Big anniversary at the Austrian company Blue Tomato (blue-tomato.com): this year, the international boardsports and lifestyle specialist is celebrating its 30th birthday. In 1988, former European snowboard champion Gerfried Schuller founded the company, literally setting up his shop in a garage in Schladming, Austria. Today, Blue Tomato employs 560 people and, with more than 450,000 products, is one of the world's largest omnichannel retailers in the snowboard, freeski, touring, skate and surf sector.

Already 30 years ago, Schuller was a revolutionary of his time. With the establishment of the Blue Tomato Snowboard School, the foundation stone of a true success story was placed. The many snowboarders in the region literally came running to his first store. With the ever-growing snowboard scene, which Blue Tomato continues to support to this day, and the resulting increase in demand, it was only a matter of time until Schuller opened his first 'real' shop in the centre of Schladming in 1994. 

The worldwide web opened up the worldwide market in one fell swoop

"They were exciting times and I was lucky to be able to live my passions -snowboarding and surfing - through my business and share them with many friends, colleagues and customers", Schuller reflects. In addition to opening other stores, the Styrian local soon extended his marketplace to the World Wide Web. "The first homepage went online in 1997 and the first webshop followed two years later", remembers Schuller. "At once it opened up the global market and sales quickly grew. Today the site receives over 100,000 visitors a day - and swiftly rising." 

Further expansion of both the online shop and stationary shops is in the pipeline. 

Today, Blue Tomato offers more than 450,000 products from over 650 brands, the webshop is available in 14 languages and the company delivers to more than 50 countries worldwide. Orders can be made by, among other methods, smartphone, live chat or directly in store, should the product not be in stock. After years of expanding its online presence, Blue Tomato has been successfully expanding its 'physical' shops for a while too. Over the past 30 years, a total of 35 shops have been opened in Austria, Germany and Switzerland, and more stores are expected to follow this year.

At the beginning of 2017, founder Gerfried Schuller handed over management of the company to new CEO Adam Ellis. Until the takeover, Ellis worked at Zumiez, the US parent company of Blue Tomato (since 2012). "Blue Tomato is full of incredible people, has a first-class technical infrastructure and an extensive product palette with big names and trendy new labels. We have been doing our best to exceed the expectations of our customers for 30 years. We want to continue growing on this basis," says Ellis. 

For the Anniversary: special events and great offers

That means it’s time to start partying the whole year round - and, as usual, Blue Tomato is going for it full on, together with its employees, partners and customers. For the latter, the year 2018 offers some surprises, from special offers to special collaborations with big brands, as well as some great events that promise lots of action, good humour and, of course, confetti.

Current updates on the anniversary celebrations and all the planned highlights are available online at blue-tomato.com/30years