HISTORY
Rewinding way back to 1977, the idea for the Tushingham brand was first born when Roger was an aspiring dinghy racer. Enthralled by the sport throughout his child hood, Roger soon figured that the only way to become semi-professional at dinghy racing was to become a sailmaker despite a distinct lack of enthusiasm from his Yorkshire-based Careers Officer at school. At the time a friend suggested that he use the Jolly Roger skull logo, which was drawn on each sail by his own fair hand in felt tip during the early days of production. Come 1980, when windsurfing was entering its heyday and becoming a household sport, Roger was perfectly placed to roll out the cloth and send the stitches of his sewing machine in a brand new and exciting direction. With a glint in his eye, he recalls the early days when windsurfing was in its infancy “Every man and his dog was windsurfing back then, it was incredible! Windsurfing was the first new adventure sport and everybody got behind it in the mid 80s. The stuff we were making at the time was terrible. But we just didn’t know any better! We didn’t even have clamp-on booms. My first windsurfer had a wooden boom. For years after that we used to tie booms onto the mast with a piece of string! You had to develop this special knot, it was awful. You wonder why all this stuff took so long? I think it’s because we’re not that intelligent!” When Roger made the bold call to embark on his second Olympic campaign, he licensed the brand out to Bennett and Bowler to continue running the business while he was pre occupied with his training regime. A few years later, after the Olympics had passed, they realised that production of the sails needed to be moved to China because of price changes. Chris Bowler didn’t want the commitment and asked Roger if he wanted Tushingham back. Needless to say, the canny Yorkshireman saw an opportunity and the deal was done!
“ WHEN WINDSURFING BOOMED IN THE 80S IT WAS VERY SIMPLE, SO I THINK WE NEED TO MOVE BACK IN THAT DIRECTION ”