How the 200 dollar wetsuit changed the game

Wetties can tally up some coin. 350-600 dollars has become the price to stay warm in the cold season. Which would be ridiculous if it wasn’t the market price. If you surf enough to run through a suit a season, along with a few broken sticks you’re starting to look at surfing getting quite expensive. And, that’s besides your exorbitant petrol habit. The common thought is surfing’s a cheap sport, once you have a board and suit the act’s free, right? Not the case, between the ever-growing price of State Park passes, hourly parking and the inevitable citations courtesy of the city you’ll find your wallet gasping for green, or whatever colour of currency’s presented to you at home.

For the average surfer a year in surfing (roughly) looks at two 600 dollar pieces of poly and resin, one 400 dollar suit, at least 500 in gas, 300 in parking fees and 100 in fins for a grand total of 2500. Labeling our past time as inexpensive’s a misnomer. Maybe we don’t pay upwards of 90 for single day lift tickets or over a grand for a season pass, but hell this simple pleasure tends to be anything but.

In 2014, Vissla emerged on the scene and what came with was a 200 dollar full suit, the 7 seas. With minimalism in mind they presented a high-quality suit for half the price. And business is, how they say: booming. The vertical Vissla logo can be seen on the back’s of necks at whatever break you happen to frequent. Leaving us with the question: Why’d this take so long? Wetsuit tech has improved drastically over the years and the majority of suits get pumped out of the same location for three, four, five, six… two hundred. The days of stiff rubber have been dead for quite sometime but there’s finally a presentable suit that won’t drain your budget, keep you warm and looking slick.

Now in this earthly amorous age of 2016, the boys with the capital V are releasing the next addition to their rubber arsenal. The Eco Seas suit’s set to hit the market this upcoming August, which judging by how fast the clock tends to tick, will be here sometime tomorrow. Don’t sustainability have such a sweet ring to it? They’ve teamed up with Sheico and are going enviro-conscious. Cue the reclaimed wetsuit: 45 recycled bottles make up the jersey lining, natural rubber not neoprene and water based glues for the seams. Tie it all together and the outcome’s a suit that’s flexible and holds hands with the deteriorating environment, consider it an apocalypse combatant. Now, go stock up on guns and canned foods, then quit paying double for the same quality wettie.