BREAKING NEWS ::: closing of GST snowboard factory

[snowmatic]

Global Sports Technologies of Austria, known as GST ends-up snowboard manufactoring.

GST was known for very high quality build snowboards.

GST produced snowboards for brands like F2 (his own brand), Kessler, Jones, Arbor, Step-Child, Bataleon and others.

Austrian Television report

After Elan factory at Furnitz now the last big snowboard maker of Europe will close doors July 31.

GST was founded at Antiesenhofen Austria in 1995 where F2 tooks up own production of snowboards, because they had many quality isues on the Years before.

GST reached one of the highest quality level on mass-production of snowboards on whole industrie. Even as very unique they hold quality reports of each board they ever produced. This could be asked about, if you tell them the serial-number of your board. They even can define the Year of production out of that number.

Now things went to a dramatic end. GST is closing factory (no bankrupt!). China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Dubai, Eastern Europe offers way cheaper production costs, for sure on much lower standards than we had before. And Yes, what I saw the last Years, quality is much lower on that boards, even for longterm and on hard using.

We had 3 big snowboard factories in Austria:

- PALE which was closing the decade before we are now.

- ELAN Furnitz, covering lower quality snowboards, which went bankrupt March 2013, see here

- GST, thats in mean and known as F2, which is closing now.

So that's the last company which was able to produce high volume of snowboards in Europe which will close the doors this summer.

GST is F2. F2 is World's last hardboot / raceboarding related main brand which is known very well. If GST dies, harbooting dies.

Well in case of F2 Bernd Flugel of Water Colors International Sports owns a factory at GDR, which is now Germany. There F2 Speedster Proto snowboards are produced. I guess he would overtake the lots of F2 from GST.

Why GST is closing?

We had ISPO trade Show of Munich/Germany some weeks ago. Thats the place for to go if you have a sporting good store. There you order all the boards you need for upcomming season. I think there must be way less orderings for 2015/2016 season over all brands they produce. So after a loss of turn-over from € 12'000'000 down to € 7'000'000 for actual season, GST took the decision.

Edited February 27, 2015 by snowmatic

[Corey]

GST is F2. F2 is World's last hardboot / raceboarding related main brand which is known very well. If GST dies, harbooting dies.

At a large international gathering of hardbooters (SES), I saw 2 or 3 F2 boards. That's less than 3%. I think you are overstating the importance of F2.

Don't get me wrong; I hate to see any alpine companies shut down plants, but I'm quite confident the other makers will be able to absorb the extra orders if this completely takes F2 boards out of the picture.

[philw]

I guess that's a translation, but it says that they're closing the factory, not the brand.

 

Where stuff is made is not really relevant to the sport, in my opinion. Moving manufacturing to somewhere more competitive will likely avoid them pricing themselves out of the market.

 

"quality of production" is not function of where something's built. Ask Apple or any other successful company.

 

To me F2 has been about the design of their products. Their survival will depend upon them getting that and the marketing right. Building poor quality stuff would kill them off, but building high quality stuff is no guarantee of success.

[kieran]

At a large international gathering of hardbooters (SES), I saw 2 or 3 F2 boards. That's less than 3%. I think you are overstating the importance of F2.

Don't get me wrong; I hate to see any alpine companies shut down plants, but I'm quite confident the other makers will be able to absorb the extra orders if this completely takes F2 boards out of the picture.

at a large alpine resort (l2a) and over the course of a week, i saw 6 guys on f2, 2 kesslers, at least 6 thias skwals and a pogo.

f2 are a big brand on the european continent, and a popular/easy/safe choice for many.

[Aracan]

 

 

f2 are a big brand on the european continent

Exactly. Any event in Northern America will probably be biased towards NA brands. Not least because stock F2 boards in NA are expensive in relation to NA custom boards (such as Coiler), while in Europe they are a lot cheaper compared to European custom boards. 

 

Apart from that, no, GST is not F2. As philw pointed out, the factory will close. But GST and F2 are separate entities, although what is now GST used to be owned by F2 (until 2005, according to the linked report).

[michael.a]

At a large international gathering of hardbooters (SES), I saw 2 or 3 F2 boards. That's less than 3%. I think you are overstating the importance of F2.

 

 

Almost every single hardbooter I know owns or owned at least one F2 board here in Europe. I used to own 4 at one time. It is the most common brand you can find in stores and online and they are relatively low-priced and good quality boards (not all years but most). The prevalence of used F2 boards is huge and I'd say one of the reasons why hardbooting is far more ubiquitous here than in the US: you can easily buy one on ebay for less than 100 euro. Used entry-level hardbooting stuff in the US is 2x-3x as expensive.

 

The closing of a snowboard factory is definitely a bummer but with the globalized economy what can you do.

[Neil Gendzwill]

At a large international gathering of hardbooters (SES), I saw 2 or 3 F2 boards. That's less than 3%. I think you are overstating the importance of F2.

Don't get me wrong; I hate to see any alpine companies shut down plants, but I'm quite confident the other makers will be able to absorb the extra orders if this completely takes F2 boards out of the picture.

Aside from company reps from Oxess, Virus, Pureboarding et al, plus a few outliers like Alan, I think SES is primarily a North American gathering.

[pokkis]

Last two years i've seen only one new/modern F2 here. It seem that thy are mainly bought be beginners or by people who dont hang around different forums.
Anyway hope that they get them manufactured more economically due low-price level boards are needed to get new folks to sport.
Same applies to beginner level cheap bindings, there is real need for them, currently they cost too much.

[Aracan]

The omnipresence of F2 in European hardbooters' cellars and garages is probably not least due to availability. In many sports stores F2 boards were present years after most other alpine gear had disappeared. No idea why that was. 

[snowmatic]

Yes, GST = F2, for sure!

But it's right, the brand F2 was overtaken by a German company some Years ago, to prevent F2 brand dies that days.

We will see where F2 let produce 2016/2017 boards.

Like widely well known since many months (are You realy up-to-date?), Capita mfg is on constructing a brand new snowbaord factory at Feistritz-Gailtal (Austria).

Thats near to the Elan factory of Furnitz, which went bankrupt.

Capita mfg get $1'000'000 for free from state and a some new streets to the factory for free.

They plan to start production to the end of 2015. They want make up to 70'000 boards a Year.

New factory produce with same employers and technologies like before at ELAN. We will see if they are able to enhance quality to the level of GST.

Well, maybe it was a plan to close the one factory and open a new one then, I don't know. Maybe they use the machines from GST now.

philw: Where stuff is made is not really relevant / "quality of production" is not function of where something's built

Volkl was made in Germany until 2006. But than Volkl of Jarden Corp. switched to China. Volkl snowboards dissapeared fully from any shelf/store I visited the last Years. There are reasons for it. For sure, you can still order them online.

Aracan: In many sports stores F2 boards were present years after most other alpine gear had disappeared

That's it! No build-quality discussions and a reasonable price for good function and fun (=F2).

Now a-days the boards on lowest price for the Youth and many hardbooters too. And for sure there are riders on slope with actual F2 boards on feets.