If there's any group that understands the importance of timing and catching the perfect swell, it's surfers. Surfing has evolved from a sport into a lifestyle, deeply intertwined with personal identity and a sense of community.
Surf Junkie Club (SJC) has a simple vision:
To achieve this, SJC has built a unique space to engage, connect, and serve the global community of surfers. By utilizing Kazm, it has integrated community-led growth strategies and experiences into its website, becoming a catalyst for passionate participation.
In collaboration with many of the biggest names in the sport since Day One, SJC has partnered with dozens of superstar surfers such as Jesse Mendes, Tatiana Weston Web, Luana Silva, Suelen Naraísa, Willian Cardoso, Ryan Kainalo, Everaldo Pato Teixeira, Bela Nalu, Michelle de Bouillons, Bruninho Santos, Chris Cote, and Rachel Apollonio, as well as legendary Donavan Frankenreither, Alemã de Maresias, Fábio Gouveia, and Carlos Burle. And it has already reeled in some massive brand partnerships, including Corona, Ford, Garmin, Pyzel, Evoke, Macaronis Resort, RK Training, and Surfmappers.
“A CLUB CREATED TO SERVE THE SURF COMMUNITY WITH THE MOST EXCLUSIVE PRODUCTS AND THE DOPEST EXPERIENCES.”
SJC’s vision first came to life through a successful collaboration with world-renowned designer Marcello Serpa, resulting in a 3000+ NFT sellout in just three days, a significant milestone in their journey.
With an audience and community of surfers, SJC required a solution that accommodated a less tech-savvy membership, allowing them to easily log in, participate, and contribute without Web3 expertise. Simultaneously, SJC needed a flexible, future-proof toolkit, capable of scaling with technological advancements, meeting surfers' changing needs, and establishing a sustainable global hub for the surfing community.
SJC navigated these waters by building a model for community-led growth and advocacy. This model operates across popular channels, offering meaningful rewards for engaging in fun and familiar actions.
With Kazm’s seamless, embeddable platform, SJC incentivizes its members in several ways. Members are encouraged to post to their social handles, engage with challenges, participate in weekly content quests, and help cultivate a connected culture within the community. In return for their engagement, members earn points that unlock additional benefits. Furthermore, by submitting ideas or attending the club's official meetings, members gain Junkie Points. This allows them to directly influence the club's direction and reap tangible rewards from their involvement.
"WE CREATED A MODEL IN WHICH MEMBERS HOLD INFLUENCE OVER THE CLUB'S NEXT STEPS AND EARN REWARDS AS THE BRAND GROWS"
With Kazm, SJC incentivizes members to generate high-quality, authentic content that drives massive engagement and global awareness for the brand, particularly through activities involving social mentions, tagging, and image-sharing. Instagram has become the primary platform for SJC members, acting as an essential channel for viral growth and promotion. This platform is also where SJC’s most innovative UGC concept, the Barrel Shot Challenge, came to life.
This unique and engaging IRL+ social media challenge has produced some of the brand's most awe-inspiring user content to date. Remarkably, it was launched within minutes without a single line of code, thanks to Kazm’s image upload feature.
“The Barrel Shot Challenge was a simple way for our members to log in and show us that they have a photo riding a barrel, thereby earning some points," Surf Junkie Club founder Felipe Baracchini said. “The Challenge's imagery and advocacy are self-explanatory. We have set up numerous quests to better understand our members' preferences and needs. We plan to fully utilize everything Kazm has to offer to both challenge and reward our members.”
To drive engagement and long-term commitment, SJC offers exclusive perks and extraordinary prizes for earned points. These rewards range from festival tickets to surfing expeditions in exotic locations like Indonesia, Maldives, Central America and Europe, as well as the first official apparel line featuring high-quality gear.
SJC is already charging into the next phase of its program. Kazm makes it easy for partners to collect and incentivize member feedback, identify which quests resonate with users, and crowdsource suggestions. Armed with member feedback and key learnings from the past year, SJC is enhancing the community experience. This enhancement includes introducing new interactive challenges, refining the structure of points and levels, and ensuring that both the club and its members consistently avoid any lulls in the action.
"Early on in our venture, we partnered with Kazm to explore, learn, and enhance our members' community experience," Baracchini said. " Fortunately, our community has often highlighted the platform's ease of use and simplicity."
With that feedback and insights to guide a more optimized member experience, SJC has recently launched an exciting contest. This month, the member who accumulates the most points by completing various challenges will win a surf trip to Mexico. As members increasingly engage by sharing, posting, participating in quizzes, and promoting the club, their influence within the surfing community grows, and so does the community itself.
Lifestyle brands of the future will thrive thanks to their passionate communities, which will, in turn, benefit from the brand's growth.
Surf Junkie's aim is to become the most influential surf brand worldwide. This community-led strategy employs new technology to navigate the future. As the first surf brand to start as a club, they've established a model where members influence the brand's direction, contribute to its success, enjoy exclusive benefits, and earn rewards.
Kazm will facilitate SJC's growth by empowering the devotion and advocacy of its members.
The swell is coming.
