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Home My Public Portal AboutAlter, HobieHobie Catcreator makes McCall his base BY ROGER PHILLIPS The Star -News Hobie Alter, known worldwide for his surfboards and sailboats, has made McCall his base for a new product - snowboards. Alter moved to McCall several years ago and his sons and business partners, Hobie Jr. and Jeff, followed. The family owns and operates Hobie Designs in downtown McCall, which is the product development and mar- keting arm of the Hobie company. Alter said he was at first reluctant to enter the super -saturated snowboard market, but his son, Jeff, convinced him they had something new to offer. "If we don't do something better, there's no use being in it," he said. Hobie snowboards have a unique double edge designed for better track- ing and quicker turning and the boards are made from a lightweight carbon fiber material. They will hit the mar- ket this spring at trade shows and will likely be in retail shops by next fall. Alter's latest venture into recre- ation equipment is a long way from Southern California, where his after - high -school dream had nothing to do with creating a recreation business empire. He just wanted to stay at the beach. After Alter graduated from high school in 1950, his options were lim- ited. He could either be a beach life- guard or go inland and find a job. Neither option particularly appealed to him, so he started building surf- boards in his father's garage. He had crafted his first balsa wood and fiberglass surfboard as a teen- ager and later sold it for more than it cost to build. That sparked the idea that maybe he could make a few bucks building surfboards. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately in his case, there was no one to show him the trade, so he learned it on his own. He built 20 balsa wood boards that first summer and sold them all. By 1954, he opened his own shop at La- guna Beach, which was only the sec- ond surf shop in Southern California. Alter's output was 190 boards that year, all of which he made himself. Then came two events that would forever changed the surf industry: polyurethane foam and "Gidget," a cheesy movie that introduced the na- tion to surfing and the Southern Cali- fornia beach lifestyle. Alter claims no allegiance to "Gidget," but he did have a hand in changing the way boards were made. When the demand for surfboards in- creased early in the late 1950s and early 1960s, a board -maker's output was limited by the availability of balsa Into the Outdoors Roger Phillips wood. Alter experimented with polyure- thane foam to replace balsa as the:; material for the surfboard's core, and in 1962, he introduced the first foam: and fiberglass board to the surfing world. By 1966, his company, Hobie Surfboards, was building 260 boards per week. Alter said in the early days of South- ern California surfing, the board -mak- ing business was controlled by a bunch of surfers turned businessmen he jok- ingly referred to as the "surfing Ma- fia." If that crew was the Mafia, then Alter would eventually become the ,Godfather of fun. At age 63, he has given the world new ways of enjoying the outdoors and in the process cre- ated a modest empire. After starting his surfboard busi- ness, he created the Hobie catamaran sailboat line, then went on to manu- facture or market skateboards, wakeboards, water skis, fishing cata- marans, powerboats and monohull sailboats, not to mention clothing lines and sunglasses. All in all, enough cool toys to make any fun junkie drool. Alter credits sheer luck and perfect timing for his success, but beneath his modesty lies an inventive craftsman and tinkerer who has a knack for spawning innovative ideas or refin- ing existing ones and reshaping them with his own visions. If you've spent much time near the water, chances are good you've seen his handiwork sailing past. Contrary to popular belief, Alter didn't invent the catamaran, he just made it what it is today. In the 1960s, there was already a production cata- maran on the market, but it took six people to launch it and cost about $3,000. Alter envisioned a catamaran that a single person could launch from the beach and sail. After six days of ex- perimenting, he had his first one built. Four prototypes later, the 14-foot Hobie Cat was christened. It has re- mained essentially unchanged, except in price, since it hit the market in 1967 for $999. Alter said the Hobie Cat was ini- The Alters - Hobie Jr., Hobie Sr. and tially panned by the yacht -club set. "The sailing community did not ac- cept it at all," Alter said. But that didn't faze Alter or the early fans of the Hobie Cat. They started their own regattas, which em- phasized fun over pageantry and strict rules. Before long, Hobie Cats had revolutionized sailing by bringing it to the masses. The 14-foot Hobie Cat' s successor, the 16-footer, became the best selling sailboat ever built. Alter continues his long history of inventing and building everything from skateboards to yachts, but he has turned most of the manufacturing duties over to other companies that he licensed to use his name, a move he started when he sold Hobie Surfboards Star -News Photo by Roger Jeff - outside their McCall studio. in the late 1960s. "I didn't really like the business end of the business," he said. One of his most recent inventions, a fishing platform that resembles a miniature catamaran, was born here in McCall after Kevin Grove, owner of High Mountain Nursery in McCall, took Alter flyfishing on Little Payette Lake. The two used float tubes, which by nature are slow and cumbersome. The experience inspired Alter to apply some of his boat -building knowledge to create a hybrid catamaran and float tube called the Hobie Float Cat. Now the famed Hobie logo graces the company's latest foray into still another sport - snowboarding.