Designer Spotlight : Surf City’s Princes of Tides

Nice guys, Pat Fraley and Mike Schillmoeller.

The 25-year-old owners and designers of Counter Culture, a surf-wear company, are riding a wave of business success powered by inventiveness and the kind of traditional business ideas that old-timers think today’s youth don’t understand.

“There’s a list we follow: honesty, quality, service and some others. Those are the ethics we work off of,” Schillmoeller says.

Oh sure, when the conditions are right, they take time from their work day to hit the surf, but that’s part of business, too. Schillmoeller says: “Running a business, if you don’t surf I think you’d lose it.”

What they have not lost is the understanding that they need to slowly build a loyal clientele rather than making a fast buck. Counter Culture hit the competitive surf market scene in mid-1991, and since the beginning its focus has been on designing quality basics that will survive the wear and tear of the surfing and skateboarding lifestyle.

The label’s original trunk still ranks among its bestsellers because “it’s a no frills, basic board short,” says Fraley, “that’s very durable and light.”

Instead of the more commonly used nylon, Counter Culture cuts its trunks from 100% cotton poplin, a fabric first used decades ago to make board shorts (theirs is a lighter weight poplin). For added strength, seams get a double-, sometimes triple-stitch.

In this fall’s 24-piece collection, Counter Culture uses soft, sturdy fabrics such as brushed denim, corduroy and a “hairy’ canton flannel in practical hues of dark blues, hunter green and tan. The loose-fitting denim pieces have been lined with red and black flannel to give them a different edge, Fraley says.

The “Work Later” pants and shorts with a hammer loop and painter pockets come with the message to “surf now and work a little bit later,” Schillmoeller says.

The men’s surf backgrounds influence the T-shirt graphics, which incorporate oceanic folklore such as King Neptune, squids and water serpents. Fraley and Schillmoeller direct the graphic artists, who are also surfers.

“We learned that by bringing in graphic artists who can’t relate to what we do, they have a different vision of what’s cool. So it doesn’t look authentic; it looks contrived,” Fraley says.

The clothes and caps, which retail from $9 to $60, are available at Laguna Surf & Sport in Laguna Beach, Beach Access in Costa Mesa and Riverside, the Frog House in Newport Beach, Ocean Gear in Manhattan Beach and in markets from New York to Puerto Rico.

“We spend much of our time building a rapport with our buyers,” Fraley says.

Fraley, who worked for five years at Victory Wetsuits in Huntington Beach doing everything from advertising to merchandising, decided to venture off on his own last year with the help of his newly groomed-for-business buddy, Schillmoeller, a graduate of the entrepreneur program at USC.

Both are involved in all facets of the company, but Fraley “fine tunes the silhouettes” for final production. He uses his previous design experience with wet suits in creating the fit and look of the collection.

“When I designed a wet suit, the comfort and fit came first, then the actual look came second. We never sacrificed comfort for look. I use the same formula here,” he says.

That means the two avoid “over-designing.” Fraley says: “A lot of the new companies these days have an entire line of extremes. They don’t have anything that the guy who’s not so extreme would want to wear.

“Our line is based more on good, clean stuff, and then we’ll have a couple of pieces that have flavor, flair.”