How many SUP'ers are there???

[ricki]

"CENTER BARNSTEAD, NH -- Standup Journal publisher Clay Feeter says he is asked almost daily, "How many standup paddlers are there out there?"

His answer is "I have no idea."

But as a fair indicator Standup Journal recently pulled a report from their website showing unique site visits over a one-year period, between July 14th, 2009 thru July 14th, 2010."

Top 10 Standup Nations

1. United States - 13,348
2. France - 1,545
3. Australia - 978
4. Canada - 900
5. Japan - 714
6. United Kingdom - 453
7. Brazil - 381
8. Spain - 302
9. Germany - 197
10. French Polynesia - 186



Complete article at:
http://www.mylocallineup.com/stand-up-paddle/news/top-10-stand-up-paddle-board-nations.html

[Water Monkey]

Definitely a hard question. Seeing that the Wall Street Journal recently reported that stand up paddle boarding was over a 6 Billion dollar industry last year it seems those numbers might be a little low. As someone in the industry I would love to have more concrete numbers on growth, sales, ect...

Are there more solid numbers for kiteboarding??

[ricki]

Wow, the WSJ said 6 Billion?! Seems a bit high. Consider, being generous, say only 60% of that figure is in direct retail board sales. The other 40 % goes to instruction, bags ... uh, (?) other stuff. Again, trying to help out the Journal. Now assume $1500. per board and paddle on average. That equates to 2,400,000 boards last year. That is a lot of boards vs. the Standup Journal's <14k paddler estimate. That is some range. Assuming perhaps half bought a new boards last year, they would need to buy around 342 boards each? Something seems off in the estimates.

There are no concrete kiter population numbers because no one counts them. All we have are estimates.

[Water Monkey]

$7.2 billion dollar industry......This is a section of the article.....Does seem high but a respected source....

"Stand-up paddling is the fastest-growing segment of the surf industry," says Sean Smith, executive director of the Surf Industry Manufacturers Association, whose most recent study found that the industry had sales in 2008 of $7.2 billion.

Some manufacturers say they can't make them fast enough. "Every one we make is already sold, and that's the case with most manufacturers," says surfing legend Laird Hamilton, who has licensed his name and stand-up board designs—including a model called the Laird—to Surftech and other manufacturers.

[Kiteboarding Tampa Bay]

Interesting topic.
Having this demographic info readily available, and perpetually current could mean increased access for kiting, SUP, and other watersports we love.
Since part of the ASF mission is to help preserve and to INCREASE access (throughout the USA), we put a lot of time into finding the right tools and combination of components to obtain an "industry survey" such as this.

Providing we had this info on hand for these watersports, it could be used to seek increased access to public lands, to seek donated land, or even seek state/ federally owned lands specifically for watersport activities. Tampa Bay Watch, just outside Ft. Desoto Park, is a prime example of the state donating a 600,000 dollar chunk of waterfront land to a charitable org., or Shake-A-Leg in Miami would be a good example for the South Fla readers.

For kiteboarding, we have the upcoming 2010 Kiteboarder Census, which will be readily available to affiliated local kiting associations working to preserve access. More on this soon.;)

This will easily work for a SUP survey also, we just need the survey questions and help circulating it. Let me know if anyone would like to tackle a project like this.:p

Happy Paddling!