So here we are.
Okozo Longboard Backpacks is ready to go! As you could read in our previous blog, we’ve got the whole team ready to go.
Investors? Check.
Capital? Check.
Marketing, design, website, logo? Check.
Experienced bag designer? Check, check & double-check.
Only, we’re now just getting started. We have our teams set up, and after much research, we’ve also decided where we want to produce our bags. After a lot of travelling and discovery, we decided we wanted to have the okozo bag to be produced in Europe. Because you see, sustainability is important to us. Here’s why.
Much like everyone else, we too, see companies and organisations being irresponsible with our natural resources and with nature in general. And so, even though we want to produce the best longboarding backpack money can buy, we firmly believe we should try to make the right choice wherever we can. And to us, that begins with common sense. Producing something and shipping it halfway across the world isn’t common sense. It’s wasteful, and it causes unnecessary pollution. So for that reason, we choose to partner with our atelier in Portugal, enabling us to put “Made in Europe” on our bag. We’re pretty proud of that if we’re being honest.
So while Lena was busy developing the bag, Matthijs reached out to some of the biggest names in the longboarding game. Through his longboarding network, we connected to amazing skaters like Antonine Champetier, Lotfi Lamaali, Jeff Corsi, Mirko Paoloni and Valeriya Gogunskaya. Besides being famous for their longboarding, we partnered with these people because of how much they give back to the community. Lotfi is known for teaching regularly, and Valeriya runs a longboard camp in Portugal that teaches people longboard dancing and freestyle, to name a few examples of ‘paying it forward.
So then, on September 7th of 2022, we launched Okozo Longboard Backpacks! We could hardly believe it, but after almost two years of preparations, meetings, brainstorming, COVID-19 and much testing, we can proudly say:
“We’re a longboarding start-up. We create the best longboard backpack money can buy”
By the time this article is published, we’ve been in business for about two months. We’ve had the pleasure of sponsoring amazing events like the Hamburg Open and Lozopenride in Lausanne, Switzerland. There are going to be many more events that we’ll sponsor; we love being able to support and grow the community this way. What’s also upcoming is a new shoot in Paris with Antonine and Lotfi, supported by Axel Massin and directed by Tim Eichel. We can’t wait to show you!
In the next blog, we’ll introduce our industry-leading bag designer Lena Hahn from Germany and how she started her approach to create the perfect longboard bag.
Let’s go and skate!
Much love,
Matthijs & Johannes
