It’s been a long year for Mike Raper, but he has no complaints. As he shuts his door closing off the office banter at the new North Kiteboarding brand design center in New Zealand, Mike candidly shares with prideful and excited exasperation that he’s only taken three and a half days off in the last year. Locked into a disciplined campaign of 12-16 hour days, the new North Kiteboarding team pulled off what many had thought to be impossible: building a top-tier kite brand in little over a year.
Having been hired by the North Technology Group (NTG) in May of 2018, Mike immediately set about assembling some of the most experienced kiteboarding equipment designers capable of building a full product lineup that includes three comprehensive kite models, a control bar system, four twin tip models, three surfboards and a modular foil system with three deck options. If that sounds unimaginable in just 12 fast-paced months, Mike can attest that it is not; the confident and energetic kite brand manager insists the North lineup has been 20 years in the making. In truth, the new North Kiteboarding has been over 60 years in the making now that North Technology Group, one of the largest sailing conglomerates in the world, is putting its financial and technical might behind its spinoff North Kiteboarding… To read the rest of the article, become a subscriber of Tkb Magazine.
Tkb’s Vol. 16, No. 3 fall 2019 digital issue is available now. The print issue will be landing in mailboxes soon!
