Thus ends, for the company,  36 years of kayak production.

For the next few weeks the skiing takes first place. By clicking on the link below you can access my performance on Mt Hutt this last Friday. Make sure that you scroll down to witness my place on the Leader Board. Then proceed to read my message of thanks to the manager of Mt Hutt, David Wilson.

https://www.mypass.nzski.com/spring/public/home?execution=e3s1

I have enjoyed the past 36 years. Making kayaks was certainly not a dull vocation. At times very exciting.

Last December I built a huge batch of kayaks. The market looked good. I invested in some more time saving plant. Maybe kayaking will weather this recession as it had in the past – because of its simplicity and low entry costs? When compared with power boating.

But the kayak market died. Totally! No just Sisson Kayaks – Lots of other kayak businesses were rearranging their ‘deck-chairs’.

At 69 years of age I was certainly not interested in advertising and marketing – just to increase market share from a dead market. I know how it is done. The boom years 1987 through 1995 coincided with our nation-wide marketing efforts.

I chose to stay at home at Anakiwa. The Methven factory lawns grew knee high as I abandoned my usual summer trips South to build batches of kayaks. Instead I tried out the life of retirement. Yeah right! Never been so busy in years. It was nice to have the time to catch up on projects that had been stalled for 15 years – since the factory fire in 1996.

I am here in Methven casting an eye at Mt Hutt as I set about building that last batch of kayaks. All of these nine kayak orders were received just recently. I find it amusing that my last batch of kayaks is equal in number to the orders received on day one.

The Methven farmland now has a For Sale sign on it. Our Farm Clearance  auctioneer CRT, will move in October, at any cost, in a September Clearance Sale, all of the stuff associated with the kayak business, plus my 6 ton tip truck and JCB digger. Yeah – I admit – I like digging holes. Whew – says my wife Lynda – no more holes to fall into.

I still have time to make a few more kayaks in this last batch. So – if you want one of the last of a huge line – place your order now. I promise to make the last one the very best one. SORRY – NO MORE ORDERS WILL BE ACCEPTED – WHEN THESE NINE KAYAKS ARE FINISHED I AM GOING SKIING

I must thank all of those thousands and thousands of nice customers who have made my lifestyle possible. Thank you.

The future? The Sisson Kayak company will likely trade on, but with a different name. It started as Sisson Industries Ltd. At home at Anakiwa I have the most amazing workshop and I will be developing some crafty alternate energy devices – the prototypes for ourselves. Maybe some of these may end up being sold by other companies by arrangement. I am not retiring. Just heading off in the new exciting growth direction.

Grahame Sisson

Some photos following

Who would start such rumours? My wife Lynda comes to mind. She thinks that after 36 years I deserve a change – or a rest. But sadly the trail of mis-information seems to lead back to certain kayak retailers who cannot access my products.

Thirty six years ago there was no such thing as a kayak retailer. Maybe the problem (lies) may be almost resolved. The current economic depression is causing kayak builders and retailers to close up and dissappear into the clouds.

So – just to confirm – I made the first real New Zealand sea kayak in 1977. I made the first real multisport kayak in 1987. I made the compact Gap 1 kayak in 1975 – which Anne Dwyer of Kiwi Kayaks took to the USA – and changed kayaking forever. If you do not believe me – click here    http://www.paddlinglife.net/article.php?id=394

Sadly I no longer make the Gap One kayak (but I still use one). The good news is that I still custom build all of the current kayak models listed here on this website. Just send me your orders.

Last November / December I built the largest batch of kayaks since 2007. Huge! But honestly – since mid November I have secured just one kayak order – for delivery in July 2011. This is the worst order taking in 36 years. A massive sort out is taking place. Other manufacturers are closing, or retrenching, or combining production. They all seem to be chasing the surf ski market. Yeah right!

Kayak retailers are closing. Many were just opportunists who just pushed the latest fads. The Christchurch kayak retailer that I am friendly with – PaddlerZone are trading along nicely. We actually joke that soon – if this kayak business carnage continues – we will be the last-men-standing. Wow! Shades of 36 years ago. The ‘good-old-days.

An admission. Since mid December 2010 I have been fully retired. Which is why I can be open and honest about the market condition. The break from work has been nice. But also busy. Not really sure how I ever fitted work into my days. But a problem looms. Lynda has found that having me messing up the house decor 24/7 in not really too rosy. Lynda requests that you send me some kayak orders so that I am not under her feet in the house. Please help me!

Cheers Grahame

Lynda and I were in Rotorua with a trailer load of demo kayaks. These kayaks were later used to make our post-fire moulds.

The frost was hard. the pipes were frozen and the staff were working. Our alarm monitoring company in Wellington knew that the smoke detector had activated. Four minutes later the 111 call was lodged.

Up until then insurance was something that we bought – but hardly ever claimed on. We had never met an insurance assessor (AKA Loss Adjuster) until 20th June 1996. Wow – this is different!

Loss Adjusters are trained since birth to always make their adjustments in one direction. In favour only of the insurer.

Even though our insurance had been updated and everything was covered, our payout did not cover the total losses. Fortunately we had made a solid net profit the previous year, and our Loss of Profits policy made the rebuilding of the business worthwhile.

But none of the above happened automatically.

An insurance policy is a contract between the insured and the insurer. Initial meetings with the Loss Adjusters lead to early realisations that they were working only for the insurance company – not us. Things looked bleak.

This is what we did

1. Retired to our Anakiwa holiday home with all of our relevant insurance policies
2. Read each policy at least 5 times – every word
3. Using Post-it notes – littering the document with ‘this is what this means’ notes
4. re-read each policy 3 more times
5. Called a new meeting with the Loss Adjuster

What a difference! These people do not read your policy. They operate on certain assumptions – based on industry wording averages. They are surprised to learn that you can constantly make them look like – well – beginners.

Sisson Kayaks was paid every dollar that we were legally entitled to. Beyond that our insurers paid X-Gratia amounts beyond what we were entitled to. These extra payments were possible because in the end our insurers accepted that we were all unified and a part of the same team.

Have you ever heard of an insurance claimant ‘firing’ a Loss Adjuster? I did. The sub-human Auckland based moron that our insurer employed to administer our Loss of Profits payout thought that he would make his bonus easily. Instead he was heading back to Auckland on the next plane. And after that I demanded to only deal face-to-face with the local manager of this company.

Not all Loss Adjusters are bad. One showed human compassion. And 10 months after the fire, when all looked impossible, this man cleared the Nelson City Council paper-work log-jam. Paul Kinghorn made it possible for us to enter and trade from our newly re-built factory.

Christchurch people. Go grab some Post-it notes. Take a break away to somewhere peaceful. Read and re-read your insurance policies. Settle with insurance payments that are fair.

Firstly we celebrated Xmas and my 90 year old father-in-law’s birthday. Not always in that order of importance or timing.

Then we took a month holiday looking at parts of this land that we had previously missed.

Then we headed back home to Anakiwa and wham – received that text from our son Richard “chch leveled by eq”

I wish to say sorry to those people who have been waiting for me to respond to their kayak enquiries. This is the city where Lynda and I were raised. This is the city that still has a mysterious bond. This is the city wrecked.

For the following weeks we have tried to do our best to support family and friends. Then just as we seemed to be seeing things settling into some sort of normality – the Japanese triple disaster happened.

Those who have known our business since 1990 will remember when almost 50% of Sisson Kayak’s annual turnover was exported to Japan. Container after container of sea kayaks heading to Kleen-tex Japan Inc. The final shipment to Kleen-Tex was delivered in 1997.

About the same time I chose to become a one-man-band ‘hobby’ business. And Kleen-Tex closed their outdoors division. I am proud to say that, all these years later, I still remain in contact with the company President Fukuhara, Outdoors Division boss, Matsumura and the office administrator, Hisanori.

All are safe but I am concerned that should the wind turn to the East, Matsumura may be at risk at his Sado Island home.

Back to Canterbury. Our Methven factory is fine. Our son Richard has been living there at times in order to escape the aftershocks. He was working very close to the PGC building, and came within centimeters of being clobbered by a huge light fitting.

At times such as this family comes first. They are all visually OK. Friends are, as far as we know, OK. But many including Steve Gurney are homeless. We intend to ramp up our help after some sort of direction returns to their lives.

Only one positive item has happened lately. We have our multiple 2011 season SKI PASSES secured.

And today I am about to answer a lot of kayak enquiries that have hit my in-box in the past few weeks. I say “sorry” to all of those who have waited for my response. I admit to you that I could have found the time. But somehow my head was pulverized by the events.

The benefits of the Omega are covered in its Product Page. The Evolution Cutting Edge is history. I chopped up the plug. It was in my way. And that is that. The Cutting Edge would have replaced the original Edge. More room for wider bottoms – 30mm longer and faster. Gone for good. The Omega is the final kayak design that I will waste my time creating.

Why you may ask. The multisport market, which I helped to build (at our peak we sponsored 27 athletes and 7 events) in the late eighties and early nineties is too small to be bothered with. On top of that there is a perception, fostered by morons, that the Evolution Omega is a fraud. I do have other business interests apart from my kayak making retirement hobby. I will follow those other business interests whilst still making existing models as the orders flow in.

New models – the answer is no!

And then two things happened. I redirected my energy to making some solid capital in another business. And Bill Gates stuffed up my $2000 version of his FrontPage. Then I changed to Mac computers and ended up with Contribute as an editor. I hated it.

This new website is powered by WordPress – and I am loving it.

Stay tuned in as I master more functions.

Grahame

Perception were the first US manufacturer to make inroads into the New Zealand market. Their kayaks sold at prices well above similar composite models – even though they were much heavier. Several New Zealand manufacturers seemed to believe that this was the path to the future. At Sisson Kayaks we simply questioned the guys with the bumper stickers! And kept on making composite boats.

The slalom paddlers had noticed something strange about these new kayaks – they were slow. Somewhere I obtained two images that were magnified to the power of 5000. The composite surface looked like the surface of a tar-sealed road. The plastic surface looked something similar to the boulder-section-in-the-Deception-River. Huge roughness – and DRAG. SLOW!

I regret that I cannot upload those images – because they were lost in the fire of 1996.

Sisson Kayaks just kept bringing out new and better designs – all constructed in composites. Thirty five years of composite kayak construction – and never one deviation. There were some who though us strange – old fashioned – left behind. We even suffered verbal abuse!

As you know – roto-moulded plastic kayaks no longer command the premium price. Composite kayaks – the well constructed ones command the high prices. This is because for multisport they are the only way to go – performance wise.

With regard to composite sea kayaks some very interesting observations can be made. Lets take a frozen point in time – 1990. If you look at the Sisson Kayaks range it consisted of : – Puysegur, Southern Light, Arctic Raider and Nordkapp. Sisson Kayaks still sells the last three models in this list. Unchanged. The properties of wind and water remain the same. Why change?

Now look at some of the rotomoulding companies that realised that they had made a mistake with regard to premium pricing (and profits). They belatedly introduced composite sea kayaks into their ranges. Their current models look very similar to what Sisson Kayaks was making in 1990 – and still making today. How about asking them to show you their initial 1990 composite sea kayak designs? Their 1990 sea kayak designs were MMMMMMMMM – ask them to show you – these were substandard compared to what we were selling in 1990. Suffice to say their current composite sea kayaks all look so similar to our models. There is the answer .

Even I have trouble telling some sea kayaks apart from our own when they are on a roofrack!

But I degress. However the above fact is an important reason why Sisson Kayaks totally dominated the two market segments that we targeted from 1984 thru to 1996 – multisport and upper-end sea kayaks – that all perform and endure.

In short – those 1980′s slalom paddlers had it so right – and for that reason – right through the late eighties our marketing included the following statement.

Glass is fast!

The Puysegur was a ‘beginners’ sea kayak with all of the upper-end fit out. It was not re-instated after the fire. Plastic boats had taken that market because they became so cheap cheap cheap.
Most 2010 composite sea kayaks from other sources now include three compartments, pod seat, three hatches and fully retractable rudder. All of these features first appeared on Sisson Kayaks sea kayaks – ahead of all others – globally.  If only these guys would have an original idea – maybe I could copy it?
“Glass” is short for fibreglass – or composite – which now includes Kevlar and carbon.

All of the testing on that day had been done at the totally aerobic level of 130HBPM. Luke had been taking his own times using his heartrate monitor gizmo – and I had been backing up the timing using my IPhone stopwatch – and some brisk MTB peddling along the stopbank.

When Luke yelled “go” I assumed a cruisey bike ride with lots of time for a photo finish taken with my camera. This stupid belief shows you how – my own ingrained sub-concious had been corrupted to believe that “The Eliminator is only just fast enough not to be laughed at” (quoted from M Jacques) may just be true.

Sadly for me, the peddling on the bike was still bringing on leg  pain I had endured with the Omega testing.- My attempt to fire up my camera had to be abandoned just to deal with (in panic mode) the IPhone timing cutoff.

In the end the only way to photo Luke with the Eliminator was after he had changed.

Luke happy to be photographed with the 'beginners-boat'

Evolution Omega at 130HBPM over 700 metres of RDR in moderate flow (average) 2 minutes 48 seconds

Eliminator at 130HBPM over 700 metres of RDR in moderate flow (one run)    3 minutes 5 seconds

Only 17 seconds slower – no wonder the camera photo-finish resulted in the camera being dropped.

Weather conditions were clear and calm.

This testing confirmed  a 1992 test that I conducted using Steve Gurney as the motor. We had a HR monitor – but had to make our own speed ‘pressure-guage’. The actual speeds were 11 graduations (Evo) and 9 graduations (Eliminator). It seemed too close. But was correct.

And when Nathan Fa’aave lived at Anakiwa he found little difference in his paddling time to Picton – in his Evo Classic or his Arctic Raider. The Eliminator hull was ‘stolen’ off the Arctic Raider.