Indiana Paddle & Surf invites you to become a shareholder: Maurus Strobel shares all the details

Indiana Paddle & Surf Co., the Swiss watersport brand specialising in high-performance SUP, foil and surf gear, has announced a crowdfunding investment opportunity and is inviting backers to invest through the CONDA crowdinfesting platform and become a part of their dynamic growth.

What is crowdinvesting?

Crowdinvesting is a form of crowdfunding in which individual investors or backers (the “crowd”) participate in the financing of companies and profit from high return potentials. As a private person, you can already invest money in projects with high growth potential without the need for large financial reserves (investment starts from 100 CHF / Swiss Franc).

To find out more about the opportunity, TotalSUP caught up with Indiana’s Boss, waterman and frequent flyer himself, Maurus Strobel.

Hi Maurus, we dig scale-up and board stories, especially when a brand derives from street culture and skateboarding! Indiana’s journey ‘from the streets to the ocean’ has been remarkable, and now you’re reaching the next milestone with crowdinvesting. What’s been the pivotal moment in your opinion?

During the COVID-thing turnovers in watersports went through the roof and then went down rapidly during 2022 and 2023 due to different reasons. Shops still have lots of stock and no liquidity. Pre-orders went down too. To make us futureproof we’ve adapted the prices to be able to sell more all over Europe. We needed a way to finance our development, production and the strategy to create a long term relationship with our customers, and the idea with crowdinvesting popped up.

Could you tell us more about the decision to launch the crowdinvesting campaign?

Borrowing money for growth from banks is not an option. Loans from private persons were a solution in the past. Nevertheless it is more healthy to get more equity. On one hand we build up and support our competence centre partners and on the other hand we push our B2C (business to customer) sales which both needs investment. Also the crowdinvesting-project will provide us with cash for product development and marketing, and on top of that we’ll have shareholders who can be customers and ambassadors as well. They can profit from the voucher system with commission. We call this swarm intelligence. Many humans working together for the same goal.

Will you or have you been looking into or considering private equity investment along the way?

Private equity guys are looking for a good exit cash option. Many small investors are helping us more than one big guy. Shareholders profit the most by getting discounts on their gear. The more of  a watersport enthusiast a shareholder is, the better is the return on investment because he saves money on every purchase.

What’s the investment goal of your campaign and how does it translate onto your growth journey plans?

We are looking for 500.000 Swiss Francs. If it’s more, even better. We are planning to invest the money according to the steps in the graphic below.

The first 100k will be invested in Staff, R&D and Production to have more of the freshest stuff in stock.

For the 250k we will furthermore improve our web shop with new features and more languages such as French and Spanish, and invest in Marketing.

For 500k to 1.000k we additionally will invest in expansion, especially in new markets e.g. in southern Europe, Benelux, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe.

There are various levels of investment ranging from Silver to Diamond packages but backers can start investing from 500 CHF. What’s the incentive for supporters starting with that minimum amount?

These backers get a discount of 10%. More interesting is the Gold Package as starts with the goodies and the voucher system. Check out the incentive list:

What are some key differentiators that set your brand apart from competitors in the premium segment?

Our inflatable SUPs have many smart features, that our competitors don’t have, which makes it easier and more fun to use our products, for example our Split Finbox, Fibreglass Footbases, Hyperflow Fins, that makes it faster and more comfortable to fold the inflatable boards. These smart features are all part of our “SUP 2.0 Technology”.

All our FOIL products are on part with the latest technology and developed by our very skilled, experienced and passionate development teams in Constance, Switzerland and Fuerteventura, Spain. Thanks to our foil ambassadors we have improvement inputs from the water almost every day.

In addition to the technical advantages, we also have an outstanding customer service team, that reacts quickly and always finds fair and customer-focused solutions.

You’re the ‘first Swiss brand to recognize and revolutionize the potential of pump foils’ and it’s clear that you’ve sparked some proper hype around pump foiling. Why do you think it has taken off (literally!) so successfully?

It was about time for a new thing. In Switzerland we have no swell and not a lot of good winds. Making an adrenaline sport where you do not have to rely on wind and wave is cool. You can do it alone or together with your buddies all year long, day and night in your neighbourhood. In Europe,  there are a lot of lakes and rivers close to people. It makes no noise and is environmentally friendly. It’s hard to learn, but once you reach the 1 minute goal you feel so good especially as a part of a cool group.

Thanks to our SUP foil boards back in the days we were very quick, and one of the first brands, to offer well working wing foil boards too. Wing foiling is more simple than wind surfing and less dangerous and complicated in terms of legal issues in some countries.

Has your focus shifted from SUP to pump and wing foiling? Are you planning to invest more into these disciplines?

SUP market has dropped a lot, but still, we offer lots of nice hardboard and inflatable SUPs with SUP 2.0 technology. Stand-up paddling will stay but the SUP market is going through a cleaning up process right now. Materials and production processes are quite perfectly developed, however I don’t see not much potential for innovations now. In foiling there is still a lot of potential for improvement and the different foiling sports are evolving fast and customers’ needs and expectation are changing fast. Product cycles for foils and foil boards are much faster compared to SUP. So yes, we invest much more time and money in Pump, Wing and Downwind Foiling.

Are there any upcoming product innovations or expansions planned to tap into new markets?

We will release very soon the high end Barracuda and Marlin monobloc foils and new stabilzers. The smaller sisters of the world record Condor XL front wing will be released soon in the sizes M and S in monobloc technology. And we will set a new standard with the ultra light and stiff pump foil boards with Rohacell foam core and carbon in the sizes 83 cm and 95 cm.

Could you share your top reasons why you would personally invest in Indiana?

It’s nice to be a part of a traditional Swiss board sport brands with roots going back to 1989. Getting nice discounts on a very well engineered and produced gear and participating in the voucher system is quite cool too, I think.

Thank you for your insights Maurus and wishing you a successful crowdfunding campaign!

To get involved and back Indiana, visit INDIANA PADDLE & SURF – OUT ON THE WATER!

To find out more about Indiana Paddle & Surf, visit:  Indiana Paddle & Surf

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