Snowboarding is a rich kid sport. With $100 plus lift tickets and tons of necessary gear, how could it not be? Last spring we posted the summer plans of the pros, including Hood trips and more and a bemused reader commented, “I feel like you cant become pro nowadays with out having maaad money to go to snowboarding school, hood, and shit like that…” Someone else lamented. “Yeah they have a real hard life. I’m going to be working 40 hrs a week. Last time I had a summer vacation I was in college. They are lucky ones.”
So is it true? Is it all luck and can you only make a life out of snowboarding if you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth? Is the American Snowboard Dream over? Certainly with an industry in decline it seems like the dream is becoming less and less unattainable, but we’ll let you in on a secret: it’s always been hard work.
Chris Beresford, business man.
Those pros “living the dream” are actually working their asses off. And not all of them go home and roll around in fat stacks of cash every night. In fact, many rely on a keen sense of money management to make it possible.
Take Chris Beresford for example. He got his start thanks to a $199 seasons pass and Austen Granger’s parents, who were willing to drive to the mountain every weekend. From there he made a sponsor me video which scored him a shop sponsor. Shop sponsorship led to rep sponsorship and a job at the shop got him free tickets.
“I did that for a few years, and was working odd jobs along the way through the summer to be able to get out to Utah and hang with the boys who had a little more family backing in the winter months, and try to film as much as possible,” Chris explains.
It helped that he was friends with Scott Stevens, who got him a job coaching at High Cascade and from there, well, he’s still working for it. In addition to filming and traveling, he runs his own brand, Dang Shades on the side. Even when you’ve “made it,” money still doesn’t grow on trees.
Tim Eddy’s hand-built house, almost completely off the grid.
Another frugal boarder, Tim Eddy, offers this advice. “For me it’s all about priorities, ” he says. “Spending money on things that are important…board sports! Not wasting it other material things. Splitboards are efficient and way more affordable than motorized forms of backcountry accessibility. Truck/Car camping is sweet too. Cook your own food, free nightly accommodations, and save on gas cause your sleeping at the slopes. Oh and B.Y.O.B. The bar is expensive!”
Andrew Burns takes a similar approach.
“My favorite shit is real expensive,” he explains. “Since snowmobiles and helicopters aren’t cheap, I like to optimize my cash so I can blow most of it on shredding. Living in a trailer: best move ever, I save about $7000 a year. Groceries are key, you can eat 4 times cooking at home for the cost of one restaurant or fast food meal. Getting hammered: 40′s, cheap and get the job done, and make friends with bartenders: they all have promo budgets. Hustle: make dollars anywhere you can.”
This is not actually Burnsy’s trailer but you get the idea. Photo: Levitation project.
The moral of the story?
“Work hard! Don’t be lazy once you sit back nothing will happen,” Chris says. “I do have to thank Scott for getting me that job because that evolved into getting on K2 my first summer coaching and have started my own brand and haven’t had to work a normal job since. It is crazy!! Sometimes I forget, because as soon as things are working good it covers up those not so good days. LiFE!”