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As I sit here typing my last blog as a BambooSK8 intern I’m amazed that 4 months have gone by.  I think that statement alone says something about this internship.  It was definitely difficult and frustrating at times (what job isn’t) but it was definitely a lot of fun too.  Being busy and having fun makes time fly by.

During the internship I learned about the role that social media plays in a small company, about growing video views on youtube, and about creating press releases.  Through our midterm and final I learned about the income statement and statement of cashflow, how the two relate, and how important they are to a business owner.  I also learned a lot about myself. I now know that if I pay attention to all the little details and am more efficient with my time I can be successful.  I learned a lot in 4 months and I’m definitely proud to be 1 of the final 3 interns.  Now that its over I definitely feel more prepared for a career in marketing in any industry but especially the action sports industry.

I want to thank Geoff K, Mark, Wyatt, Geoff C, and Jackie for all the help along the way and I want to congratulate Kyle and Chelsea for making it all the way through.  Thanks guys for making this such a great experience!

For everyone out there reading this, I’m leaving you with some pictures of the office ugly sweater Christmas party…..

Have a happy Holiday!

Its getting down to it folks, only a few weeks left here at BambooSK8.  All the interns just took the final which was more difficult than I thought it would be.  It taught me a lot about lead time, which basically means I learned about inventory.  A company has a given amount of lead time ( say 8 weeks ) to get new product from the factory (total of ordering and then shipping), if you do not order your items early enough then you will run out of inventory before the new shipment comes. So business owners/companies have to plan ahead in order to optimize their inventory.  Basically the test asked you to look at the big picture and determine when you need to order your next shipment of skate decks.  I actually did pretty well on the test scoring a 47 out of 50 so that felt pretty good.  The final helped me understand the relationship of the income statement and cash flow statement with regards to lead time.  It also taught me that no matter what your area of expertise (marketing, management, accounting, finance) you need to have a basic understanding of the other departments in order to get things done.

On Tuesday I noticed another addition to the warehouse.  We can now take breaks and play ping pong!  Last night after work I beat the other intern Kyle 10 times and only lost once…. kind of a beat down…. but it was definitely fun and brought me back to when I used to play all the time.

Here’s a link to what our ping pong game looked like:

ping pong match

Thursday all the interns had mock interviews with Mark, Geoff, and Wyatt (the boss men).  I kind of sucked.  But the experience was definitely positive.  They were all super supportive and gave great feedback.  Some things I need to work on were exuding more confidence and making eye contact with all the people that were interviewing me.  They also gave me feedback on all of my interview answers so that I can practice them for future interviews and so that I can have more confidence in my answers moving forward.  At the end, they reviewed my resume and gave me some feedback on that as well.  I definitely feel more prepared for the next interview that I get, wherever that may be.

In other news I was up in LA and then visited Venice the other weekend which was a lot of fun.  Venice is a really cool town, with a lot of great skate parks, I attached some pictures because the view from the beach is great.

Venice Beach

View from the apartment I stayed at in LA

Until next time,

Tyler

I just had a great weekend down in Florida with my family.  I caught a bunch of fish and golfed for the first time since I had my ACL surgery.  But now I’m back to work.  Its really time to get some results as we only have about a month left here at BambooSk8.  The big thing that I am working on and trying to get done before I leave is to get our decks onto Backcountry.com’s group of websites which includes whiskeymilitia and steepandcheep.com.  So hopefully within the next month you will be able to see BambooSK8 on those websites.  Also, two other interns and I are contacting local highschools in order to sell some decks to their art programs.  Its a pretty cool project because the schools will be able to buy our boards at a discount and the kids can use them for their art projects.  Other than that I am just getting excited for all the tasty treats that come with Thanksgiving.  Can’t wait for the stuffing…. whats your favorite???

Have a Happy turkey day,

Tyler

Helllloooo,

Big Chicago Bears victory over the Eagles on Monday. Pretty excited about it.  Over the weekend I worked a sustainable home and garden event for the Bamboo Buddy side of the company.  It was a good time, there was a lot of cool companies at the event that are focused on helping people live more sustainably.  I built a mini city out of the coasters that we give out at events, which actually attracted a lot of potential customers to our booth.

Its been a little more than 2 months here at Bamboo Sk8.  We have been using a system called MPS to track goals and results.  It has really helped me keep track of where I started and where I am trying to go in terms of helping this company improve.  Also, I just got my midterm back and I did pretty well getting 45 out of 50 points.   The midterm helped me really think about and understand the importance of an income statement and statement of cash flow, for a business.  It also made me think about how this internship has helped me grow as a young businessman.  It has helped me focus more on getting results and also on leading a team of fellow interns towards results as well.  After having to focus on my time management and efficiency (through a weekly time-sheet) I am more aware of how my time is spent and sometimes wasted.  This helps me get the most out of my time spent inside and outside the office.

Currently I am working on getting press on blogs and other media outlets.  It has been a challenge reaching out to reporters and bloggers.  However, the PR team and I are working on writing press releases for our upcoming skate events in hopes that someone will want to blog about it or post it on their websites.  Overall I am learning a lot from my mentors (Geoff- the president and Mark- the operations manager).  They helped me prepare for an interview that I had last week and they also teach us a lot about the industry and the company in general.

As for whats coming up, its almost 11/11/11.  I have to start thinking about a major wish that I am going to use at 11:11 am and pm on 11/11/11.  World Peace? Ending world hunger?…. no more like the ability to fly or maybe invisibility….

That’s it for me this week have a good weekend,

Tyler

Its been a busy week so far.  The interns have been trying to add media contacts but it hasn’t been going so well.  Plus we are all gearing up for the midterm so that has been a little hectic.  But I feel that we have been making progress in some areas.  Another intern (Kyle) and I have been coming up with some good ideas for growing videos and we should have some good content out there soon.  So be on the look out for some new videos. Over the weekend we all went out to support our videographer,  Nate, at the RAW artist event in downtown San Diego.  It was an event to showcase some of the best local artist.  It was a lot of fun, as some people were already dressed up for Halloween and Nate had the most support out of anyone.

I was Mayhem (the allstate guy for Halloween), our operations manager Mark dressed up as Nate, and Nate dressed up as Mark.   What was everybody else??

Until next time,

Tyler

Greetings and salutations,

I am excited about this week mostly because it is supposed to be 75 and sunny all week, gotta love living in southern California.  Over the weekend all of us at BambooSK8 worked at the Sacred Craft Surf Expo in Del Mar.  It was a really cool event.  There was two “shaping stations” and one section for glassing boards.  We were outside in the “Skate Zone” which had its pro’s and con’s.  It was nice because the weather was great all weekend, but when a Van Halen cover band came out to play it ruined the whole vibe out there.  I have a lot on tap this week dealing with PR and growing our videos, so I figure why not start now? Check out our commercial and enjoy your week!

Later,

Tyler

BambooSK8 Commercial

Shaping at the surf expo

The first month at Bamboo Sk8 is almost over but it has been fun.  We have worked a couple ec0-friendly events where I have sold some decks and met a lot of cool people.  Right now I am working on getting us some press in local newspapers and some magazines.  The other day I got us mentioned in the North County times for an event we were working.  Also, the other interns and I have been working on ideas to build our presence in all social media outlets.  Its been pretty tough coming up with unique ideas but its also interesting to think about what works and what doesn’t on the social media sites.  So far the internship has been a good learning experience and I hope in the next couple of weeks that I learn even more about the industry.

Until next time,

Tyler

Tarp Surfing at the Cardiff Surf event we were at last week

Hey all you out there in the blogosphere,

I’m Tyler one of the interns from class 11 at Bamboo Sk8.  We are just starting week 2 here and things have been going well so far.  It has been a crazy two weeks for me because I just moved out here from Colorado but I finally found an apartment and am excited to move off of my buddy’s couch!

I wanted to join the Bamboo Sk8 team because it seemed like the perfect stepping stone for a career in the action sports industry.  I have been snowboarding, wakeboarding, and longboarding for about 15 years but I felt like now was the time to try to get into the business side of the industry.  I have learned a lot in my first two weeks and yesterday I sold my first longboard at the Point Loma Sustainability Fair!  All in all its pretty good out here in Oceanside.

Until next time,

Tyler

View from the Point Loma event