Mountain Weekly News ~
With all the social media post this week about Burton Snowboards thanks to a letter posted over at Yobeat.com I figured it was time to get a couple things straight. First off all it seems that Burton Snowboards is no longer invested in the North American snowboard community anymore..
Donna Carpenter who owns Burton Snowboards with her husband Jake had this to say “We’re just starting to grow in China,” Carpenter said. “China is small right now, but it’s changing so quickly. The government is committed to building 150 new ski areas in the next three years. The scale at which they do things is incredible.”
Interesting since according to Yahoo News “Burton Snowboards has opened 5 dozen stores in China. A country with only 50,000 snowboarders.”
Isn’t China one of the most polluted counties in the world causing widespread environmental and health problems? Sounds like a perfect place to manufacture without environmental regulations or child labor laws where children are known to start working in factories at the age of 5.
Back in 2010 Burton closed their Vermont manufacturing center (BMC), laying off 43 employees in the process while moving the jobs overseas to Austria.
“When I started Burton Snowboards in 1977, all we did was make snowboards in Vermont,” Burton’s Carpenter said. “But simply put, it costs us significantly more to produce a board in Vermont than we are capable of selling it for, and sadly, this is not sustainable in the current economy.”
Currently, most Burton snowboards are being made in China, while some of the higher-end boards are being produced in Austria.
When people think of snowboard brands Burton surely comes to mind. However when you ask a core rider what they’re running 99% of the time it’s not BURTON. There however some exceptions to the rule, some people swear by Burton boots. The Burton Fish is a really cool concept, and less we forget the 420 Kit, however they seemed to have re-named The Kit 
Personally I don’t have access to Burton snowboards so it’s hard for me to say if their boards performs well on snow? Maybe the PR team will see this, hopefully not That being said their AK Jacket is solid for splitboarding.
And let us not forget that ol’ Jake left a cushy desk job in Manhattan back in 1977 to develop the brand. With over $500 million in merchandise sold annually, Jake and Donna are doing well for themselves especially considering they kept the company private and earn an estimated 40 to 70 percent of the total revenue. Do the math…
The post Burton Snowboards Doesn’t Care About You, They Care About China appeared first on Mountain Weekly News by Mike Hardaker.