Action Sports Conference highlights

All photos by Jerry Kasai, courtesy of Group Y.

Yesterday I stopped by the second groupY Action Sports Conference at the Hilton in Huntington Beach, Calif.

There was a full crowd of about 300 people in the audience from a variety of sectors in action sports from brands and media to marketing and PR agencies.

The event was geared towards non-endemics looking to work within the action sports arena as well as brands and athletes weighing in on action sports culture and media as a whole.

The event was broadcasted live through Twitter feeds all day with people highlighting some of the key takeaways from the various panels and presenters.

Some of the most interesting comments came from people outside of traditional action sports.

UFC Chief Marketing officer Bryan Johnston talked a bit about his business. Johnston said he said he spends 60% of his time focusing internationally at the UFC, while when he worked in action sports he spent most of his time only focusing on North America

Tim McFerran, President of Maloof Money Cup, mentioned that he is taking the event to South Africa next year, and that there’s a lot of interest from a variety of different countries to do more international events.

On page 2: Athletes and Retail