Interview by James Royce | Photos by Alexis Castro and Ian Michna
Independent publishing is about the trickiest thing one can throw themselves into.
It’s just not a static business model. On one hand, there are the highs. The freedom to make your own schedule. The pride in physically holding and reading something you made with your friends. Last-minute flights to Paris, Barcelona, New York City. All for the sake of writing a profile or shooting photos or just to hang out with interesting people from around the world in the most beautiful places in the world. Put your feet up with an effervescent glass of your preference in hand as a member of rows one through ten. This is for business, after all, so your points apply.
But it’s never just champagne and showing off in the high street book shop window and fleecing Centurion Lounge access off American Express, though, is it? No. There’s chasing advertisers to fill the last twenty pages, and deadline is a month away. There’s the ongoing background-hum anxiety of a sporadic Dropbox outage crippling your entire business, and deadline is a week away. There’s spending the holidays at your significant other’s for the first time and telling their parents you work as a professional writer and you see them just wince in tremendous unison because they are just so, so, so disappointed in you. Thank goodness they don’t know you also missed deadline the day before.
But, the higher the risk, the immeasurably sweeter the reward. That’s why we’re all here. So, it’s important to celebrate the ones who persevere. Enter Jenkem Magazine.
A rebellious counter movement challenging the established culture, Jenkem was born from a small crew desperate to escape the cliches of skate publishing. Less, “We hung out with your favourite pro as they woke up and saluted the sun before meeting up with all their friends at a coincidentally empty skate spot.” More teaching Kanye West how to ollie, talking Austyn Gillette’s fakie flips with Werner Herzog, and taking acid at Street League.
By now, you should know we’re big fans of Jenkem and their approach to things. Things that have helped them become a staple of both New York and international skate culture for the past decade. A milestone and eternity in independent publishing years.
Seeing as we’re all in this ink-on-paper thing together (Volume X out now!), we thought it’d be fitting to call up Jenkem’s managing editor, Alexis Castro, on the magazine’s ten-year anniversary and ask him how they do it. If you don’t know Alexis, well, you should. He’s not only one of the most underrated creatives in New York City but also a damn fine human. And a just-about-day-one Jenkem employee and only person to stick through it all alongside founder Ian Michna.
The history of the magazine. Making up business models. Never selling out. What makes New York City still so very special for a skater, Jackass’ case for being modern American art, and who to watch out for on the global scale. All that and more with Alexis included within.
Hey Alexis! Little weird here, usually you’re on my end with this sort of stuff. Let’s start with the basics, though. Name, age, how did you get into skating, what’s your connection with Jenkem and all that good stuff.
My name is Alexis Castro, I am 28 years old, and I’m originally from California. I was born in Watsonville, which is this small, kinda-farming and kinda-surf town right by Santa Cruz, California. From there I moved to Gilroy, a suburb in Silicon Valley. It’s like the last city in Santa Clara county that’s considered Silicon Valley. I grew up going to high school in San Jose and that’s where I really started skating and getting interested in it. My high school was right outside downtown San Jose, which was popular with a lot of people that skated for Enjoi. So, like, Jerry Hsu has a lot of footage skating there. Louie Barletta, Caswell Berry, all those guys. The bus that I took back and forth would drop me off by City Hall. There’s a rock gap that people would skate and I would skate flat ground right there or at Cesar Chavez plaza. So, yeah, I graduated from there and moved to New York for college and that was really the catalyst for everything.
“We wanted to be this magazine that gets the most in-depth interviews with outspoken figures in the industry. So that was what we aimed for at that point and slowly as more and more things hit we realised we’d interviewed most of the people we cared about that we could actually get in touch with, so what else can we do? What other content would be interesting for us? And that’s how it evolved.”
Right when I moved to New York it became a hub for skateboarding. Kind of just by accident. So, I moved there in 2011 and then Cherry came out in 2013, that’s the Supreme video, and then everything at the time started to accumulate in skating. And that’s also around the same time I first came across Jenkem. Growing up I was a media nerd, so into photography and writing and a little bit of video. So when I saw Jenkem I thought, “Oh! This is sick. This guy is calling for interns and needs someone who can do sort of everything.” I was coming off a journalism program in high school at the time and was already covering sports news and current events for the student body sort of shit, so it was the perfect thing to apply for. So in college I met Ian Michna, the founder of Jenkem. This was 2013. And I’ve been with Jenkem in some capacity since then. Started off as an intern, left for a little bit, then came back.
I also worked at Complex a little bit as a writer there. That was an interesting tangent. They needed a writer for men’s fashion news, hah. But it was a really interesting position, because the way that they work is they had a quota on how much content they had to publish every day. And thinking back on it now it’s a little crazy how they made us work. Basically, I would have these eight-hour shifts where I had to monitor Twitter, Instagram, or whatever and just find something that I turn into a news story. So, I’d see something, like, “Oh, some person wore this blah-blah jacket,” and then somehow had to turn that into relevant content. So I did that for a little bit, but was splitting my time between Complex and Jenkem. And then I quit that and it was all Jenkem all the time.
So how was it coming back from an editorial set up like Complex to Jenkem, then? Jenkem obviously isn’t a news-based publication and there isn’t that daily pressure to get something out the door. Were you able to shake off that frantic energy quite quickly or did you ever catch yourself maybe getting a little too relaxed at times?
I was way more relieved. The content schedule at Jenkem is interesting because we do kind of have a quota. We do try to post three times a week. But the stuff we do post varies a lot. We don’t have this, like, “Every week we need three news articles and a branded content piece and blah, blah, blah,” mindset.
In our heads, maintaining the website is putting up three or so posts a week. That means we’re keeping it alive. Then the rest of the time we can spend doing other shit. Designing merch or planning out long-term projects, For example, we’ve been doing records with Jenkem recordings. Along with other little side projects. Over time though we’ve developed into this multi-armed company and the website is just one of them. But, yeah, it was relief not having to sit at a desk and go: Fuck I have to do three articles today or I’m going to get fired. And then you have all the freedom in the world whereas at a place that’s more pulled-in to advertisers, like Complex, you don’t have as much flexibility with things you can’t write about or cover. Or you’re forced to do things that you don’t want to do.
“In terms of how and if we tip-toe around stuff, that’s never really been a thing. We’ve never been a position where we feel like we can’t say something because of the popularity of skateboarding elsewhere.”
So from what I gathered from the timeline of everything here you were the first employee, or, rather, the first employee to stick through it all aside from Ian?
Yeah, I mean I think there was an intern or two before me. But I was the one that stuck around from being the intern to now. Ian founded it in 2011 and I’ve been working with him in some capacity since 2013.
So when you started in 2013 was there much of a plan editorially? Were there meetings where someone was saying, “Okay, we need to get three-to-four good, quality pieces up here a week.” Or was there just more of like a, “Let’s just see where this goes,” flow to everything? How did it look on the first day compared to how it looks now?
The first week that I was there was really interesting because, and I think this experience is familiar to a lot of people, but in my head I was, like, “Oh, sick, I’m going to go work with this magazine. And it’s a skate magazine! I’m going to pull up to the office and there’s going to be a mini-ramp,” and all this cool shit. But at the time we were working out of a co-working space that was owned by Wix, the website company. They like host and help you build websites, but it was a free work lounge and it was just us at a communal table sitting next to each other while other bloggers were working on their shit next to us. So at that point Ian was just running everything by himself. He had a videographer that was helping him, his name is Richard Quintero, and he was helping him produce some original videos, but very sparingly.
Then I came in and he basically said to me, “We need to make stuff,” hah. There were no long-term projects or anything. Our YouTube following was basically non-existent. I think at that point merch wasn’t even a thing for Jenkem. It was still being run like an early internet blog. Free ramblings, not as much structure. I think the thing we were most known for at that point was the interviews. That’s how I had first heard of Jenkem and it was one thing that we tried to push. We wanted to be this magazine that gets the most in-depth interviews with outspoken figures in the industry. So that was what we aimed for at that point and slowly as more and more things hit we realised we’d interviewed most of the people we cared about that we could actually get in touch with, so what else can we do? What other content would be interesting for us? And that’s how it evolved.
So was there ever one of those milestone moments in those early days when things fell into place and you were like, “Oh, wow, okay we’re really doing this now.”
I’m pretty sure this was between the time when I left and came back, but once we got our first office-office in Brooklyn. It was still in a co-working space, but we had our own cubicle now, hah. But in the back of my mind, that’s the moment I realised that, okay, we have money, so we must be doing something right. Because at the earliest points I was working as an unpaid intern and Ian was probably making enough to pay his rent and eat cheap food, and that was pretty much it. Server costs were dirt cheap because the site had nothing on it really, hah. It also took us from this weird… how do I put it? Tech-bro space Wix lounge to moving and becoming a Brooklyn-based company. That was the moment where we were, like, we have our niche now. There’s Quartersnacks and there’s New York Skateboarding and there are all these other publications going on around us but then there’s us. We now found our thing. We’re based in Bushwick and we’re in the industry but also not really, hah. But let’s run with that angle and voice. Yeah, that was a turning point I’d say.
“There was a period, from like 2014-2017, where every company decided to do a short-length to semi-full-length video based in New York.”
Did it feel like you had to compete against those other publications to be heard?
The interesting thing is it has never been competitive between any of the other publications. Because around the time we all started hitting there was so much going on. Video premiers every other week. Pro skaters coming to live an entire summer at a time in the city. There was a period, from, like, 2014-2017, where every company decided to do a short-length to semi-full-length video based in New York. So there was a lot of stuff crossing our path and we were just at the right place at the right time. And the stuff that we did and do is different from what Quartersnacks does and what Skate Jawn does and what New York Skateboarding was doing. We all had our own corner and specific aspects we excelled at. So it made it very non-competitive, and that was cool.
I mean it’s been talked about quite often but a lot of that Jenkem niche was influenced by publications like Big Brother and early Playboys and even the Howard Stern Show. Those tones were there from the set-up. Were there any other influences you wanted to bring in that maybe Ian or anyone else didn’t know about that you thought would be good to take note of or reflect?
So, it’s funny, the interesting thing about all those is they’re a little before my time. I’ve had to work backward to understand their significance. How and why Big Brother and Howard Stern worked the way they did. Vice was always talked about as an influence, too, and I would say that was something I more-or-less grew up on. Watching something, like, We Sent This Dweeby Kid With Glasses To Iraq To Watch The War had an effect for sure.
And you can definitely see that reflected in pieces like Street League On Acid, which is quite funny.
Yeah, exactly. I always found that stuff interesting, and around 2012-2013, Vice, through Noisey, was doing this music series called “Chiraq.” The correspondent’s name was Thomas Morton. He was like the nerdiest, most Vice person ever and they’d sent him into Chicago to do lean and smoke blunts with rappers and he was just so out of his element. That sort of stuff I always thought was fun. But also, and it’s fresh on my mind because it just came out today, but I was in the MTV generation. So I grew up watching Jackass and Viva La Bam and a lot of the silly, MTV-style dating shows. So, today we put out a piece “Date A Skater,” which is like our own little reality TV show where we set up a skater on a blind date and record the date and do little post-date interviews and make a reality TV-styled short out of it. But, yeah, the pop culture I grew up with is definitely reflected in the content I make now.
“I’d go back to my hometown, and I’m in this really small suburb with nothing to do and boredom just breeds this chaotic pre-pubescent male energy. And it’s those feelings that created things like Jackass and, well, good skateboarders. And it’s funny how that permeated because it’s all over the US.”
It’s interesting you mention the Jackass and Viva La Bam influences. There was a recent profile earlier on Wee Man, you probably saw it, in the New York Times. Really nice read altogether but the writer made this observation that really stood out. Basically it was about how skate and skate-lifestyle videos are one of of the last true, American art forms out there. It needed, and still needs, the infrastructure of American suburbs to exist. Massive supermarket parking lots with empty curbs and benches and all lit at night for safety. Camcorders that are cheap and accessible so that children could be given total unsupervised access to them. A healthy middle-class, adolescent acceptance for self-harm and violence brought on by a desire to find any excitement that’ll break the regular malaise of endless hours every day spent just existing in the suburbs. And then of course you throw in skateboards, which are an American invention. Altogether it, like jazz, is a product created by uniquely American circumstances. And, like jazz, it’s enjoyed by just about everyone on the planet.
I’ve thought about that a lot in the past. I grew up entirely in the suburbs. And I always had the classic, you know, big city dreams. My parents are from Mexico City, so when I would travel to visit my family I would always go oh, wow, this is cool and this massive city is where I want to be. And then I’d go back to my hometown, and I’m in this really small suburb with nothing to do and boredom just breeds this chaotic pre-pubescent male energy, hah. And it’s those feelings that created things like Jackass and, well, good skateboarders. And it’s funny how that permeated because it’s all over the US. You can go to a strip mall in New Jersey and it looks just like a strip mall in California which looks just like a strip mall in Iowa.
So with those influences and knowing now what you wanted to reflect in Jenkem, how did you pitch yourselves to other people? Like, how do you want advertisers to perceive you?
I can’t speak for certain because I’m not super involved in that part of Jenkem, which is interesting to say because we’re not a huge team. But there’s still that division, which is cool. What I think has helped us a lot is that we’ve been a consistent voice for a decade, essentially. 2011 was more than ten years ago. We’ve been around long enough that, as cocky as it sounds, it’s impossible to ignore us. We’ll have people come to us and say, “Hey, these guys are going to be around New York and doing stuff around New York.” And we like New York and want to be known as a company that’s aligned with New York so we’ll run with it.
Again, we just happen to exist in a very interesting market for a lot of skate brands. They love the background and being able to, say, do an event at Blue Park or somewhere else in Bushwick or have their skater skate around Lower Manhattan in the Financial District. Or go to Harlem and eat a good meal or go around Central Park and walk around a bunch of fucking ducks or whatever, hah. It’s stuff that brands want their riders or the brand itself to be aligned with and we just happen to be able to provide it. And, of course, focusing on original content has always been huge for us. We’ll have a brand approach us and say, “Hey, we want to do coverage for this season, and we’re focusing on this rider. Now, what can you do with them?” They’ll leave it with us and trust us to bring out interesting characteristics about their rider that even they would normally overlook or haven’t really figured out a way to highlight. That’s where we shine.
“What I think has helped us a lot is that we’ve been a consistent voice for a decade, essentially. 2011 was more than ten years ago. We’ve been around long enough that, as cocky as it sounds, it’s impossible to ignore us.”
And ten years is pretty much an eternity in independent publishing. Do you feel like, and I know it’s a bit of a harsh word, but do you feel like you’re mainstream now? Do you see yourself as a bigger player that can pick and choose what you work on and who you work with?
I think what’s keeping us grounded enough to not let shit get to our heads is the fact that the skate industry still mostly exists in California. We’re still technically outsiders to it. Everything is still either San Francisco or Los Angeles, LA primarily. And that keeps us on our toes in that we still feel like outsiders but we’re still doing work with all those companies.
And I wouldn’t necessarily say that we’re mainstream either because we don’t really have the household recognition that a name like Thrasher does. That’s not to say that we want to compare ourselves or strive to be Thrasher in any way. It’s more so, like, if there are skate companies that are household names, we’re definitely not there yet. And if we cross that threshold, I would reconsider that, but until then I consider ourselves one of the biggest in the underground.
Funny you say that despite being in New York you still feel like an outsider. If you were to talk to a skater in Paris or Malmö or wherever and ask them where the Mecca for skating is… they’d more or less say New York immediately.
Oh, it’s interesting you say that because European skateboarding was another thing that was taking off right at the same time we started. In 2013-2014 it was huge. Brands like Polar and Palace were massive for us because, for them, New York was the first place they could come. It’s right across the water and it’s more familiar to skate a place like New York than Los Angeles where you’re in a car all the time. So coming from a place like London or Paris, New York is easier to navigate. And that really helped in giving us more opportunities when it came to people to work with. We were able to represent faces that were, at that point, from across the world.
“Coming from a place like London or Paris, New York is easier to navigate. And that really helped in giving us more opportunities when it came to people to work with. We were able to represent faces that were, at that point, from across the world.”
Since we’re sort of on the topic, are there any European scenes or brands or people you’ve all been keeping a tab on or really like what they’re doing?
Specific companies are difficult to pinpoint because at this point I feel like most of them are big players. You know, brands like Polar and Palace have embedded themselves in the culture well-enough they’re just like a constant now. Me, personally, I’ve always been interested in Scandinavian skateboarding like in Copenhagen and Malmö. I’ve never been to either but I’ve always really liked the way that skating looks in those cities and the skaters that come out of there. To give names, Oskar Rosenberg, Heitor Da Silva and skaters like that. Coincidentally they both went to that high school that teaches skateboarding, hah.
Skating’s gotten so globalised, it’s hard to pinpoint a particular region that’s really killing it. Everything comes to your face via an algorithm now, so you can come across a girl skating in Brazil as easily as some kid ripping in Japan. It’s almost difficult to say what particular regions are killing it right now.
Similarly, from when Jenkem started to now, skating’s just taken a massively exponential upswing in terms of recognition. Fashion, art, general culture. Has that affected or changed how you look at stories or what you’re publishing for Jenkem today?
I would say there are moments where… maybe? It has opened up the doors for us to work with other publications or other writers from different fields. Either to give us insight or to make sure we’re not totally blind on the background information of a piece we’re working on. For example, if we’re working on a piece where we’re making fun of someone who’s ripping off skate culture in a particular moment, we now have easier access to someone whose written for a magazine like Hypebeast or Fashionista or whatever first. That gives us an insight that we normally wouldn’t have ourselves. If someone is a quote-unquote authority in the space we want to make a connection with them. That way we have a mutually beneficial relationship where we can be correspondents to each other. But in terms of how and if we tip-toe around stuff, that’s never really been a thing. We’ve never been a position where we feel like we can’t say something because of the popularity of skateboarding elsewhere.
“I think a lot of the stuff that we work on is indicative of where we as individual writers were at the time. Where our interests lied. A lot of times we try to force our personal interests into Jenkem, for better or worse.”
Would you say it has shifted the focus of your editorial because now a lot more of the world is aware of even the more niche aspects of skate culture?
Yeah, I mean we’ve done silly pieces. Like right now we’re working on one about the origin of Blind baggy jeans. And we’ve done an article where all our favourite skaters gave us four pants recommendations. In 2013, would Jenkem do that? Probably not. But nowadays, skateboarding has accepted that it’s this beacon of inspiration for fashion slash has accepted that we’re very image-driven as a culture. So it’s not taboo to talk about that sort of thing. Whereas earlier it’d be kooky. Like, why are we talking about pants? Hah.
On the reverse of that, is there anything in the past ten years that just did not age well and you look back now on and are, like, “Why… on earth… did we publish that.”
Of course! So our website has a “generate random article” button, and every now and then I’ll just do that when I’m bored and stuff pops up all the time that is so bad. Thankfully there’s nothing we really regret. A lot of the stuff that we work on is indicative of where we as individual writers were at the time. Where our interests lay. A lot of times we try to force our personal angles into Jenkem, for better or worse. So I think that can sometimes come out in a piece that we’re really hyped on but leaves the reader scratching their head.
Letting individual writers flex their voice though is certainly a double-edged sword. On one hand, you’re creating a point of difference that differentiates you from every other publication. But on the other hand, what one person might find to be completely normal could be completely alarming to someone else. You can quickly alienate a lot of readers.
And I think that’s one of the biggest strengths of Jenkem. But also one of its potential weaknesses. Because we are independent and can do whatever we want and are interested in, we keep people on their toes and keep them engaged. But also we might go way too far and spend a ton of time on something that just ends up being a total dud.
Testament to good editors then, hah. What would you say is a quintessential Jenkem story?
I would say there are like three big examples. The first being just the most unhinged interview with a very outspoken figure in skateboarding. Like, this person has agreed to a no-holds-barred, full-disclosure tell-all style interview. That’s the kinda shit we were really into when we first started. Because there was all this red tape in skateboarding. A lot of skateboard media is inadvertently, whether it wants to admit it or not, some form of advertorial. There’s not much true investigative journalism that comes from endemic skating. You’re always going to have a company or a skater trying to tell you, like, “Hey, maybe let’s not blow that out.” So whenever someone agrees to take off the gloves and be honest, that’s the best.
“A lot of skateboard media is inadvertentely, whether it wants to admit it or not, some form of advertorial. There’s not much true investigative journalism that comes from endemic skating. You’re always going to have a company or a skater trying to tell you, like, “Hey, maybe let’s not blow that out.” So whenever someone agrees to take off the gloves and be honest, that’s the best.”
The second one would be lifestyle videos. We have our flagship series, “Hanging Out With…,” and that’s just like, hey, let’s spend an entire day with your favourite pro skater doing absolutely nothing in New York. Basically just eating dumplings, skating a spot, and bullshitting with them about whatever’s on their mind that day. I think people really gravitate towards that because that format is very known in skateboarding and really all action sports. But they’re always so forced and scripted. Like, they come and wake the skater up and then they try to meet up with all their friends who are coincidentally all in one place at the same time. I think the fact that we ditched that formula and kept it very raw and organic reflected a lot on how we try to run the company.
So that would be number two, and for number three I’d say we do really good investigative deep-dives into industry questions that you wouldn’t know the answer to unless you convinced us to write about it, hah. For example, during the beginning of the pandemic skateboarding was hit with the giant supply chain issues that everyone in the rest of the world was hit with. So, we had one of our writers, his name is Ian Browning, talk to heads of companies about their issues and talk with shops and distributors. And it’s the kinda stuff that people talk about at the skate shop and hear about word-of-mouth but they rarely get to hear about it from people who work in skateboarding and actually get stuff into shops and into the hands of skaters.
Are there any parts of skating that you think are unfairly underrepresented at the moment?
I mean in general, and I’d say we’ve tried our best with this so far, but certainly not as well as we should, is there’re a growing number of women and girls skating across the entire world and there’s not enough media out there that speaks to them. We’ve done some stories where we interview female pros or female up-and-coming skaters but, I’ll be honest with you, I just don’t know that scene enough. And we’re always looking for someone that can put us on. Like, hey, you should be paying attention to that person or this person.
And also, aside from that, the growing queer community in skateboarding needs to be spotlighted. That’s not a community I’m super tapped in to and know what’s going on in either, and I can’t really put together something as easily as someone where that’s their life.
“It sounds a little corny to say but we’re a community of doers by nature. We all need to make something, and it’s not going to happen if the idea just sits in your brain.”
We’ll use this an open call for submissions! If you want to pitch for Jenkem, there’s where to start, hah.
No, really! And we haven’t been shy about it. We’ve asked on Instagram and Twitter about it and everything. It takes a lot to admit that you don’t know something. I’m aware that I’m ignorant to that side of skateboarding, not because I don’t care about it but rather because I don’t know how to engage in it. I don’t know where to look or start. I think that at some point someone will come along, and hopefully we’re involved in this process, who will sort of capture that audience in a way that we hopefully did when we first started Jenkem. I think that is a big opportunity.
What else? There are global scenes that are really underrepresented that shouldn’t be underrepresented based on how much they’ve produced for skating as a whole. Mainly Japan and Brazil. Like, Brazilian skaters have obviously been a thing forever. You know, from Bob Burnquist to Rodrigo Teixeira and Tiago Lemos today. They’ve always been our South American cousins that hang with us but for some reason haven’t gotten the same level or recognition or respect as a scene that places like Paris or London have received. Same with Tokyo. There are a couple magazines that have done stuff for skating based on Tokyo like VHS Mag, they’ve put out a lot of really cool videos, but, again, there’s definitely a lot more room for Japan and Japanese brands to be a global influence.
So there is hope out there then for all the kids reading this who want to go into the glamorous world of skate journalism?
Yeah! And I would say don’t be afraid to write us with your ideas. Even if you don’t have them fully fleshed out yet. If you have the conviction to send something to us and believe in it enough and think there’s something there, there’s a high probability that there is. Opportunities are missed when people second guess themselves. So, yeah, whether it’s an idea that’s in video format or written format or even a product, send it to us or send it to your favourite magazine and tell them you want to do something. It sounds a little corny to say but we’re a community of doers by nature. We all need to make something, and it’s not going to happen if the idea just sits in your brain.
And do you think there’s an opportunity for more independent publications to pop up and find the success like you found at Jenkem?
Definitely. Especially, interestingly enough, in music. There was that indie music-blog writing scene that was coming and really starting to pop off when I first started to write at Jenkem. And then companies like Conde Nast bought Pitchfork, Noisey was part of Vice, and now Vice is Disney or whatever. But there is room for other cultural views and scenes to venture into. There are opportunities for indie journalism in places where it doesn’t seem to exist. Like in music or elsewhere.
“We have a running joke that skate companies shouldn’t be more than twenty years old. Because after that everyone who was part of the genesis of it is too old for it now and can’t see toward the future and are stuck in their ways. So hopefully we get to twenty and figure it out because we know that that’s a problem.”
So another decade at least of Jenkem then I hope? Two decades? A century!
Yeah, well, we have a running joke that skate companies shouldn’t be more than twenty years old, hah. Because after that everyone who was part of the genesis of it is too old for it now and can’t see toward the future and are stuck in their ways. So hopefully we get to twenty and figure it out because we know that that’s a problem, hahah. So twenty, at least. And if we suck we’ll burn the company and just fold.
Well until then let’s hope the sun never sets on the Jenkem empire.
