brand profile
Starting from a simple desire to rinse and dry a wetsuit, Exit now offers a range of products based around wetsuit care. Founder Kieran Sammon gives us the lowdown on his niche business starting to make waves in the surf accessories market. What was the thinking behind launching the company? After a session I simply wanted to rinse and dry my wetsuit and accessories as efficiently and quickly as possible. I came up with the idea for the XRail in 2014 and built a prototype in my shed. I knew it was a practical and useful invention but had never developed a product from scratch. The Exit business was created then with a vision of creating products to help the user look after their wetsuit and accessories better than anything else on the market.
40
Tell us about your launch product XRail and its design process. From the early days of making a prototype in my shed, it took three years and a few wrong turns along the way to find the right designer to work with on the product. Eventually a Dutch designer, Rudo Enserink, came on board and his process involved using 3D printing to refine the design to what you see now, the side view of the XRail is intentionally shaped like a surfboard, the hex structure has three functions (i) to keep the XRails weight to a minimum but maintaining strength; (ii) to reduce the amount of material in the
product; and (iii) to allow air to circulate around as many surfaces of the wetsuit as possible, which no other wetsuit hanger can do. Tell us about the materials you use and what are you as a company doing to be more eco-friendly. Our aim is to use recycled materials in as many of our products as possible. Where we can’t use recycled materials in a product, we will only go ahead with that product if we see it fulfils a purpose, serves a need in the market and ultimately indirectly reduces waste by lengthening the use and life
