You would have to be living in a snow cave for the last 5 years to not know about Northern Alliance Board Shop. Not only do they have a well positioned shop right on the main drag in sandy, but they also have the most enthusiastic group of people on Mt Hood reppin for them. The owner of the shop, Nate Langer, is one of the chillest dudes I know. Nate took some time out of his busy Saturday at the shop to write up a little history lesson on his shop. Take some time to read about NA and support this completely rider owned shop.
And Nate, thanks for the socks. You're the man.
The History
I've been in and around the snowboard industry for about 12 years. I've worked park crew and park crew supervisor for about 4 years and then realized there is no money in the mountain business. Also we realized that Meadows will never change their park and operations no matter how hard we try, even if we infiltrate there operations. So then I decided to try and buy a bad business in sandy that was once called NRC (New Release Company). We have all worked for or with Mark Archer so we all knew how he was. I was working the Ski Fever shows for Mark and one day he mentioned that he wanted to sell the shop and get out of this business. I jumped on it and got a great business lawyer to deal with Mark and his shady ways. The rest is history.
We are in our 5th year in business and every year has been cake until this year 09/10. The recession has hit the retail industry the hardest and it has been a struggle to stay out of the red. Eating a lot of top roman has helped my broke ass out. I am not and never have been in this industry to make money. I am in it because I love this sport and the progression of it. After I realized my broken body will never go pro, I found out a way to stay in the industry and have my impact on it. Be in to something because you love it and then everything else will fall into place.
The name Northern Alliance
I got the name from trying to find something to represented the N.W. and the N.W. Mountain range. I was thinking that there can then be a Northern Alliance in Washington, Cali, and BC. They are all on the N.W. Mountain range and represent the same thing.... Snow/Mountains. As well, we as Mt. Hood locals have been riding together from the start so this is an Alliance of friends/riders. I got the logo literally from and idea from a movie. It's actually a Stephen King movie called "The Fog". On the cover of some of their movie's you will see a group of people walking through the fog which is where the logo came from.
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