Tag: Transworld Snowboard

Selling SnowboardsSelling Snowboards

March 7, 2023 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

The natural terrain features, beginning of boardercross, and the early adoption of a terrain park all helped cement Whistler’s important place in snowboard history. The early snowboard shops in Whistler were also important for supporting local snowboarders and the growing sport.

The first snowboard shop to open in Whistler, known simply as the Snoboard Shop, was opened by Ken Achenbach. Ken got into snowboarding in 1980 after he quit ski racing and was looking for something else to do during the long winters. He bought a snowboard from snowboard pioneer, Tom Sims, and was immediately hooked. Ken was so confident that snowboarding would be the next big thing that he borrowed his Mom’s credit card and bought six more snowboards intending to sell them to local stores. Ahead of his time, none of the stores wanted them and he started selling the snowboards out of his Calgary garage to pay his Mom back. This grew into the Snoboard Shop in Calgary, one of the first snowboard shops in Canada.

Soon Ken was in the centre of the snowboarding world, competing in the first Snowboard World Championship and appearing throughout snowboard media. He came to Whistler to film, fell in love with the mountains, and in 1988 he opened the Snoboard Shop in Whistler.

Down an alley and out of the way, the Snoboard Shop was an institution and opened before snowboards were even allowed up Whistler Mountain. Making up a surprisingly large portion of the snowboard market, according to Ken, when TransWorld SNOWboarding Magazine came out, the only snowboarding magazine at the time, the Snoboard Shop made one fifth of the total magazine sales.

Tom Sims, original snowboard legend, signs posters during a Showcase event in 1994. Showcase Snowboards was well-known for big parties and bringing in celebrity riders. Whistler Question Collection.

Likewise, before boots specific to snowboarding were widely available, Sorel’s regular snow boots were popular for snowboarders. Modified with a ski boot liner inside they were the best snowboard boots on the market at the time. In a Whistler Museum Speaker Series last year, Ken said the Snoboard shop had some of the highest sales of Sorels in the country. When the Canadian representative for Sorels visited the Snoboard Shop to learn more about their success, the rep was shocked to see that they were not an outdoor store. Playing an integral part during the early years, the Snoboard Shop in Whistler closed in 1996 for the team to pick up new ventures.

Showcase was the second snowboard shop to open in Whistler and also holds an important place in Whistler hearts and history. Although Showcase today is known for snowboarding, when it opened in 1989, it was known as Showcase Tennis. The Chateau Whistler Resort had just opened with six tennis courts, including two covered courts. Not long after opening, management made the financial decision to pivot to snowboarding which was blowing up, with Blackcomb and Whistler Mountains both recently welcoming snowboarders. Blackcomb opened to snowboarders during the 1987/88 season and Whistler opened the year after.

To properly cater to snowboarders they brought in Graham Turner as manager, who was a snowboard racer and Blackcomb Mountain employee. Graham was also early on the snowboarding scene, making a snowboard in woodwork at school in the early 1980s before it was easy to buy a snowboard in Vancouver. Like so many others, he moved to Whistler to be closer to his favourite hobbies, snowboarding and mountain biking.

Graham Turner ripping down the hill on his directional racing board. Blackcomb Collection.

Showcase had events and marketing perfectly dialled, starting the Showcase Showdown which is touted as Canada’s longest running snowboard competition. Fondly remembered by many, it sometimes seemed like half of Whistler was living on Kraft Dinner from Showcase thanks to the marketing genius where you could get three boxes for 99 cents. Used as a loss leader to bring people into the store, the Kraft Dinner was excellent value even then. You can only imagine the lines out the door if that special came back today! During Graham’s reign Showcase became the biggest Burton dealer in North America while growing the local snowboarding community.

Whistler’s Robin Dow goes for big air to win the male 18 plus category in the Showcase Snowboard’s half-pipe competition on Blackcomb in 1992. Whistler Question Collection.
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Snowboard Park – No Skiers Allowed!Snowboard Park – No Skiers Allowed!

April 5, 2022 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Blackcomb Mountain opened for snowboarders in the 87/88 season. While it would take Whistler another year to start embracing snowboard culture, Blackcomb was generally supportive of the ‘knuckle-draggers’ thanks to the persistence and passion of a few snowboarders on staff and in the community. Additionally, Hugh Smythe could see the strategic benefits of welcoming a new group of riders.

Before terrain parks were a common feature of ski resorts, snowboarders would travel from all around Canada and the world to take advantage of the many natural features of Blackcomb, perfect for sending big air and pushing the boundaries of the new sport. The natural quarterpipe and wind lip on Blackcomb featured in many publications and films, including the cover of Transworld SNOWboarding with Doug Lundgren. Before the official park, groups would also build their own kickers and crude halfpipes on the mountain. This sometimes involved trying to avoid the watchful eye of ski patrol.

The natural features of Blackcomb attracted snowboarders from around Canada and the world. Blackcomb Mountain Collection, Sean Sullivan 1991.

Stu Osborne was instrumental to the snowboarding scene on Blackcomb. Stu started as an instructor and went on to become Snowboard Coordinator and then Terrain Park Supervisor, founding the first Blackcomb management-sanctioned halfpipe and snowboard park. While the Kokanee Snowboard Park officially appeared on the Blackcomb trail map in the 94/95 winter season, the first halfpipe and park launched earlier.

There was still a mentality of skiers versus snowboarders at this time and despite receiving approval to create the initial halfpipe, accessing the resources from the Blackcomb Operations team to build the park was a different story. To get around the lack of resources, Snow Ejectors, a private snow removal company, became a sponsor, providing custom-painted shovels for the build. The early halfpipe was created using these shovels and a little cat time.

During a competition featuring many of the world’s best riders, the Snow Ejectors’ hand-painted banner was larger than those of any of the other sponsors, much to the chagrin of Blackcomb management. The next year, more equipment and support was provided by Blackcomb Mountain. Before the opening of the Kokanee Snowboard Park, Blackcomb became one of the first resorts in Canada to get a pipe dragon, specialised grooming equipment that could carve out a uniform halfpipe far more easily than hand-digging.

A snowboarder takes flight near the Kokanee Snowboard Park. Blackcomb Mountain Collection, Dano Pendygrasse.

In the early days, ‘Blackcomb Snowboard Park’ was exactly that, a park for snowboarders. Rules had changed (in this one niche area on the mountain) and there was a big sign that specified ‘no skiers allowed’. Skiers would wait outside the snowboard park in groups, and bomb the park together in a train so they were harder to catch. It wasn’t long, however, until the park evolved to welcome both snowboarders and skiers as the more inclusive ‘terrain park’ that we know today. 

Originally, the park features on Blackcomb and other resorts in the Canada West Ski Area Association were rated like ski runs, with greens, blues, blacks and double blacks. As most people probably understand, riding a beginner feature would require different skills to a typical green run; however the system broke down when a visitor went off a jump that was far beyond their ability and sustained a debilitating injury. The resulting lawsuit was eventually settled out of court and, learning from this experience, the ratings in the terrain park were changed to those that we see today. Burton had just introduced Smart Style, the orange oval to indicate freestyle terrain. Whistler Blackcomb and the Canada West Ski Area Association went one step further adding S, M, L and XL sizing to keep it easy to interpret. Both features and parks are marked so people can easily choose where to ride within their ability.

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