How One Surfer Dude Founded One of The World’s Best Action Camera Companies
Nick Woodman, Surfer ,CEO and founder of GoPro Wearable gadgets is not one of them, he has been open about his success and failures right from the beginning.
Woodman is no stranger to the entrepreneurial game. After two failed attempts to build two separate startups, his final attempt -building GoPro has been his most successful yet. Woodman credits his prior failed attempts as the stepping stones to building his career at GoPro. Instead of giving up, he employed the lessons from his past and applied them to GoPro’s future. From Nick Woodman, we learn the lesson of perseverance, the spirit to keep going with your ideas despite the humps on the way.
In the world of extreme sports, the GoPro wearable camera is King, and this branding is completely unintentional. From kitesurfing to cave spelunking, wielding the GoPro is the surest way to grab the best footage as you engage in your adventures. In this article, Conde Nast Traveler highlights some of the best footage captured on the GoPro after a failed search for the item when it dropped from a burst balloon.
In 2013, three friends attached their GoPro camera to a weather balloon and launched this balloon into the air. The balloon eventually burst and fell to the ground, and the camera could not be found, much to the disappointment of the group. Months later, a lone hiker found the camera, traced the owners through the SIM card- one of the best features of GoPro products , and gave the camera back to them. What they discovered was beyond what they could have imagined – “stunning, high- altitude video of one of the natural wonders of the world” as described by Cynthia Drescher.
The GoPro wearable cameras are a favorite for lovers of extreme sports and outdoor adventure because “they don’t sell just a video camera, they sell the memory of the wave or the ski trip down the slope.” as quoted by Ben Arnold, a consumer technology industry analyst at The NPD Group. Extreme sports and outdoor adventures are not just hobbies for the people who engage in them, they are a keen proponent of a lifestyle. People who are involved in this lifestyle are always on the go, trying out new things and looking for the next adventure.
The value of the GoPro wearable camera is in the community engagement it promotes. According to Wired Magazine, in 2013 alone, GoPro customers watched over 50 million hours of videos with GoPro in the title tag or used as the search term. GoPro as a product has been able to transcend its original branding as just a camera to a lifestyle commodity.
With stunning image and product design quality, it seems that GoPro will be continually worn by lovers of extreme sports and adventure, and why not? It’s an amazing product!
Information is culled from Wired Magazine and Conde Nast Traveller
