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Italian Market: Surf Market Stable, Skate Has Consolidated

Let’s start with the economic situation and outlook. We are in full electoral campaign during August and September as our Prime Minister, Mario Draghi had to let go as he could not find any majority within the parties and this causes big confusion and again instability. But we are used to this as we are used to changing Prime Ministers every year.
By Franz Josef Holler

Mr Draghi had a long-term plan to recover Italy back to the good times but we will never know the outcome as he did not reach his target in the short period of time he led the country. Now we are facing an unstable political situation paired with enormous costs of energy which is really putting us in a bad spot. Less power of spending for families on goods form the boardsport industry and price increases everywhere. Families with low incomes are already in trouble and have a hard time reaching the end of the month with their income as we face inflation of about 8.4% according to official data sources. This creates a very bad outlook which also means that the better earners and wealthier people spend less as they want to save for the times to come. Retailers don’t feel this too much right now luckily but the fear that turnovers could have a heavy downturn this fall / winter season is already everywhere.

Skateboarding is seeing a lot of product on the shelves during and national distributors confirm and complain that their warehouses have never been this full with hardgoods especially. Giorgio, owner of AcriminalG skate shop from Arona states: Sales for hardgoods in 2022 are still good and request is still high and people keep buying the selected goods they really want even if expensive, but of course the big boom in decks and completes from 2021 is slowing. He also adds that it is very positive that more and more skateparks are being built and that more and more girls are coming into the stores to buy boards, something he’s noticed for quite some time now and you also notice it when at the skatepark.

The high stock levels keep pricing for hardgoods stable in Italy which is good for the end consumer but distributors are worried about the weak Euro which makes it very hard for importing goods form outside the EU and keeping prices stable, something the end consumer will notice from now on and especially for SS23. This said SS23 pre-books in general have been quite conservative for many retailers boardsport-wise.

Longboards and cruisers sold less this summer and the number of new beginners is decreasing as many surf store owners confirm. On the surf side SUP is still riding its wave to success and more and more boards are sold and seen… Surf in general is still trending and sales are stable on hardgoods only – the clothing side is struggling still.

The lack of a boardsport uniform – clothing wise – is maybe the biggest problem when talking to retailers, people are wearing all different kinds of styles and the styles are much more diverse than previous years. Also second hand and vintage clothing combined with more expensive pieces now is a good portion of the cake. Even luxury goods brands now play a role and kids like to wear clothing or accessories from luxury brands. Kids would much rather buy 1 t-shirt that’s expensive rather than buying 3 or 4 cheaper ones, something which is also driven by the music industry (artists) who promote this a lot.

September started extremely hot with temperatures still over 30 degrees but now everyone hopes for good winter sales, even if the outlook of costs and expenses is very bad, but the hunger of being outside and doing what we love keeps us in a positive mood.