses.