Stand up paddleboarding, (SUP) is riding the crest of a wave right now. The ever-growing popularity of paddleboarding has led to a big growth in the paddle board market, and lots of business opportunities for people looking to escape from their day job.

As McConks, we work with a large number of outdoor education providers, SUP rental businesses, and instructors, from the Princes Trust, the National Trust, and the Scout Association at a National Scale, to working with individual instructors giving learn to ride SUP lessons, or working with charter Yacht companies who provide SUP adventure weeks to small groups.

And the one thing that we hear regularly from our customers and partners is that trust is THE most important success factor. The businesses need to trust the gear and the paddlers need to trust the instructor. So selecting your kit, making sure it won’t let you down, making sure it won’t let your customers down is essential in making sure that you don’t put lives at risk or your business at risk.

So if you’re ready to ditch your day job and set up a stand up paddleboard business, what are the key things you need to know? We’ve set up a specific ‘things you need to know’ when running a SUP business section of our webpage. This page has come from years of conversations with all of the SUP businesses that we’ve worked with: the frustrations and challenges of running a SUP business; the little tips that have turned the business from a struggle to a success; what marketing and social media has worked for them; how to get technical support; how to manage your business and personal liability, and lots more. And we intend to keep updating with new SUP hacks and tricks regularly – we still talk to businesses on a daily basis. And as stand up paddleboarding continues to grow, we’re sure that we’ve all got lots more to learn!

As we said, it’s all about trust, and one of your biggest decisions will be around what type of board you stock. There are a lot of questions about durability vs cost, transportation and storage, ethics and sustainability. So we’ve put together a guide to choosing the best board for paddleboard businesses, to help you answer these questions and make the best choice to help your business run smoothly and hassle-free.