About Us
HOW IT ALL BEGAN...
Every story can be told in many ways, in various versions and from different perspectives. Many of them have an origin that only few know, but it still gives meaning to all the other versions. This is our story, and it all began long before we were born. Our real story began in another story, that of a boy named Bernardo Neto.
FROM ICE CREAM TO SURFBOARDS…
Benardo moved to the city of Fortaleza, Brazil as a child with his mother, father and five other siblings. As a teenager, Bernardo studied at night and worked in the morning with his brother Rubens, in an ice cream store near the Beira Mar de Fortaleza. He met many surfers there and was intrigued by the sport. With his first paycheck, he bought a Styrofoam surfboard, which broke in half on its first day in the water.
Using his observations from repairs made on his father’s automobiles, Bernardo used plastic resin and automotive mass to mend his broken board.
The result, though not perfect, was the start of everything.
One day Bernardo was surfing with a new board made of fiberglass and polyurethane at the Metallic Bridge in Fortaleza. As he jumped from the bridge to the water, his new board was damaged.
Bernardo fixed his damaged board this time using fiberglass. His skill only got better. He began repairing his friends’ boards and eventually started a small surfboard repairing business. When he finished high school, Bernardo left his job at the ice cream parlor and dedicated himself to his new surf business.
In the early 1980’s Australian four-time surfing champion Mark Richards launched a new model of board. A board that no longer utilized the single fin, but a tri fin design. This challenged Bernardo to stretch his thinking cap and design a tri fin board in Brazil too. With his first creation he signed the tri fin board with his nickname, PENA, a name which means FEATHER in Portuguese. This was our beginning. The beginning of transforming a nickname into a brand.