Founded in 2016, Mango Surfing has grown from a passion for surf culture into a thriving network of three stores across the South West: Cornwall, Devon, and now Dorset. Our Cornwall store specialises in clothing and accessories, stocking premium brands including Vans, Deus, and Volcom, as well as one of the largest YETI collections in the South West. The Devon store is our dedicated surfboard warehouse, offering boards from top brands including Firewire, Fourth, Love Machine, and Mick Fanning Softboards. Our newest location, Mango Dorset, is a specialist longboard showroom, showcasing boards from brands such as Thunderbolt, Flying Diamonds, and MF Softboards, catering to both longboard enthusiasts and beginners. As well as our product offering, Mango Dorset also offer a board repair service. Beyond our stores, our online shop makes it easy to access the Mango Surfing experience from anywhere, offering free delivery on orders over £40, Klarna payment options, and same-day dispatch for eligible orders. Whether in-store or online, Mango Surfing is dedicated to bringing the best in surfboards, clothing, and surf lifestyle essentials to the South West and beyond.

As an Independent we keep prices low and customer service high, so whatever it is you’re looking for, we’ll help you choose the right thing.

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So where did Mango Surfing come from? My whole career has been in the surf industry. Firstly in a surf shop for my work experience whilst at school, which in turn led to a permanent position at “Just Add Water” and the first Animal store. These were in Bournemouth where I grew up, surfing in a tight knit and eclectic surfing community. Whilst studying at Plymouth University I met my business partners Sami and Pablo. Two people who undoubtedly changed the course of my life for the better. Sami a well travelled surfer from Dubai and Pablo a pro bodyborder on the world tour. We qualified as lifeguards and surf instructors, and worked throughout uni as surf coaches. We helped run the Plymouth Uni Surf Club and in our final years of university we set up a surf camp in France called Star Surf Camps which still runs to this day. The surf camp business was booming at the time and Star Surf Camps grew to be the UKs largest surf holiday company. With camps in France, Spain (mainland and Canary Islands), Morocco and Bali. All we wanted to do was surf, and we were fortunate to do so whilst sharing the experience with people from all over the world. We built a business on introducing people to surfing, sharing our love for what we do. I always said one day I would settle back in the U.K. to raise a family and open a surf shop and when I met Liz who I am so proud to call my wife, we took the step to move to the U.K. to do exactly that.

Star had grown and needed an office for its full time team, and we saw the opportunity to open our shop and have an office all in one place. Having studied in Plymouth it made perfect sense to return to where it all started with Star to start the next chapter. At this time I was an avid surfer but even more so an avid board collector. My collection of vintage surfboards included over 100 boards mostly focused on overseas 70s boards. The best of which are still on display in our stores. In addition to this the collection has grown to include world title boards from some champs over the years also all available to view in our stores. 

No one starts a surf shop to sell t shirts. My obsession with surfboards was the driving force to opening our Plymouth store, located underneath the money centre opposite the university. In a tiny space we crammed as many boards as we could from some of the worlds best shapers in the game. A little naively I ordered most to suit my personal taste (and dimensions) and for a while we focussed on performance shortboards. We soon realised that for the U.K. these are not the best option for most surfers. Think of it like an F1 car. You don’t learn to drive, or parrelell park in an F1 car. Nor would you take it out on a country road. In the U.K. our waves more often then not ask for more user friendly fun boards. And with my background teaching surfing I soon realised I much preferred helping people get started in their surfing journey and help them progress through this journey on the right equipment, so we slowly started to shift our focus towards catering for a much wider selection of U.K. surfers. 

The Plymouth shop was great fun, and people like our first manager (Ross) really set Mango Surfing off in the right direction. Ross epitomised everything we strive to be still to this day. Honest, hard working, customer focussed, friendly and without the ego. As the money centre was coming up for sale, and the store got broken into a few times we started to look further afield for a bigger and better store. We took a massive leap of faith with the Cornwall services store. Signing up for a very expensive and long lease but we truly believed we were on to something special. We built the store up from an empty unit into a two floor emporium of clothing and hardware, the perfect mix I only feel was achieved correctly by the original Just Add Water store on commercial road in Bournemouth. For a while things were great, I was able to be in store as my full time role and we got things right to the point where we wanted them. Unfortunately for Plymouth our focus had to be on this store due to the huge overheads and risk. So Plymouth closed whilst we built our new selves in Cornwall. 


Then Covid……ooooooooh covid. We built a huge retail store off the back of a very successful holiday company. Retail and travel, I can’t think of two industries much worse to be in during this time. But we had a small amount of luck as a few months pre covid we recruited to build our online sales/website. This got us through a very difficult time but we weren’t unscathed. Star now only operates in its few key locations and Mango had a lot of work to get back on its feet. We lost one business partner and I put myself in store full time. At the time I was living 1.5 hours away and my wife was pregnant at home. We bought the old Hymer RV you see in the Plymouth warehouse so when Liz had Max, our baby boy, she could be with me in Cornwall, whilst together we got the store back on its feet. At 5 days old Max was in a harness on the shop floor with his supermum serving customers and putting all the attention into the store that she reminds me often that I don’t have. But it’s not just Liz, anyone who knows our business really knows Kirsty and Justine really are the glue that brings it all together, without either of these two we would have no business at all. I know they don’t like me putting things like this out there in public but I couldn’t write this without mentioning them. Thank you both.

So, Cornwall services. Our main flagship store. Post Covid it was no longer sustainable for me to be there away from the family, and with increasing rents the store turned more and more into a fashion store. There is nothing wrong with surf shops selling clothing, in fact you make more selling 7 tee shirts than one board, which is why most shops have to offer both. But the balance in Cornwall went to far for my personal taste. We became a clothes store not a surf shop, and I know only one way to solve a problem and that by giving Kirsty and the team a much bigger one….we are opening another store, and it’s all going to be surfboards!

Welcome to our Plymouth warehouse, a two storey massive showroom housing close to 1000 surfboards from some of the best brands in the business. We have exclusivity on those we import ourselves into the U.K. such as MF softboards (the best in the game), McCoy, Aloha and Elemnt and we work closely with some of the best U.K. shapers including Cord, Skindog and Colab. With such a huge hardware offering we have got the balance right again. A fashion store and a hardware store. And for hardware you get the same experience as our first Plymouth store. I couldn’t be prouder of what we have achieved here. 

Theres been huge hurdles between covid and opening Plymouth for us as a business. Most of these I’ve been very open about. One perhaps not so much is how through all of that I lost my love for surfing. Keeping the business moving forward, having our second child and almost losing everything more times than I can recall. Surfing seemed indulgent and selfish. I started to surf less and less whilst simultaneously drinking more and more. As my fitness dropped, so did my wave count. The dawnies became less frequent and the Stoke faded away. Something I had focused my whole life on, built my friendship groups through, based my identity upon now lost its connection to me. But through a lot of support from team and family came a breath of fresh air. The younger surfer in me shuddered, but I got a longboard.

The first step in addressing a problem is recognising you have one. And I had one. I was now a longboarder. So with the usual impulsiveness we needed to shift gear and add longboarding to our offering. As fate would have it one of my good old friends from Bournemouth was looking for a partner in his longboarding endeavours. Andy runs the amazing Log Jam event, the duct tape invitational of the U.K. scene. He also has a ding repair workshop, a few longboard specific brands and a small unit he was working from. We have taken all of these including Andy under our wing to open our Bournemouth longboard store and repair shop. Whilst moving forward with our own brands and events. 

It’s been one hell of a journey so far. One that’s given me everything and that I am very grateful for. As a business we still have a lot of changes and plans for the next 12 months but watch this space for the next reinvention of Mango Surfing. Thank you all for being part of it. 

Joe