When it comes to serving the local aquatic community, Liquid Foundation is squarely on solid ground.
“It’s always been a board shop, all about surfing,” said the Mission Beach company’s president, Matthew Gardner, who also owns Cheap Rentals nearby, which now offers monthly memberships. “It’s not just a big corporate place,” said Gardner of his updated boutique. “It’s just a great local surf shop that you really feel good going into. I loved that vibe about it.”
Liquid Foundation is a surf boutique carrying custom-made boards from four renowned shapers. It offers full lines of men’s and women’s surfwear and carries accessories for dogs, including a line of “Barking Dog” socks, from which a portion of proceeds goes to support the San Diego Humane Society.
“We really stand behind brands with important causes,” noted Gardner.
Gardner finally took over the business in February of 2014 after having been approached repeatedly to do so by the previous owner.
“He really sweetened the deal with a better price, a different layout,” Gardner said, adding, “I would have hated to see it (Liquid Foundation) go. So I jumped at the chance to jump in and keep it alive and revamp and revitalize a lot of the aspects that make LF unique.”
One thing Gardner changed was Liquid Foundation’s image.
“Before, it had that biker-bad-boy kind of image,” he said. “I cleaned up the image, made it a little more family- and community-friendly. We’re trying to be a little more inclusive of the everyday kind of person.”
The company features numerous high-profile, topflight brands like Reef, Electric, Sector 9 and GoPro. One section offers Reef sandals of every size for every age. Another section is devoted to GoPro action, sport-oriented waterproof still and video cameras that can be mounted on surfboards or on surfers themselves. Items are in the $250 to $500 range.
“(The cameras) come with all sorts of different accessories, depending on what else you want to do,” Gardner said, adding the cameras and their mounts “float in the water.” Near GoPro is a rack of floating, polarized sunglasses made from recycled materials. In the back are the custom-made surfboards, a cornerstone of the shop’s business.
Shapers include Marty Allen, of Australia, and Jim Ellington, of San Diego, who’s been designing and shaping boards since 1976.
“Jim got his start on the North Shore of Oahu,” Gardner said, “and he’s always been right here in Mission Beach. Everybody knows him. He’s a classic guy and makes a very nice, clean, sharp surfboard.”
Also on hand is a surfboard line from North County, called Kailani. Surfboards are typically in the $450 to $550 price range.
The shop’s Cadillac surfboard is a super-long “shark” board shaped by Allen, with the image of a shark on its nose, selling for $1,200.
Liquid Foundation also has a rack of trendy Sector Nine skateboards. Gardner noted that skateboarding is an important crossover business for him.
Also carried are complete lines of board shorts; thin, stretchable, quick-drying T-shirts; and full-length wetsuits, all of which, Gardner noted, are “comfortable and easy to wear when you’re out surfing.”
Gardner has a dream for what he’d like Liquid Foundation to become.
“We have big goals in mind with our new wholesale line,” he said. “We want to get our brands inside of (surf) shops, yet still keep that local vibe. That’s the difficult goal we’re trying to accomplish through our wholesale line; not just selling more products that everybody else has, but giving people a choice that makes them feel like they’re shopping (somewhere) that touches them on a more personal basis. That’s what I want to try and convey.”