Hi I was looking into buying a new park board.
And after looking at the usual big names I came across Raven
There is not alot of information about them on the net but they claim to make their boards
"in the two best factories in the world: Elan (where also Nitro, Artec or Arbor are produced) and Nobile (where Burton is produced)".
I am very interested in these boards and wondered if anyone had anymore information for me. Or has got/tried one of their boards.
The one i'm looking at is
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320617238717&ssPage...
Thanks in advance
- Snowboard Club UK Menu
- About Us
The Club Website
Snowboard Club UK
Welcome to the website of Snowboard Club UK.
Launched in April 1997, the site grew to become the definitive UK resource for information on slopes, events, riders and more.
We love snowboarding. Our aim is to keep you informed and get you involved both on and off the hill.
Our online and offline communities are friendly and enthusiastic. Create a free account and start building your profile.
Club Membership
Our Club launched in October 2004 to enable UK riders to get more from their snowboarding. Our members save £100s on equipment, holidays and slope time.
Club Bashes are a great opportunity to meet like-minded people and have a laugh on the slopes in the UK and abroad.
In 2015, Action Sports Club launched, providing more discounts across more sports for all members.
- Save Money
Quick Links
Joining the Club will have you saving money quickly across many sports. If you snowboard, save £35 on a new snowboard, £50 on a week away, £20 on an avalanche transceiver and £5 per session at your local indoor slope... It soon adds up!
Join the Club for just £15 a year.
Discount Categories
- Info
Quick Links
You'll find heaps of wisdom throughout the website, but we'll point you at the wisest bits here.
General Information
Snowboard Terrain
Equipment Guide
- Community
Quick Links
The Forum is a place for the exchange of opinion and information. Friendly and moderated with a light touch.
Club Membership
The fact that there are just two unknown riders on the Raven team rings alarm bells, also the lack of technical information. You have to consider that the boards are cheap for a reason, it's not all brand markup.
# Level - Beginner to pro-riders
Quite a broad spectrum of ability there...
Turned out to be a perfectly serviceable board. You could tell it wasn't expensive though - it just seemed a bit thin and didn't exude that feeling of quality you might get when you spend top dollar.
Rode it for a while before selling on to buy something else just for the fun of it, but
I'd buy one again if I needed a board and was having to watch the pennies.
I'll say again though, this wasn't a Raven, just a similar class of board.
Please don't compare Elan to Nobile. 50% of Elan production are "PU-Wood-Core" (it's 90% PU and 10% wood) boards for Decathlon, Intersport or Sport2000 and many of these boards can be found on eBay. Nobile concentrates only on tip-to-tail wood core boards and it can only be compared to GST.
Please let me know if you are going to organise some test. I will eagerly send you some boards for testing.
We are also introducing a new high-end brand Pathron (we will use all available technologies like honey-comb, kevlar, sintered bases) and the retail price should be under 180GBP. It will be available for testing in September.
Greetings from Poland
Marcin
Greetings from Bulgaria and UK
http://www.alexander-apartment-bansko.com
info
http://www.screwboards.com/team.html
i'd give it a wide birth, you can get a board from a known entity for £150 in the sales. They might turn out a quality product, but i'd let someone else find out first.
But, considering I bought a brand new 2011 K2 WWW from my local store for less that £200 I think your local store would be a better place to start from.
Nice Photos
http://www.alexander-apartment-bansko.com
info
@MotoXXX - 180.00 GBP RRP. There will be two models: FR and FS (I would rather call it AM/FS). Here are the first photos of the samples:
FR:
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
FS:
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff166/pyc-sport/deski/pathron/pathron...
Frankly speaking I'm not fully satisfied with how the Pathron FR rides (I always compare every FR board to my Sapient PNB2) but the AM/FS is really good.
If it's like that how do you it??
This would give 108GBP brutto. Margin is not the same as discount. In this case, the netto price is 87,80GBP (101EUR). The retailer margin is 67% then.
I will not tell you the manufacturing cost but a production of high-end boards (let's say with carbon, triax, sintered base) comparing to basic boards is only 40% more expensive. Big brands earn a lot of money with their expensive models.
My problem is that we are not able to sell 500 boards of the same model directly (from the economic point of view it doesn't make sense to produce less than 500 boards/model), so the only way to sell so many boards is to offer them to other retailers and keep our whole sale margins very low.
@MotoXXX - 40GBP may be enough to produce a CAP board in China but is not enough for even a basic sidewall board made in Europe
http://www.alexander-apartment-bansko.com
info
Rider's Front of Judea
<a href="http://badkarma.redbubble.com/" target="_blank">[ Art ]</a> <a href="https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1115473583" target="_blank">[ FB ]</a>
Thinking I might buy one as a first board.
Please don't compare Elan to Nobile. 50% of Elan production are "PU-Wood-Core" (it's 90% PU and 10% wood) boards for Decathlon, Intersport or Sport2000 and many of these boards can be found on eBay. Nobile concentrates only on tip-to-tail wood core boards and it can only be compared to GST.
Please let me know if you are going to organise some test. I will eagerly send you some boards for testing.
We are also introducing a new high-end brand Pathron (we will use all available technologies like honey-comb, kevlar, sintered bases) and the retail price should be under 180GBP. It will be available for testing in September.
Greetings from Poland
Marcin
Seriously? You really want to open up this can of worms? Do even know what most Intersport, Decathlon and Sport2000s sell? Most sold board at Decathlon over the last few years has been the Rossi One Mag built in Rossi's Spanish fab. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to find boards that don't use wood cores? Every rental board I've been proposed over the last three years has been full wood core.
Don't compare Nobile to Elan? I'd agree with that. I'd go with Elan 10 times out of 10 as they're a professional fab that don't use old Burton designs as some sort of weak marketing crutch. I would even go so far as to say that Elan has better facilities and process than GST, certainly feels that way when riding sticks out of those respective fabs.
Your website is terrible. No specs on anything (although seeing how all your product is at least a decade old I'm hardly surprised by this), ancient design, broken links, and no useful information on anything. Why even publish it? You're destined to live and die the life of an ebay vendor.
Why on earth would you even start a high-end brand when you can't establish a basic one? Any thoughts as to where you're laying the kevlar and honeycomb, or are you going to rip-off another big name?
You WILL NOT break into retail locations that matter (UK, Alpine, US) with your current line no matter what you offer. Even at 3:1 depot/vente I wouldn't stock your gear.
Good luck and send me a demo!
-Oscar Wilde
have to agree that the website is bad though. Had to come here for board info. :S
Please don't compare Elan to Nobile. 50% of Elan production are "PU-Wood-Core" (it's 90% PU and 10% wood) boards for Decathlon, Intersport or Sport2000 and many of these boards can be found on eBay. Nobile concentrates only on tip-to-tail wood core boards and it can only be compared to GST.
Please let me know if you are going to organise some test. I will eagerly send you some boards for testing.
We are also introducing a new high-end brand Pathron (we will use all available technologies like honey-comb, kevlar, sintered bases) and the retail price should be under 180GBP. It will be available for testing in September.
Greetings from Poland
Marcin
Seriously? You really want to open up this can of worms? Do even know what most Intersport, Decathlon and Sport2000s sell? Most sold board at Decathlon over the last few years has been the Rossi One Mag built in Rossi's Spanish fab. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to find boards that don't use wood cores? Every rental board I've been proposed over the last three years has been full wood core.
Don't compare Nobile to Elan? I'd agree with that. I'd go with Elan 10 times out of 10 as they're a professional fab that don't use old Burton designs as some sort of weak marketing crutch. I would even go so far as to say that Elan has better facilities and process than GST, certainly feels that way when riding sticks out of those respective fabs.
Your website is terrible. No specs on anything (although seeing how all your product is at least a decade old I'm hardly surprised by this), ancient design, broken links, and no useful information on anything. Why even publish it? You're destined to live and die the life of an ebay vendor.
Why on earth would you even start a high-end brand when you can't establish a basic one? Any thoughts as to where you're laying the kevlar and honeycomb, or are you going to rip-off another big name?
You WILL NOT break into retail locations that matter (UK, Alpine, US) with your current line no matter what you offer. Even at 3:1 depot/vente I wouldn't stock your gear.
Good luck and send me a demo!
So you seem to swing the bat a bit.
What's the beef with Raven?
Think I'd be wasting my money?
-Oscar Wilde
Bit of a dilemma really isn't it. This company offers what looks like a decent, shiny new product for a bargain price and you have to understand that someone like my friends and I, who are new to the snowboard racket (BMXers by trade) and don't really have the nouse to shop for a used, may not be in a position to spring top dollar for the boundary-pushing product. Gaps in the market are always gonna get filled. :S
Also, whilst I sympathise with your views, you have to admit that their RRP speaks volumes on mark ups from the bigger names.
Anyway sans politics and momentarily putting aside your seething hatred for vampire new start ups, would you say they're a bad buy for a first board? Mostly pistes with a few kickers and a bit of that buttery stuff?
I'm also open to suggestions on reasonable alternatives