Skateboarder keeps a half-pipe in his office

Brendan Rohan built his first half-pipe in his backyard when he was 13. Today, he has one in his office. Once a skateboarder, always a skateboarder, and Rohan has carved a living out of the passion with custom skate ramp kits he builds south on U.S. 2 south of Highway 40.

Rohan started the business in 1998, making skate ramp paper templates in his one-bedroom apartment. When someone ordered a template, he’d have to get out the equipment, print it out on his large-format printer and then put everything away again. The big paper sheets took up half the apartment.

Today, he works in a spacious warehouse, using a computer numerical controlled machine that precisely cuts out half-pipe and other ramp parts. A buyer simply has to purchase some lumber and follow the directions to put together a custom ramp for their home or community.

As Rohan’s Web site says, “Unpack it. Build it. Skate it.”

Kits range from 6 feet to 24 feet wide and start as low as $480 for a quarter-pipe to $9,000 for a 24-foot wide, 41-foot long model. The kits include Skatelite surfacing, an ultra durable product made to withstand the constant pounding of a skateboard’s wheels.

Rohan grew up in Massachusetts, attended college in northern Vermont and then landed an internship at Big Mountain Resort’s events department, helping start the ski area’s first terrain park.

Save for a few part-time employees, Rohan is a one-man gang. He’s shipped his kits across the country and the world — a customer in New Zealand recently bought a kit.

Rohan stresses the quality of his product.

“People today want to do this once and want to do it right,” he said.

He’s also expanded his operation. He now builds custom cribbage boards, picture frames and other gift items in the shape of Montana that he sells locally and regionally.

He even builds his own shipping pallets, using scrap wood from Western Building Center’s truss plant in Columbia Falls. He buys his steel locally from Pacific Steel and Recycling in Kalispell.

“They’ve both been a great help over the years,” he said.

Rohan also rented part of his shop to Devon Kelley, who makes everything from bird houses to earrings from recycled skateboards.

For more information, visit online at www.skateramps.us.