Rising Stars: Meet Don Tashman of Culver City

Today we’d like to introduce you to Don Tashman

Hi Don, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I grew up skateboarding in Los Angeles in the 80s/90s. In 1989 I first encountered snowboarding and it was love at first sight. In the 90s I went to college in New York City. I studied Literature and Astronomy but spent most of college building skateboards to get around NYC and to emulate snowboarding. And snowboarding whenever I was able to pull it off. It the late 90s I lucked into a job during the dot com boom and unintentionally made a decent amount of money in stock options and headed back to LA to work for my dad (a serial entrepreneur), I was supposed to work for him and have some time to start my own business. He actually worked for me and helped run the business side while I focused on building a business making the best boards I could. Loaded launched it’s first board, the Vanguard in 2002 and we launched our sister brand, Orangatang Wheels in 2008. It’s been an amazing journey filled with incredible people, a kind and inclusive world wide community, and roots in the awesome city of Los Angeles. 22+ years in and it’s more fun than ever.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
HA! For the first 7 years of the business I was burning through savings. The launch of the Dervish in 2007 allowed us to get our heads above water. This was the first board to use bamboo in a snowboard style construction with a “drop through” design and it was a success. Great marketing talent, more great products and a great international community helped us have 10 good years. There continues to be ups and downs but I think we still have a lot more important products to create and love to share.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
We originally specialized in emulating snowboarding on the streets by applying snowboard technology to skate. We continue to have a strong passion for materials and for building the best possible products we can. Our design philosophy is to expand the nature of what a skateboard can be. We are focused on innovation not for innovations sake but in order to create more tools to enhance the human experience. We currently have a full lab in our Culver City office where we can create rideable prototypes in 24 hours.

Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
Being engaged and challenged by thoughtful, kind and passionate people. And challenging them back.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://loadedboards.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/loadedboards
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/loadedboards
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@loadedboards
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@loadedboards

Image Credits
Ethan Cochard and Loaded Boards, Inc.