A couple of years ago, Cliff Ray floated a new concept: a paddleboard with built-in, deck-flush paddle storage. The design, he reasoned, would make the boards easier to carry and transport.

Teaming up with local surfboard shaper Jimmy Keith, Ray polished his design and launched Prone2Paddle, otherwise known as P2P. Starting in November 2014, Ray and Keith have produced prototypes and tested them.

Ray has spent much of the past year promoting his designs to the paddleboarding world, even as he figures out the details of manufacturing and distribution. In calculating the likelihood of his endeavor’s success, he is banking on two factors. 

One is the rising popularity of paddleboarding as a sport and of doing yoga on paddleboards. The other is the increasing importance to consumers of American-made products.

“With 98 percent of paddleboards sold in the U.S. being manufactured overseas, consumers have few options for purchasing American made,” Ray said.

“[P2P’s] recreational and race board materials are also 100 percent manufactured in the U.S., another unique differentiation of our product line,” he added.

P2P plans to use computer technology to produce its boards, keeping costs down and allowing the company to respond quickly to new design trends. The company aims to become the only paddleboard manufacturer on the East Coast.

To compete with Asian manufacturers and their lower labor costs, Ray said P2P has invested in a state-of-the-art 3DM computer numerical control (CNC) shaping machine with CADD-type design software. The machine, he estimates, will reduce board-shaping time and will enable the company to scale its production.

“This machine is the only one of its kind on the U.S. East Coast,” he said. “Without the CNC machine it would be near impossible to establish market-competitive sales points that would keep P2P production in the U.S.”

The company has recently identified a new market: life-saving personnel.

Ray said that the company was challenged by ocean rescue organizations to design a very stable board that would allow rescuers to stand up while paddling out to reach a drowning person, thereby improving the rescuer’s line of sight amid wave swell. With the ability to grab the stowed paddle quickly in launching the board and stow it again while rescuing the victim, lifeguards will reach people more quickly and perform their duties more effectively, he said. 

“Paddle design for ocean rescue has not evolved at all in 30 years,” he said, adding that the U.S. Lifesaving Association invited P2P to showcase its Rescue Board at the organization’s annual meeting recently. 

“This will potentially save lives around the world,” Ray said.

There is a personal component to P2P’s newest product. Ray’s father drowned when Ray was young, and he wants to improve swimmer safety.

“My wife is a doctor and she saves lives,” he said. “I would like to save lives too.”

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