Who Started The Ryde and Why?
The Ryde was imagined and conceived by Mike Figueroa and Matthew Allen. Mike and Matt met the last day of design class at Saddleback Junior College circa 2000. Mike asked Matt to help him with some design projects that had been floating around in his head. They brainstormed logo designs for the short lived Surf Shops International website. Then Matt headed off to college in San Luis Obispo. Later in 2001, Mike came calling again and they began to work on Laguna Surf Company. Mike pitched Matt with the idea to create artwork of Laguna Beach surf spots. They soon realized that 12 color t-shirt designs were ridiculously expensive to produce. Their focus shifted to one color line art. As Laguna Surf Company found its niche, the two friends decided to expand their horizons beyond Laguna Beach and they changed the name of their company to The Ride. When they sought to trademark their name, they were encouraged to change the spelling to its current incarnation. The Ryde was officially in busi
