Early Beginnings
Braille Skateboarding was founded in 2007 by sponsored skateboard Aaron Kyro.
At the time, Aaron had just moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to pursue his dream of becoming a professional skateboarder. He soon realized just how difficult of a career path this would be. He saw friends of his and people in the industry working really hard to make awesome skateboard videos and then having a hard time marketing and selling the videos through local shops and on the internet. He wanted to create a way for them to be able to sell an unlimited amount of videos without having to deal with expensive DVD reproduction and ground mail distribution. He launched brailleskateboarding.com and started offering some of the first ever Skateboard digital video downloads for iPods, computers, and early mobile devices.
This was the original purpose and mission statement of brailleskateboarding.com - to help skaters share their skating with the world in a new digital age.
After being unexpectedly dropped by his board sponsor - Aaron took the skateboarding video part footage he had spent years working on and uploaded it to a little known site at that time, Youtube.
His skating footage shockingly got 50,000 views in the first week. This was unheard of at the time. It then got picked up by a popular skate magazine and was propelled to 350,000 views. This was the spark. Aaron then kept uploading to Youtube as a way of pursing his passion of skateboarding. After years of doing this, Aaron decided to use his knowledge of skateboarding to create something bigger than just himself. He decided to dedicate his Youtube channel to teaching others how to skateboard. Braille Skateboarding then became more than just a YouTube channel, it became a community and a mission.
"Our purpose is to push skateboarding into the world's largest sport by teaching, motivating and inspiring."
How we Bring our Mission to Life
The Braille Youtube channel
With over 6,000 videos, and 5.7 million subscribers, the Braille YouTube channel is one of the largest in skateboarding. From tutorials and skate sessions to wild viral videos like skating a glass skateboard, our content inspires people around the world to pick up a skateboard—no matter who they are.
Skateboard tutorials
Created Aaron Kyro, Skateboarding Made Simple is the most structured and proven tutorial series for learning how to skate — taking a brand new skater from beginner to being able to land the advanced skateboarding tricks. With more than 25 years of experience skateboarding, Aaron saw the problems skaters ran into and the exact points where skaters would give up in trying to progress. Skateboarding Made Simple Volume One covers the basics of riding, pushing, turning and gradiently teaches one all of the basic skateboarding tricks such as the ollie, the kickflip, and more. Each volume of Skateboarding Made Simple covers increasingly difficult tricks. The latest addition to the Skateboarding Made Simple series was Skateboarding Made Simple Volume 0, available for free as an undercut to Volume 1 to create a seamless transition for beginners from their first time stepping on a skateboard to mastering essential skills like ollies. All Skateboarding Made Simple Volumes are available as an instant digital download right here at brailleskateboarding.com.
Braille Skateboarding Academy
The 15+ years of teaching skateboarding revealed consistent challenges skaters faced. Aaron developed a step-by-step progression system and launched the Braille Skateboarding Academy—a comprehensive online school offering personal coaching, feedback, and a full roadmap from beginner to advanced so skaters would never get stuck in their skateboarding progression again. Check it out here.
Skate Supports
In order to achieve our mission of the teaching the world how to skateboard, Aaron Kyro created “Skate Supports”. This is where any skater anywhere in the world can send in a clip of them skating or trying to land a specific trick, and Aaron will review the video and give voiceover instructions on what to tweak to help them land it! This video then gets posted on our social media to help other skaters who may be running into the same exact thing in landing that trick themselves. Find out more about Skate Supports here!
The First Try Foundation
We created The First Try Foundation as a resource for people everywhere to get a skateboard, no matter their ability to pay. We want to give back to the skateboarding community, and when more people are skateboarding, everyone in the industry wins. We do this through collecting donations of new or used skateboarding equipment, donating new skateboarding gear, helping get new skateparks built and hosting events to spread the love of skateboarding. Find out more about the First Try Foundation here!
The Braille Skate Shop
As our Youtube channel grew, so did our community. In 2011, we released our first Braille Skateboarding merch - consisting of a plain white shirt and a plain grey shirt with the words brailleskateboarding.com written across it—and from there it took off. We gradually added more and more products, culminating in the release of our very own Braille skateboards in April 2020. Today, BrailleSkateboarding.com is a full online skate shop built to help beginners and seasoned skaters alike. In our shop you’ll find our best-selling Best Beginner Complete Skateboard, Skateboarding Made Simple tutorials, skate accessories, you name it.
We have a skater-run shop in Newberg, Oregon that ships within 24 business hours, worldwide.
Why “Braille”?
Braille is a play on words from the phrase “I’m feeling it”— something skaters might say when they’re skating well and “in the zone”. In other words, they’re enjoying the incredible freedom that skating brings. That’s the spirit behind everything we do.
Join the Braille Army
We believe skateboarding is for everyone. The Braille Army is a global community of skaters who share that belief. No matter your background, age, gender, or experience—you’re welcome here and you’re welcome in skateboarding.
Need help? Want to share your story? We’d love to hear from you. Reach out to us at contact@brailleskateboarding.com |
