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(go to bottom to see quick timeline ) Tim got turned on to kayaks at the early age of 13. He grew up by the water in Malibu, California where he could look up to his house from the Pacific Ocean. The surf in Malibu was always filled with kayaks, so Tim and his buddy ordered a do-it-yourself Kayak Kit, put it together in the back ya rd, threw on some Sears weather-beater paint and it was ready to go. Tim describes his first experience on the ocean in a kayak as a magical one. He instantly fell in love with being on the ocean and this became his passion. Malibu always had two or three foot surf, which inevitably filled the boat with water. Tim, coming from a family of artists, began coming up with new designs to deal with the rough California surf. Tim took an old tandem surf board, carved out wells for your butt and your heels and a place to keep your gear and had created his first sit-on-top kayak. Tim took this out on the water and knew he had created something great. But how could he make it even better? At thetime, Tim was interested in sculpture and was learning about shaping and forming molds with different materials. He decided he could come up with a better shaped boat that would maneuver through the surf better. He shaped one out of plaster and made a mold. Using this as his guide, he and his buddy each made a fiberglass sit-on-top. One day while out on the beach in 1971, someone asked, “How much for one of those?” Tim hadn’t previously thought about selling these, but threw out a number, “150 bucks”. Tim figured it costs him about $50 for the materials necessary to make one and the rest was just time and money in his pocket. Being just out of high school, this was the most attractive part of the whole deal. Between the time Tim sold his first boat and 1986 Tim continued redesigning and building these sit-on-top kayaks and experimenting with some other boats as well. Tim had property on Vancouver Island that was about 20 miles away from civilization. The only way to get around up there was by boat, so Tim really learned to navigate the waters. He would follow the sunshine staying there for the summers and back to California for the rest of the year.  In a four year span, Tim had sold 22 kayaks to a one mile span of beach in Malibu. Tim saw the potential to go big, if he could sell that many boats to that one little beach imagine what he could do with all of California or even Hawaii. The only thing holding him back was production. Making these boats out of fiberglass made it difficult to up the quality and it was difficult to find anyone that would do it for him. Then, Tim learned of a new technology called rotational molding. Tim was skeptical at first; unsure if anyone would really want a kayak made out of plastic. He finally talked himself into making his boats out of poly-ethelene. He made his own molds and his own machine and started production.
Timing was perfect! As Tim began production, the popularity of windsurfing started to decline because of the technical knowledge and expertise required. It was time to make way for the sit-on-top kayaks. In one years time, Tim had sold to one tenth of one percent of Santa Barbara. This was the critical point, where he had reached the level of awareness that he needed for this whole thing to take off. Tim made about 500 boats in two years and really learned the process well. So well that he decided to pack up his stuff with his machine and all and make the move to beautiful Bellingham, Washington where he started Ocean Kayak.
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