One of the purposes of this site is to give you a look into different parts of the shred industry, including what happens behind the scenes at different companies. It’s always impressive and rad when a snowboarder steps up and starts his own company within the industry, especially when it’s a new and untapped product. Industry start up The Vert Effect is in it’s freshman year in the skate/snow/surf industries offering super nice stainless steel water bottles while also giving back by getting seriously involved in a number of rad snowboard, skate, and surf events. Owner, founder, snowboarder, surfer, friend, and good dude Nick Centineo sat down and answered some questions to give a look into The Vert Effect and why they will succeed.
To build some hype, Vert is giving out limited edition Eastern Snowboard League bottles. To get one, just cruise over to the Vert Facebook page, post a rad shred video clip, and get 10 ‘likes’ on the video. The first five people to do this will get one of these bottles, which are ONLY available to competitors of the ESL series.
So what’s up Nick? Tell me about what you have going on?
Hey The Dude, stoked on life right now….the snow just keeps on falling!!! This is one of the best winters i can remember in a long time. I’ve just been shredding out of my mind and promoting my new company “Vert Effect”.
Of all things people in the action sport industry are into, what made you decide to go with water bottles?
Every sport in this world has super talented athletes who constantly raise the bar for the competition. As an athlete to be able to perform and compete at your highest level you need to be hydrated! Most sports like basketball, hockey, soccer, etc. have different types of water bottles or other ways of keeping the athletes hydrated. Action Sports has nothing like it. I know we all like to drink our energy drinks but at the end of the day you need WATER and I’m just providing a way for the athletes to get it.
How do vert bottles or the brand its self differ from the competing brands out there?
Theres a few things that make us different:
1.) We make our product with a super high quality stainless steel called 18/8 grade. Its the same material your moms pots and pans are made out of. We make it with this because its really strong and extremely rust resistant. Other brands use lower quality materials like plastic, aluminum, or lower quality steel.
2.) We are not some big corporate company just firing out water bottles left and right trying to make a million dollars. We are a very small local company that’s main goal is to make a difference. Every bottle we sell, we donate one dollar towards supplying clean, drinkable water to struggling countries through out the World. That one dollar supplies one person with clean drinking water for an entire year. So we already have impacted so many lives and are only looking to keep this going!
What are your plans for growing in the board sport industries? Team riders? Sponsor events? What’s good
Well we just recently started to develop the VERT team and recently just brought on Matt Bothfield aka Matty B. He is our first snow team rider and we are stoked to have him, kid can shred! In the coming weeks we are only looking to expand. Anybody who has a passion for the sport and wants to help us with our cause, we would be psyched to consider bringing on to the team.
I ran into you a few weeks ago at the first ESL stop and you had some rad guerrilla marketing stuff going on…what are you doing as far as marketing goes?
Vert Effect is one of the main sponsors of the Eastern Snowboard League and we are pumped to be a part of an event that is so different and really geared for the local riders. We created a limited edition Eastern Snowboard League bottle that we have been giving away at the events to the riders and eventually these will be available for sale on our website www.verteffect.com as a super limited edition bottle. If your at any of the events well be giving out tons of stickers and bottles.
It may be very possible that you are the first guido who also happens to be a legit snowboarder and surfer…how did that happen?
HAHA JOKES JOKES. Hating on JERZ. Just cause I’m italian, from jersey, and occasionally like to pump my fist does not make me a guido. Jerz is an awesome place to grow up, we have the beach minutes away and the mountains a couple hours away. There’s not too many other places that can say that. So naturally I spent a lot of time at the beach surfing and in the winters driving up to VT shredding on the weekends.
If you were on jersey shore which dude would you be? Fist pumping party dude? Meat head ladies man? DJ Nicky D?
Anyone who knows me knows I like to go out and party! I have been known for “cutting up a little rug” on the dance floor and sometimes the fist will come out but its gotta be the right time and place ha. I don’t know, you tell me.
So back on subject…what do you have planned for the rest of this season and then for next?
Were gonna finish out the ESL strong and focus on building a sold Vert Snow Team for next year. We are also gonna start to pop up in your local shops so keep an eye out for us.
