Take your briefcase and fuck off, we don't need any more bullshit money grabbing companies in the scene, especially not in the UK scene.

So two moderators of this forum have decided to shun that Close Up has a dedicated UK distributor?
Absolutely shameful and small minded... How will this scene ever grow if all you will do is stop people from trying to make things work and enter the scene?

So in essence you don't want new businesses to start showcasing fingerboard products, you want to keep it all a tiny tight community and monopolize all the people who are interested in this lifestyle to buy from your own brands/websites...

Absolutely shameful in my opinion and this is not good for the scene. You may moderate a website but you have no idea about commerce or what it involves. You have absolutely bamboozled this with unnecessary and incorrect information all to create a negative thought which I am very perplexed about.

Its funny also how some peoples reply to this was positive at the start then as soon as you start making up stories and rumors everyone follows.... So is this forum just a group of you who only allow yourselves into this 'scene'? Looks that way to me and we wish for increased customer awareness, not decreased slanderous ramblings.

This clearly was the wrong place to post the Close-Up launch and feel your welcoming nonexistent. Absolutely shocking to see moderators of a forum acting like you are. If you love finger boarding so much why not welcome people who are just doing a job for the greater of good and quit with your small-minded thoughts of 'they just in it for the money'
Businesses are required in this world - deal with it or stop buying branded goods all together because for all you know, your buying products from the same people who own such brands/products, or people who actually produce products for a number of brands...

CLOSE UP UK wrote:

So two moderators of this forum have decided to shun that Close Up has a dedicated UK distributor?
Absolutely shameful and small minded... How will this scene ever grow if all you will do is stop people from trying to make things work and enter the scene?

So in essence you don't want new businesses to start showcasing fingerboard products, you want to keep it all a tiny tight community and monopolize all the people who are interested in this lifestyle to buy from your own brands/websites...

Absolutely shameful in my opinion and this is not good for the scene. You may moderate a website but you have no idea about commerce or what it involves. You have absolutely bamboozled this with unnecessary and incorrect information all to create a negative thought which I am very perplexed about.

Close Up is a decent company. Close Up having a dedicated UK distributor sounds alright to me. Baggars Belief sounds like a money hungry business. If you want to be a part of fingerboarding, at least try to understand it. Stop selling china shit and stop taking so much offense when we question your business. There are loads of leads that says that your business is harmful for the scene.

Also, us being moderators have nothing to do with anything? Should being a moderator stop us from having an opinion?


And you are right, we know nothing about commerce what we do know a lot about is fingerboarding, something that you seem to fail to understand.

Quote :

So in essence you don't want new businesses to start showcasing fingerboard products, you want to keep it all a tiny tight community and monopolize all the people who are interested in this lifestyle to buy from your own brands/websites...

I think you might be starting to understand a bit of what it is about.
I (and many others) want fingerboard products to be made/designed by fingerboarders. We want the fingerboard scene to be self-sufficient.

It's not about people buying from my brand, i don't really care if they do. I make decks because i enjoy it. I sell them so that it doesn't cost me a huge load to have fun. I sell trucks and tape because people who have bought my decks have asked me to stock some more essentials. I stock fairly unknown brands of fingerboards to help spread the knowledge of other deck makers.

And you dare to say i'm trying to monopolize the scene.

Your remarks are still slanderous, unnecessary and wrong.

Close Up cannot run a business in France and the UK so they appoint a dedicated distributor. This is how most brands work and this is how products/brands get better coverage! Its called a worldwide marketing strategy. Just because you dont have one and we do, that doesn't mean we are a money grabbing company here to steal all the money from the UK scene... That is why you are small minded. We are here to do a job for the fingerboard industry in the UK.

Question why Damien chose Beggars Belief... You clearly know nothing about them so why become slanderous to my boss and his company other than to be selfish, and block potential positive feedback?

The fact is, Beggars Belief is run by fingerboarders, skaters and all kinds of people who are into these types of hobbys... Why you have chosen to chastise us on the assumption that we are money grabbing is simply small minded and quiet stupid.

Yes, as moderators all you have done is use obscenities, tell myself to go away and not to be part of this. That is what I find shameful of yourself Mikkel.


If you had chosen to approach this professionally you might have found out who actually owns this majority and what their intentions where. Now I fail to see why we should even attempt at supporting your forum scene if you are just going to shun us out.

Very pathetic and your lack of knowledge is making you say stupid things which mean absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things and only makes you look more jealous of the idea someone else is involved with fingerboards and your just going to shun them because you feel they make money.....

Well I tell you what Mikkel... Why dont you go and change the pricing of all your hand made decks on your website or simply give them away if its not about the money.... Your full of absolute rubbish and sadly your followers on here are been plugged full of absolute nonsense, YOU CLEARLY ARE IN IT FOR THE MONEY YOURSELF YET YOU HAVE THE AUDACITY TO SAY WE ARE, EVEN THOUGH WE ARE AN ACTUAL REAL COMPANY... Then you yourself buys China parts for your own website to sell on. Seriously, your a joke to this industry and if you knew what was really going on you wouldn't be saying any of this.

First of all. The problem with Beggars Belief is not that you are trying to market Close Up. I can accept that without totally agreeing with it.

The fact is that Beggars Belief owns FBUK which is a bad thing for fingerboarding.


As i stated above i enjoy making decks, and i do sometimes give them away for free. The thing is, i can't really afford to buy the supplies for deck making, so I take a fairly small price for the decks i make (a few days ago i was suggested to charge more than twice the price).

I want to keep deck pricing low, as i dont think it should be expensive to buy a deck. This is why i don't sell the china stuff totally profitless. I make a bit of profit on those to pay for the expenses i have. Which is buying supplies and buying from other fingerboarders to resell.

Not a cent have ever been transfered from my paypal account to my bank account. Every bit of profit have been used to buy supplies or stock for the costumers.

That said, my china supplier does not accept paypal, so i've paid for all my china supplies with my bankaccount, and not got a cent back because its just a hobby to me.

I only got a stupid question.

Why the UK price is the same than the official closeup site, but in £ rather than €.
Last time I checker £ is way above €, I can't see the point ordering you rather than Damien directly. (26,5 € = 22,5£ / 26,5 £ = 31 €)

And knowing Damien personnaly, I know his marge and way of production. Don't tell me he charging the products so high, so you MUST overprice those products. Yes you have to run a companie, but the difference of price is payed by the customer, and when you say

CLOSE UP UK wrote:

The fact is, Beggars Belief is run by fingerboarders, skaters and all kinds of people who are into these types of hobbys... Why you have chosen to chastise us on the assumption that we are money grabbing is simply small minded and quiet stupid.

it's doesn't look honnest and real from you.
Real people who are into things doesn't wan't to overprice the products they love, they wan't to share theyre hoobys with the lesser cost than possible, others, only want to make money on somethink kids are hook on.

Damien chooses his own price points for France, the UK is a different thing all together and seen as we have just started this with Damien, costs are high and that makes product costings high.

I have asked for feedback on pricing for the obvious reason but I have yet to receive any replies that state what recommended retail prices should be for Close Up products...

We are very new, just launched yesterday and therefore we accept all feedback to create a better requirement for our potential customers. This is why I are here.

PLEASE NOTE - WHEN IT COMES TO PRICING OF A NEW PRODUCT - YOU TEND TO START HIGH, AND FIND THE PERFECT PRICE POINT!
Also, please not that we don't have our own production yet so as soon as that occurs we will see better RRP!

CLOSE UP UK wrote:

Damien chooses his own price points for France, the UK is a different thing all together and seen as we have just started this with Damien, costs are high and that makes product costings high

WRONG, the closeup site is internationnal, you even have $ prices, and you can order from anywhere in the world.
The cost aren't high, they're still the same, a deck cost less than 2€ to produce (yes it's done in china, with a big order), so I doesn't see where the cost are highest than before, execpt maybe for the shipping to UK from Dijon, France.

For the pricing, take the € price on the closeup website, use a simple devises converter, then round down.
Then you may have more customers. Cause, if I ever want to buy a closeup, I'll go to the cheapest than the closest/officialest site.

Costs are high because we are an agency dedicating a sole business to the Close Up Brand in the United Kingdom.

Ask Damien and all will be answered...

Thom McInally wrote:

Okay, well I can tell you now, that the chances of your venture failing are high. I was personally at a tradeshow with Blackriver. They were trying to distribute their products to different skateshops around the UK, the big names were all there. While there was a lot of interest, it was ultimately considered as too obscure to be introduced in their shops, and not worthy of a business relationship.. Introducing fingerboarding to the UK skate scene seems an impossibility. Kerry, Eddie, and Sam can all back me up with this.

Within the fingerboard scene, CloseUp isn't really regarded as well-known, it's more of an alternative to Tech Deck. That isn't a flattering comparison, considering all the quality companies around.

I'd say back out before you lose more money.

I've been nothing but respectful, and I'd like to highlight this post I made earlier, just incase you didn't see it.

Hi Thom, I wasn't referring to yourself.

We chose to distribute Close Up because we feel it is a step up from a Tech Deck and a good step up at that. Like I said earlier - skate shops in the UK are less likely to invest time and money into something they dont know a tremendous deal about. If skate shops saw Blackriver at a trade-show I assume the first point that will be raised will be pricing... Why would they buy a fingerboard deck that is nearly the same price as a real deck? They wont because they look at value, not the product...

Close Up in our eyes is a great way to introduce fingerboarding (I dont mean Tech Decks) to the skate shops of the UK because a fingerboard should be classed as an accessory for any skater and fingerboards should be readily available from sate shops dont you think?

We chose Close Up simply because they have a unique product, good price point and they are ready to sell in-stores. This is something that Damien at Close Up wants. He wants more exposure for his brand and products and we will try our hardest to achieve this.

Sadly it hasn't proven too fruitful here but I can tell you for sure that many people have bought Close-Up, they are continuing to do so and we are seeing a rise in fingerboard sales across the UK.

Hopefully we will one day see you at a trade-show and you will know we arent fake, or just trying to steal the Close Up brand to profit. Imagine how many fingerboards we have to sell to make money. Seriously just think about it. We are not here for the money, we are here to do a job that has been on the cards for some years now. We at Beggars Belief hope to see a much bigger increase in the fingerboard scene and hope that we will see many more brands flourishing in the industry. Just because some of the users here want it a tight community and a kind of cottage industry doesnt mean all of us do - some of us want to add to this industry and make things happen, this includes working with companies like Close Up etc..

Hi, I'm Xi Jin and I decided to wait for more information to surface before posting. But fuck it, here I am.

For those that don't know who I am, I joined the old Close Up team 2 years ago but other team riders either quit, became inactive, or both. Close Up ceased to have an official team for a while now. I'm not affiliated with Close Up but have been continuing to rep them based on loyalty and support given from them in the past.

In 2011, Close Up was co-owned by Damien and Manu and despite me having very little exposure and activity in the scene due to elitism on FFI, Manu approached the little-known rider that was myself, still using a SD cam, and asking me to join the team.

So that's who I am. Now, onto my thoughts about Close Up UK. There's a lot of negativity on this thread and a lot of it, I believe is justified. However, I'm going to stay neutral on this. Sorry guys if I am selling out, but I'm going to be constructive...

In no particular order, these are some of the issues you must address:

1. Anonymity/identity
The fingerboard scene is run by people and friendships formed between customers and owners as well as between owners, even if they are competitors in the same market.

It's better you've addressed this but some of the hostility is due to not being completely open from the start. When someone enters this forum with multiple accounts, promotes a webstore that has striking resemblances to another one and without fully explaining who they are, people are going to be suspicious.

2. Negative association with FBUK
Perhaps you can't do anything about this but let me try to explain my thoughts on this. You have a near-identical layout to FBUK and FBUK is a distro that has a lot of things that can potentially damage the scene. Overpriced Chinese-made products are sold for monetary gain but in most cases, there is no evidence of this money going back into the development of fingerboarding. Regardless of which company that sells them, ask any experienced fingerboarder and you know which of them are a positive influence on our scene and which are only there to make money. They also sell Nollie products which are well known to be ethically bad in the scene. Selling other hobby products

3. High Pricing of Close Up products
They're high. Sure, you say that starting a business is going to cost money at the start but this is the same for every business. Customers are going to want to purchase from the cheapest seller of a specific product and in some cases, it depends on proximity from the seller. What you need to do is research into other distributions' prices. There are actually many distros that sell Close Up products too.

4. Criteria of Sponsorship
The criteria for sponsorship by Close Up UK are pretty much: 16+ age, 10k YT views, attends UK events, makes professional videos.

By enforcing these criteria, you are limiting yourself from a very talented pool of fingerboarders outside of them. These specific criteria also appear objective-driven rather than fun-driven... and this is what fingerboarding really should be about.

There are amazing fingerboarders under 16 and much of the fingerboard demographic is under 16. Axel Wahl is one really talented person and not only at fingerboarding. He's under 16 but really mature. He's not available though, I'm just using an example.

There was no way I had 10k views on YT when I was sponsored by CloseUp.fr originally. View counts can also be faked and it should be about the quality, skill, personality, online activity and all forms of positive contributions to fingerboarding and to the brand.

Attending UK events is fair enough. You can't attend them all but there have been a fair few and if you are really into fingerboarding, you've probably been to at least one event in the past year. But this is also a major disadvantage to Brits from Northern Ireland, Scotland and maybe parts of Wales. Major UK fingerboard events have taken place in Lancashire (Cyclone, MeetUpNorth, UKRendezvous), Bristol (Crossed Fingers) and London (Little Wheels) and travel to these locations are difficult for some people. There may be perfectly good reasons why deserving fingerboarders have not been to an event and you can't just cut them all out.

Professional videos? I wish I could make professional videos. A lot of my stuff has no effort in filming or editing but the focus is on my fingerboarding where I excel (in comparison to video making).

What I am getting at is that there is a lot of reasons why fingerboarders deserve to be sponsored and limiting them in this way is not always good. Take a look at articles about fingerboarding sponsorship and get some more ideas.

5. Inconsistent Pricing of Close Up products
Why are different G5 decks priced differently? It just doesn't make sense.

Just choosing two examples:
http://www.closeup-fingerskate.co.uk/product/heroin-slime-brain-29mm-deck
http://www.closeup-fingerskate.co.uk/product/magenta-grey-logo-g5-30mm-deck

6. High cost of postage
You charge £3.50 to ship within the UK. I understand that this is probably Royal Mail 1st Class Signed For and I know that it is for secure and fast shipping. However, to remain competitive, you should offer other postage options. Other UK distributions, past and present, would at least have cheaper postage options. Even for something like a set of screws, or a tool, there is no other option but this £3.50 charge.

I'm not even going to give up my time for a detailed response, companies such as yours don't help the scene grow, you don't put any money into it, you just monopolize it and take customers from the hard earned companies such as fingersized and the Norwood project, people making a living from something they love, not from a gap in a market. We don't need your fucking filth in our community.
And you seem to be fixed on this idea that moderators have to be supportive of everything and everyone on here, we're entitled to our own views and opinions, I'm sick of these bullshit money grabbing companies, if you were simply just a distributor of close up, why are your prices £3-4 higher?

Thats a long one Xi so I will try to reply to all of your points below:


1) I have been completely open in regards to what I have said on here - It seems there is mass confusion in regards to whos who and whats what but that is simply it - I work for Beggars Belief Distribution, its an agency and they own the Close Up license for the whole of UK.

We set the www.closeup-fingerskate.co.uk website to help showcase products, give info etc. Please note that that was only created less than three months ago so by all means there is a lot to change and make better - that is where honest feedback and direction would have been positive for us.

Damien did not appoint the company I work for to do Uk distribution if he thought we wasnt right to do so... Our company is made up of many staff that all have some involvement in skating, boarding etc so we all stem from the same hobbys and all love said hobbys.


2) FBUK for the tenth time is not the same company - we simply sell Close Up stock to them. What pricing they set again is completely up to them as a business.

3) I have asked for feedback in terms of pricing yet not one person has actually said what pricing they believe it should be so how can we ever change if no real honest feedback is given? Our pricing is high XI because we are a limited company, not a basement company... We have offices, staff wages, warehousing and many many more costs. Our pricing was set to match our mark-up, and this does not mean it wont change. It will when we are ready to do so. We would sell close up decks for £1 if we could but we cant so at the moment we have to stick with pricing that suits our business, and over time we will lower costs when we have our own production...

4) Sponsorship - Now this is a tough subject, and admittedly we have made it difficult for people to be sponsored. There are a few reasons behind this. For example, we are going to be sponsoring riders for UK sponsorship but it is impossible for us to sponsor everyone. The age range is set at 16 due to legal reasons. We are a private company and sponsoring people is not as easy as sponsoring people. We require a dedicated team who has sufficient politeness, promptness and such. This again is for no other reason that to promote a brand... The last thing w want is to sponsor five people then they all decide they cant do it, cant go to meets, doesnt have time etc which is what happened before with Close Up as you know XI...


5) Pricing differs on some decks due to licensing... I.e. Some brand holders such as Heroin Skateboards have a premium on them because there are higher costs involved for that print etc. Damien doesnt take this into effect because he makes them but we have to because we import and distribute them.


6) Postage is the price it is because that our cost. We dont send anything un-recorded for obvious reasons so I'm afraid we will not risk sending items uninsured. £3.50 is a small price to pay for piece of mind.

I literally dont know what more I can say in regards to this - Xi you know Damien so ask him and you will realize we are legitimate.

Well that is me done for the day guys - its a shame two moderators have acted like they have and allowed lies to be portrayed about us, I will just take it as stupidity and jealousy because you are lying about a lot of facts that are not true and trying to slander us at every angle. Its really poor show in my opinion and I wont be wasting anymore time with you lot who are just trying to form an elite gang of fingerboarders.

once again Xi comes in and expresses almost everything I'm thinking. *high 5s*

BUT, I would like to ask everyone be as constructive as Xi and some others have been. If you don't like this, explain why using words, not anger.





I did also just reread some of the accusations made by both sides..

CLOSE UP UK wrote:

If you love finger boarding so much why not welcome people who are just doing a job for the greater of good and quit with your small-minded thoughts of 'they just in it for the money'

I apologise @closeupuk because this is after I emailed you back, I missed it on a first read, but still.. So much of that whole page made me sick to the stomach reading. Please explain to me how what you are doing is good. Mass produced products being made to look like all that fingerboarding is by a corporate company who try to push things. Even if what you're doing isn't for the money and you make your prices slightly more fair, you're still doing negative things on some level. Taking part of the legitimacy away from fingerboarding by branding what you're doing as your own, amazing, special made, super awesome products - when at the end of the day they're no different from all the generic cheapy china factory made skate decks. YES I know not every skate company makes their own decks and they're pressed by a few set companies who them pass them to distributors and then to skateshops, but there's a difference between the decks from Uk legends like A Third Foot, Herion, or big companies like Creature, Almost, AWS, etc - than the decks you can find on somewhere like alibaba.com which wholesale for about 5-10 dollars a deck. You could counter that by saying 'well, we got here first, why shouldn't we do all we can to promote our brand?' Well.. Fingerboarding is still growing. Imagine if all the mass produced china companies in skateboarding came along back in the 70s and 80s when skateboarding as growing? It would have become a fad because all the people pushing it would have lost their footing to corporate machines, then today none of us would have the thing we love, be it a 31" long deck or a 100mm long deck. To further that, I don't see how you can say 'we're doing to charge more because we're a ltd company'. So? I don't see how that benefits anyone other than you. Hobbies aren't grown by corporations, they're grown by the love, and if you want to be a part of it at the moment you basically have to be a basement company, whilst it's still growing. There's no space for anything else really, unless the corporations and their mindless buy low sell high mass produced blab become sooo strong that anyone doing it for the love of it is forced out of business. Which isn't us people in it for the love making bad business decisions, it's a concious effort to sell products designed for what we're doing by those who do it, rather than big markups and little effort - not to mention products that aren't very good functionally. I'm not about to chuck my BRTs, Flatface Wheels, and Blosom deck out the window for a china complete!

What people want from fingerboarding companies that appear is that they think for themselves, they have at least some process in the production of their products, and they actively promote the types of products that are positive for the scene, be it their own or others. There is also NOTHING wrong with a company selling a cheap alternative also, but I believe it should be marketed as that. If you want to put in fuck all effort and market shit to people as gold, then well, expect those who can see it for shit to frown your way, because that's a whole string of negative words I wont say in my books.

This comes from my experience, by the way. I run a company, I work in a skatepark, I am not oblivious or niave to the requirements of running a company and what goes into it. However I think that fingerboarders and the companies that are run from fingerboarders have the same capacity as skateboarders and skateboarder owned companies to stand for themselves, in order to preserve what we love. And when there is a need for a cheap, budget, beginner option, it should be marketed as just that - not the next best thing since sliced bread.

I apologise by the way if any of this comes across as offensive, I really do want to have a constructive discussion about this, and I am also aware that my opinions are not the holy grail of thought - if I am misunderstanding something or something like that, let me know. But right now this, after rereading this thread, is how I feel. I would like to say whilst I feel our opinions will likely never fully match, I appreciate that you're taking the time to reply.

CLOSE UP UK wrote:

Well that is me done for the day guys - its a shame two moderators have acted like they have and allowed lies to be portrayed about us, I will just take it as stupidity and jealousy because you are lying about a lot of facts that are not true and trying to slander us at every angle. Its really poor show in my opinion and I wont be wasting anymore time with you lot who are just trying to form an elite gang of fingerboarders.

Exactly when are we lying? I myself are just showing you stuff i have found about your company that makes me think badly of you.
I would love for you to convince me that what you are doing is good.

Your boss Tony Fisher owns Close Up UK and he also owns FBUK. How is that not a connection?
Your IP shows usage of 3 different accounts. Am i supposed to ignore that when every time that has happened it has been someone trying to scam?

You are a business, people are getting paid to work for you, that takes money out of fingerboarding. The money your people get could be used to develop new products if you were not a business but a basement company.

locked due to closeupUK's request. I believe they're leaving the forum.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the company that own the rights to Close Up UK;

http://www.beggarsbeliefdistribution.co.uk/

Lololol, what a joke.



Edit; Posted at the same time as Kerry O.o
Also, that's brilliant news Kerry!