Surf's Up: Sarasota couple launches surfboard table company

Richard and Gina Brahs always seem up for a new challenge.

Richard, a New Jersey native with a career in accounting, met his wife Gina in 2005. As Richard has retired and is almost done with his occasional consulting work, the duo have thought a lot about how to spend their free time. They considered opening a restaurant, or a sailing business, but it didn't feel right. 

What's important to them is that whatever they do, they do it together. Recently they’ve launched a new business selling a different kind of product – painted surfboards that serve as tables, bartops, and coffee tables. They got the idea while visiting a restaurant in Brazil, where the couple ate and drank sitting at a colorfully designed surfboard.

Their new business – Surfboard Bars & Tables of Sarasota, Florida — specializes in vibrantly colored surf board tables. Many of the hand-made six-to-eight foot boards have tropical colors, while others sport the American flag, or a more intricate design like an undersea octopus.  What they all have in common is they’re put together by Richard and Gina both through hours of careful construction and painting. 

“We started this basically as a hobby,” Richard said. “And now we're going to see if  we can make a go of it.”

The transition from hobby to business enterprise started close to nine months ago, when Richard created a website and started offering the boards for sale. The unsold inventory adds color to their hoome. 

Putting the surf board tables together is a lengthy process. Richard picks up three to four straight wood boards, where he then uses a saw to smooth each. He then glues them together and then alternately sands them down and applies wood filler to get each board looking right. Only then is the assembly shaped into the final form.

Front to back, his part of the process takes 30 hours. Though he’s had experience with maintenance around the house, Richard didn’t have much familiarity with craftwork before he started the hobby. That didn't faze him, and he set about learning as much about the craft as possible. Much of what he’s learned about table assembly and refinement has been from instructional videos on the internet, and asking carpenters online for their advice. 

“Everybody helps one another on the internet,” Richard said. “It’s amazing.”

He feels his approach has become better and better with each board, though he continues to tweak the process. He’s experimenting with water and oil bases to see which helps the paint last, and wants to try out a resin coat soon as well. 

While Richard deals with putting the tables together, Gina focuses on bringing color and an artistic touch to the finished product. Gina, who has her paintings and sculptures all throughout their Sarasota home, says she starts by drawing a design on paper before starting to paint the board. She takes time to get the base color down before painting the smaller, more intricate details. 

The artist has spent years painting after becoming enraptured by paintings at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. 

“I was mesmerized by everything that I saw,” Gina said. "I went to a store and I bought easels, I bought paint.”

Her artistic sensibilities have grown in the years since — she works on both framed paintings and structures — and she says transitioning to sketching out a design and translating it to a surfboard is relatively simple. 

The couple has an interest in supporting law enforcement and veterans with their artwork, donating a special table to the local police department as well as offering 15% off to veterans. Some money from each sale is given to the Wounded Warriors project. 

Though it’s up in the air given the state of current events,  the Brahs hope to bring their tables to upcoming craft fairs should they be held. The duo made their debut at Thunder by the Bay last year and hope to show off their tables and new events.

In the meantime, Richard and Gina will continue to hone their craft. Richard's favorite part of the process is still seeing his wife's art designs come to life when the board is done, but the way his work putting the tables together keeps improving is a close second. 

“When I get (a board) done, each one seems to get a little better," he said.