Australian made designed manufactured kites Review, Kiteboarding/Kitesurfing Equipment

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All Forums > Kitesurfing > Gear Reviews > Australian made, designed, manufactured kites?

Author	Australian made, designed, manufactured kites?	Page: of 1
Mikedobee NSW 312 Posts	Posted 04/05/2012, 10:06 am Hi forum, Anyone knows if there are any kites that are 100% Australian Made? Cheers, Mike
Saffer VIC 3083 Posts	Posted 04/05/2012, 10:46 am Quite a few local designed in Aus but not any manufactured in Aus.
dafish NSW 360 Posts	Posted 04/05/2012, 12:48 pm what (or who) are the local designers, besides Bws and Griffin?
Saffer VIC 3083 Posts	Posted 04/05/2012, 12:53 pm Fluid is another. Melbourne based, a guy called Steve (KSSAltona).
FlamingTroll WA 16 Posts	Posted 04/05/2012, 2:44 pm Fluid, I heard they do not design the kites? I think he pays some one in another country to design them? I could be wrong. BWS, Ben is Australian, but he does not design the kites, Dano See is the designer Lives in Hong Kong but an Aussie. New Kite boarding was Australian, I don't know about the designer or brand, does anyone have more info about New kiteboarding? Griffin is Australian designed and Australian owned. There was mud skipper? or sand skipper kites or sand groper, i don't remember the name, some one in WA, dont know much about them If you want a kite made in Australia, you would need to pay about $4000 to $5000 to cover Australian working costs.
SugarQube WA 314 Posts	Posted 05/05/2012, 11:46 am Nathan is still around, he designs his kites in WA http://www.newkiteboarding.com/ Although I dont see a lot of his quirky posts anymore. must be that Gero life style. Also thought hes actually a paying sponsor of this site ??.... As far as I know he was a designer for Wipika kites. The first few Airrush kites werte designed in Perth
jobic WA 43 Posts	Posted 05/05/2012, 3:45 pm FlamingTroll said... If you want a kite made in Australia, you would need to pay about $4000 to $5000 to cover Australian working costs. North now make their boards in Europe and still stick to the same retail price. Austria is not a cheap country so I can't see why Australia couldn't do anything here. China is not the cheapest anymore and I'm pretty sure we'll see the major brands bring the production home within a few years.
Saffer VIC 3083 Posts	Posted 05/05/2012, 4:59 pm jobic said... FlamingTroll said... If you want a kite made in Australia, you would need to pay about $4000 to $5000 to cover Australian working costs. North now make their boards in Europe and still stick to the same retail price. Austria is not a cheap country so I can't see why Australia couldn't do anything here. China is not the cheapest anymore and I'm pretty sure we'll see the major brands bring the production home within a few years. Boards are pressed and boards are still made here at competitive prices. Kites require way more physical labour which is where the cost comes into play.
jobic WA 43 Posts	Posted 05/05/2012, 11:51 pm Boards are pressed and boards are still made here at competitive prices. Kites require way more physical labour which is where the cost comes into play. Give it a few years, we'll talk about it again. With the labour getting more and more expensive I won't be surprised to see some kites "made in europe". Some sails are made over there after all....
Mikedobee NSW 312 Posts	Posted 08/05/2012, 12:40 pm Plus, I reckon people will realize at some point that cheap china stuff is nothing more than false economy and the entire world will come back to Mr. Deming's policy on quality. After all, we are being hammered every day with warnings about resources getting critically low and pollution and so forth, but the trend is to build things that will last shorter period of times in order to buy another. Coming from a country where in 80's 99% of the products were locally made and in 2012 1% of the products locally made, I can say this trend can only lead to some really grey outcomes. But anyway....let's see what the future brings.

Saffer VIC 3083 Posts	Posted 08/05/2012, 2:00 pm jobic said... Boards are pressed and boards are still made here at competitive prices. Kites require way more physical labour which is where the cost comes into play. Give it a few years, we'll talk about it again. With the labour getting more and more expensive I won't be surprised to see some kites "made in europe". Some sails are made over there after all.... It won't change, it'll just change to a cheaper country. For IT, first India was cheap, then when it got too expensive they moved operations to Vietnam. There is always a country somewhere you can get cheap labour and highly legislated countries with high minimum wages are not where its at. Until the consumer is ready to pay $4000 per kite, we won't see any made in first world countries.
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