by The Editors on February 2, 2009
Rick Fork, a.k.a. Rick Froberg was a quiet guy with a devious sense of humor when he worked in the back room at Transworld Media. But all that changed when he got on stage with his bands Drive Like Jehu, Pitchfork and Hot Snakes.
The contrast between the two was shocking and we never could figure out how all those heavy sounds could came out of such a thin, quiet, honestly nice guy.
Froberg’s art shares some of the same qualities as his music—it’s bold, skilled, sinister and primal, yet intelligent, referential and nuanced. He genre-hops with ease; from digital drawings to acrylic paint to heavy ink and back again, creating stark images of character collages, WWII-era comic figures and Dali-esque cartoon landscapes.
Filter magazine checks in with Froberg in an interview about art, music, and the realities of getting paid.
[Link: Filter Magazine]
by The Editors on February 2, 2009
NHS management breathed a sign of relief when the Consumer Product Safety Commission voted unanimously to postpone by one year a new federal law that would have required products made for children 12 and under to be tested for lead starting Feb. 10, 2009.
But that relief came after NHS’s owner Richard Novak had already laid off 17 employees because of sagging sales and worries about the new regulations.
A victory for good sense,” said Tim Piumarta, director of research and new product development at NHS, a Santa Cruz company with sales of $23 million a year. “This untenable legislation, as it was written by non-scientists in Congress, threw the entire global product supply channel into mass confusion.”
NHS and many other companies will now have a year to work out the lead details before complaining about it again next year.
[Link: San Jose Mercury News]
by The Editors on February 2, 2009
This is old and we think we ignored it the first time around but, hey look, an inflatable longboard that rolls up and packs away when it’s deflated. At least it will float when we throw it in the ocean in disgust.
[Link: Ubergizmo]
by The Editors on February 2, 2009
by The Editors on February 1, 2009
While the idea behind Toms Shoes is pretty cool (for every shoe they sell, they give one away) it seems like an odd thing for Element Skateboards to partner up with them because, we’ll you can’t skate in Tom’s shoes. Can you?
The Toms and Element Skateboards line launches today with a collection of five styles of shoes –three for women and two for men. Also, Element has designed a Toms branded skateboard to push around on while wearing what else? Toms shoes. . . .Element will follow the Toms “one for one” rule — for every skate deck or board bought, Element will give a board away to a child in need of some wheels. . . . The shoes are all $46. Skateboards retail for $150 for a complete long board and $50 for the smaller deck.
Guess you can longboard in pretty much anything.
[Link: LA Times via Blackbook]
by The Editors on February 1, 2009
by The Editors on January 30, 2009
by The Editors on January 27, 2009
With all the rumor mongering going on about Quiksilver selling this or being bought by that, it is interesting to see that there is at least one analyst out there who is still rating Quiksilver a buy thanks to the company eliminating 200 jobs and a possible debt restructuring in February.
However, KeyBanc Capital Markets analyst Brandon J. Ferro said the news means “an outright sale of Quiksilver or one of its brands is much less likely now than it was when we initiated coverage in early December 2008, as it helps to indicate the Company has made significant progress in resolving near-term liquidity issues.”
We really don’t know who to believe at this point.
[Link: MSNBC]
by The Editors on January 26, 2009
Last night when we said that Tuesday January 27, 2009 was “bring a box to work day” at Quiksilver we had no idea that so many boxes would be required.
Now that we’ve seen the press release on the Quiksilver site we better understand what was meant when we were told “the list is so long Bob doesn’t even want to look at the names.”
The company will eliminate 200 positions as part of the plan, including a reduction-in-force of approximately 150 employees which is expected to account for roughly one-third of the annual cost reductions. Quiksilver expects to record a charge of approximately $5 million in its first fiscal quarter as a result of these actions. . . Robert B. McKnight, Jr., commented, “All levels of our organization are affected by these actions as nearly 20 percent of the employees involved in the reduction hold manager-level titles or higher.
Now it sounds more like “bring a box to work week.” The worst part of all of this is that most of the people going to work tomorrow at Quiksilver have no idea if or when they will be called into HR, laid off, and given an exit interview.
Follow the jump for the entire press release and Bob McKnight’s memo to Quiksilver employees.
[click to continue…]
by The Editors on January 26, 2009
We’re guilty. Like many others we spent most of Friday standing around in the isles of the ASR Show talking about how bad things are, how much worse they’re going to get, and whether buying or selling Quiksilver stock is a good idea. The opinions on the later were mixed, regardless of what personalized license plates may have been telling us.
Mixed in with all the gloom, however, were some words of encouragement. Ocean Minded CEO Gary Ward was walking the isles with his lovely daughter Shannon and when we hit him with the “how bad is it” question he set us straight directly.
“Let’s put it this way,” he said. “It’s ten times better than we thought it would be. This industry is a family and no one is stopping this family.”
We wondered if the “family members” who committed to the January ASR show might be benefiting a little from the fact that many of their larger competitors weren’t showing. “Are you kidding? Nauds is laughing right now,” he said of Billabong’s Paul Naude. “He’s had a great year and look at their booths; they are packed. For sure, the people who stuck it out are reaping the benefits.”
Follow the jump for the rest of the story.
[click to continue…]
Rick Fork, a.k.a. Rick Froberg was a quiet guy with a devious sense of humor when he worked in the back room at Transworld Media. But all that changed when he got on stage with his bands Drive Like Jehu, Pitchfork and Hot Snakes. 
