Robb
Robb Bailey
Web guy for The Ryde
With The Ryde: About 2 years now.
Age: 29 and counting
Hometown: San Diego mob!
Favorite Ryde tee: Today it’s Rocker…
Favorite Food: Toss up between Lasagna and Burritos.
Job duties: I handle all site administrator responsibilities and also help with some of the Internet Marketing for TheRyde.com. That means I’m the guy on the other side if you hit the “Chat” button in the upper right corner of our store (feel free to hit me up any time). Sometimes my job involves cropping images, buying sombreros, and delivering tee shirts to shops, but not very often. Just ask Mike…
Story: I met Mike Figueroa, the owner of The Ryde, at a surf convention a few years ago. I was thinking of starting an Internet Marketing business and wanted to get into the surf industry somehow. So I walked the floor of ASR with my friend who knew some people and he introduced me to Mike. I really like The Ryde’s stuff, and Mike was looking to push his website from dinosaur to Ferrari in a hurry. Six months later he finally called me and we’ve been in love ever since.
About Surfing: Since the age of 6 I have been sort of a jock. I played baseball, basketball, and football as soon as I was old enough to join the leagues. I loved every minute of it. When I was 12 I got my first taste of politics and nepotism in sports when I was passed for the Little League All-Star team by a coach’s son. That upset me, but it also made me realize that I had to earn everything I wanted in life. Blessings come in different ways…
I lost interest in baseball after that, and focused on the one place you could really take your frustrations out on your opponent: the football field. I quickly became the hardest hitting defensive player on the team. My new dream was to become a pro football player. Unfortunately, as my mind and heart grew with the game, my metabolism did too. I grew tall and skinny through high school, and even though I remained competitive on the Varsity team, my role was limited. Our team went on to compete in the CIF championships and I got to play in the stadium I grew up watching my favorite NFL team play on. That kicked ass.
The way I figured it, I had to find a new dream. Graduating and leaving for college at the age of 17 to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo put me in a new town where I knew nobody. With that came a new opportunity. My next door neighbor in the dorms would come home from surfing every day and tell me about how epic the conditions were. With an athletic void to be filled, I got hooked. A friend and I teamed up to start the Cal Poly Surfer’s Association, a club on campus that has since grown into a full-fledged surf team. Ten years later, my new passion has taken me to places like Brazil, Baja Mex, Hawaii, Samoa, Fiji, the UK… the bug got me. I came to realize that life is a journey, not a destination. One lifelong dream got replaced by many dreams. My outlook changed. All because of this crazy sport we call surfing!
I am extremely grateful to have been opened up to such a great sport and community–with extra special thanks to my Godfather Mike DiGregorio for getting me my first real board and making me paddle out at Trestles the first day with it.
Other projects: Monthly contributor for South Coast Surf Shops’ e-newsletter. Manager for upcoming musician Kyle Phelan.
Personal Sites: Myspace, Generation Enterprises Internet Marketing
