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Episode 10: Cutloose Surf

Transcript

We'll look at the word shape, as well as the expressions 'on the table' and 'nut out'

Cutloose surf in 1984 was established by 2 friends at the time, Rod leary and Rodney Weasl Bedford who were great surfers back in the day. And they saw a great hole in the market here in South Australia to produce surfboards.

There is 2 parts of the business we've got the shop at the front then the second part of the business is all about the manufacturing side of the surfboards. We use quite a few different people and the reason for that is so that people can have a really good variety. now the people that we've got who are interstate who shape for us are guys like Dylan longbottom who is an ex-pro-surfer and also shapes for Billabong. Now he is a guy who really knows his boards he's been surfing a long., long time he's also been on the pro tour before so he's doing a whole heap of shapes for Cutloose from Sydney.

Notice that the word shape was used in 2 ways. It's used as a verb - they shape the surfboards. Listen:

now the people that we've got who are interstate who shape for us are guys like Dylan longbottom who is an ex-pro-surfer and also shapes for Billabong.

And shape is also used as a noun:

Now he is a guy who really knows his boards he's been surfing a long., long time he's also been on the pro tour before so he's doing a whole heap of shapes for Cutloose from Sydney.

A whole heap of shapes. A whole heap is a lot.

And what do you call the person doing the shaping?

We've got a guy out the back in our factory - Mick Higgins - he does all of our local shaping. He's been shaping boards for over 40 years and he's probably one of South Australia's oldest shapers.

Shapers shape shapes.

How do they know what shapes to make?

What we'll do with a customer who first comes in off the street we'll establish their needs. and a lot of the times people are looking for a particular board and once we establish what type of board we then narrow it down to the dimensions of that surfboard.

Narrow it down. this means finding out exactly what you need to know.

And what does 'dimensions' mean ?

Dimensions are the length of the surfboard, the width of the surfboard and of course the thickness.

Now listen for the expressions 'on the table' and 'nut out'

We'll put options on the table for the customer because we make a big variety of boards it's the case of trying our best to nut out exactly what the customer wants from their surfboard whether it be performance, more recreational or just to have just a whole heap of fun.

If you put something 'on the table' in business, it means that you discuss it or consider it. To nut out is to think about and solve a problem. Listen again:

We'll put options on the table for the customer because we make a big variety of boards it's the case of trying our best to nut out exactly what the customer wants from their surfboard whether it be performance, more recreational or just to have just a whole heap of fun.

Another expression used in the story was 'back in the day'. This just means 'in the past':

Cutloose surf in 1984 was established by 2 friends at the time , Rod leary and Rodney Weasl Bedford who were great surfers back in the day.

So we've seen that a whole heap is a lot, that shape can be a verb and a noun and that the person making a shape is a shaper. On the table means being considered, and to nut out a problem is to solve it.

We'll finish with more examples of the words shape and dimensions:

When we get our foam through it comes through as a blank and it's very similar to the shape of a surfboard but then we put our special dimensions and everything on it. We're trying to put South Australia's surfers on top of South Australia's best made surfboards.

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