When we catch up with Dan O’Connell on the phone, he’s between surf lessons. Dan took on the contract for the Dee Why surf school a couple of years ago and is on the beach at 6am every day shepherding his students around the lineup. When he’s not helping other surfers accelerate the learning curve, Dan is running Boardsox alongside his sister Sarah.
Nine years ago, Dan and Sarah took a look around and felt there was a gap in the market for well-designed, durable board covers. “Back then, no one was really doing colourful covers,” explains Dan. “That was mainly to do with the fabrics that they were using. Like it was that polyester knit, and we came in with a canvas blend, and because it was canvas, you could screen print on it.”
To give their covers a creative point of difference and some pop, Dan and Sarah connected with a range of artists. “We collaborated with Aussie Wright, Indigenous artist Zachary Bennett-Brook from Saltwater Dreamtime, and Jake Ross,” explains Dan. “Our base range of colours were just a little bit different from what was out there as well.”
A friendship network of core surfers meant Dan and Sarah had immediate access to people who could put products through their paces. “My friends are all like product testers,” says Dan. “They’re always the ones giving me feedback on covers or hats or stuff.” The Boardsox range also includes surf hats, hoodies, shirts and towel hoodies.
More recently, Boardsox launched an innovative zipperless cover. Like many surfers, Dan was tired of tossing perfectly good board covers onto the landfill scrapheap because the zippers had seized up – often because of exposure to saltwater or salt air. When industrial designer Liam Gibson got in touch about a zipperless sample, Dan and Sarah jumped at the opportunity for a collaboration. “He just reached out to me one day on LinkedIn, and I was like, ‘Sweet’,” recalls Dan. “He lives in Birdie Beach, which is one of my favourite surf spots. It was a good excuse to get a few waves.”
Like any good idea, the zipperless model had to be refined and tested before it was market ready, but Dan is happy with the current design and pleased to have solved the problem of the busted zipper. “It’s kind of like a roll-top method,” he explains. “It was kind of a double win… Get rid of the zips. Also, get more padding at the tail where it normally gets cracked.” (watch how it works here)
Becoming familiar with the way different materials behave under stress has been a big part of the journey for Dan and Sarah. Minimising the environmental impact of their products has always been a priority, but they’ve learned there are often trade-offs when you are striving to be durable and eco-friendly.
In an early collaboration with ocean activists Sea Shepherd, they experimented with a cover made from organic cotton. The covers looked great and satisfied Sea Shepherd’s stringent criteria, but when Dan put them to the test on a surf trip, they didn’t measure up. “Unfortunately, the organic cotton, when it came into contact with salt water, kind of shrivelled up and decomposed.” The product never made it to the manufacturing phase. Dan and Sarah felt there was no justification for releasing something that would degrade so quickly and end up in a bin – it wouldn’t satisfy the customer or be good for the environment.
These days the Boardsox covers are made from RPET, which is short for recycled polyester. Essentially, the tough, durable covers are made up of recycled plastic bottles. “It’s a long-lasting material, so you prefer that than using the organic one that’s going to end up being tossed in like two months,” explains Dan. “You kind of just learn those lessons the hard way.”
Dan suggests that he and Sarah are constantly on the lookout for ways of improving their products. “You kind of need to think a bit more outside the box,” he insists. “I’d like to make more adjustable covers, so people don’t have to buy so many. One cover for multiple boards. Yeah, because we can kind of do that with our roll-top method now. You know, if you get a 6’0” to a 7’0”, you just need one cover.”
Meanwhile, it’s often the simplest products that have the most appeal, like the Boardsox board sling – just toss it over your shoulder, slide a board in and hit the track. “They’ve been a really good seller for us, especially over summer, because no one else is really doing them,” says Dan. “It’s offcut material from our Boardsox covers that we recycle into the sling.”
Between the surf school, Boardsox and his Everything Ocean podcast, Dan O’Connell has a full dance card. He’s built a life that revolves around riding waves while creating products and services for surfers. Every day presents a different, salty challenge – luckily, they’re the kinds of problems he’s happy to solve.