Mark Gobble / president

Gobble hails from Florida and was fortunate to have the legendary Kona skatepark in Jacksonville as his training ground. Deaf since birth, Gobble likes to think that his enhanced vision lets him see all the possibilities when on his board. It’s not always about landing the best trick, but also finding the flow between all the lines, angles, and intersections.

Gobble is married to Leslie and a father to two wonderful kids: Trent and Shanna. In fact, his children are precisely how MARK Skateboards came to be. While Gobble has skated since he was 12 years old, and is deeply steeped in board culture, it wasn’t until his son Trent took up skating that he began to seriously think about starting a new skateboard company. Unfortunately, his daughter Shanna is more interested in princesses than boards right now, but there's always hope.

Gobble could not contain his disillusionment with how skateboard decks were currently being produced, dismayed with how designs and graphics are nothing but an afterthought on the majority of skateboard decks. They often recycle the same art but change colors from deck to deck, and many of them have not outgrown the adolescent humor stage. Gobble believes that every deck should be carefully planned, designed, and well thought out. Even aesthetics have been largely ignored. As an ASL (American Sign Language) user, Gobble appreciates the idea of communicating a message visually, through design. He also is bothered with how widespread and common outsourcing is in manufacturing decks in countries outside the United States where labor laws may be non-existent or not fully regulated and respected.

Gobble has met and interacted with people, deaf or not, in China, Europe, Caribbean Islands, the streets of Yucatan peninsula, the wilderness of Canada, and remote Sherpa villages in the Himalayas.  After every stop, the role and importance of education and community in social justice was continually reinforced.  Gobble is currently working toward a PhD at the University of Texas at Austin in educational psychology, and is interested in cognitive research in deaf learners and the intersection between multimodalities, technology, and learning. Prior to that, he was a teacher and a principal at Texas School for the Deaf in Austin. He is also the co-organizer of the annual TEDxIslay, an extremely popular event where progressive and passionate thinkers and doers are united to revolutionize the deaf community.

Marc English / creative director

English skateboarded for the first and last time at the age of nine, on some insanely heavy aluminum skateboard, with concrete wheels. At least that's how he recollects it. Since giving up skateboarding, he has snowshoed solo over the Continental Divide, kayaked the Pecos River, ridden camels in the Sahara, motorcycled the backroads of the U.S. and Mexico, white-knuckled through the Alps without a seat belt (why bother, when going over the edge means certain death?), been chased at night through a jungle in Mexico, lost a small chunk of leg on the North Shore of Oahu, and had his truck stuck in the gumbo mud of Louisiana, along the Mississippi. All that, after playing in post-punk bands back in Boston, "back in the day."

English studied at Berklee College of Music and Massachusetts College of Art, before opening his eponymous studio in 1993. Marc English Design has work in collections in the U.S., Mexico, and Germany, and has won awards in any number of categories on the local, regional, and national level for more than 25 years. He has also served as juror on the local, regional, and national level, served on the board of directors for AIGA. Having served as president of AIGA/Boston, founded and served as president of AIGA/Austin, English founded the acclaimed national design retreat, Design Ranch, in 1999. The 20th anniversary issue of HOW magazine voted English one of "twenty designers we'd like to have a beer with" and Step Inside Design magazine called him the "Johnny Cash of AIGA." Whatever that means.

The author of Designing Identity: Graphic Design as a Business Strategy, English frequently lectures around the country and beyond, and has been an educator for more than 20 years, teaching at both the graduate and undergraduate levels, in the United States and Mexico. He has a daughter, Rebecka, whom he loves very much. When not involved with teaching, design or being on the road, he can often be found in his hammock, reading, in Driftwood, Texas. His studio's work can be seen at marcenglishdesign.com

Jesse Reed

Jesse grew up in Houston where he discovered skating at age 11. In 1998, Jesse moved to California in search of an elusive dream: to skate some of the world’s most interesting terrain. Not one to be content with the California fantasy, he moved to Minneapolis. Minneapolis is a great place, but it does have its drawbacks (it’s COLD there, after all), and Jesse decided to move to Austin, Texas, a warm place offering up even more interesting terrain.

Along the way, Jesse has picked up sponsorships with many different companies, and has skated in a professional contest in Prague. Jesse has been featured in Progression Video \#1, as well as several other video shorts, as well as being featured in ads in Thrasher and Transworld Skateboard magazines. Jesse’s fluid skating style has been imprinted on the noted photographer Aaron Chang’s T-shirt line. He also enjoys spreading the love of skateboarding to others and has taught skateboarding at Air Force bases nationwide in addition to private lessons. When not on a deck, Jesse can be found running (he's run six marathons), playing guitar, being outdoors, helping others, and of course, traveling. A registered nurse, Jesse enjoys and values his time with his wife and his dogs.

Zach Koss

For Zach it all began on a driveway in rural Wisconsin in the mid 90's – the days of cargo pants, chain wallets, and Welcome to Hell. Once he learned kickflips, Zach was hooked. After moving to the "city" to study graphic design and art, Zach was sponsored by a local shop, Underloud and also helped start a small board company called Kronz. Zach has taught at skateboarding camps throughout the U.S. Prior to these trips, Zach had only experienced travel from ground-level, having never been on an airplane. Or seen the ocean. Currently, Zach has skated in nearly every state (including Alaska) and met some of his best friends through skateboarding, acknowledging that skateboarding has opened a lot of doors for him.

Zach has always been a fan of clean lines, and knows that single tricks are fun, but finding the flow and hitting trick after trick is what it's all about. He likes to lose himself in manuals and mini-ramps.

These days Zach lives in the Twin Cities with his wife. He builds and edits websites for a university during the day, and moonlights as a freelance art director and illustrator. The majority of Zach’s clients are bands and local businesses. With plans on getting a MFA and pursuing teaching opportunities in the Midwest, when Zach’s not designing or skating, he likes to read esoteric texts, play guitar, ride bikes, meditate, make beer, build community, and attempt to train his cats.

Max Kazemzadeh

Max grew up in Duncanville, Texas, skating streets and parks in Dallas, Houston, and Austin. The Duncanville crew was pretty strong back then, including Clay Keys and PJ Thebeau, both now co-owners of The Shop in Oak Cliff, Ronny “Ripper” Malippa of Texas Poolsharks, and more. Early on Max was inspired by locals like Jeff Phillips, the Godoy bros, and John Gibson. While he skated mini and vert, his focus was on street skating. In college he skated with Josh Kalis, Richard Angelides, and a bunch of other Texas guys. One summer, he lived in Santa Cruz and skated with pros Ron Whaley and Brian Childers while working at Skateworks (owned by Justin Streubing’s parents). While in Cali, Max frequented the famed Pier 7 in San Francisco.

In 1997, Max moved to NYC where he lived for eight years. In NYC, he became friends with and skated with several legends (Brian Wenning, Chris Markovich, Danny Supa, and the late Harold Hunter), and ran with some of the Zoo York crew.

While in NYC, Max travelled to Tokyo to install an interactive kiosk he and his company designed for Prada. Skaters Alex Lee Chang and Toru, living in Tokyo, invited Max to skate in a pro demo for Rookie Japan in Rapongi, Japan. Max ended up signing autographs to hordes of screaming Japanese girls, which he of course found hilarious.

Max is currently in DC where he has skated with a bunch of locals, ams, as well as Brian Tucci and Bobby Worrest. Because the famed Freedom Plaza is now a huge bust, Max has been hitting up the new “Shaw” concrete park almost everyday in Downtown DC and city spots like Courthouse.

On his trips back home, Max has skated most of the new parks popping up all over Texas, but prefers the downtown Dallas, Los Colinas, and Houston street spots.

Max is also an electronic and emergent media artist engineer and an Assistant Professor at Gallaudet University. His recent work focuses on how constructed, semi-conscious interfaces influence human interaction. Max is currently investigating how our unseen connections to the physical world through consciousness might be visible, and is incorporating skateboarding in a case study. He has worked in the field of visual and interaction design, and some of his clients include: Nike, Nike Goddess, AOL Time Warner, Sex in the City, IBM, Sprint, Estee Lauder, Rhode Island School of Design, New York Institute of Technology and more. Max is currently pursuing a PhD with the Planetary Collegium at the University of Plymouth in England.

Colin Ruloff

Colin is a long-time surfer and skater from Vancouver, BC, Canada. He’s competed at the national and international level in skateboarding, and still loves to blast big backside airs, stall inverts, and slap madonnas on those rare days when his aging body allows him to do so. He lives a few minutes from the famous Hastings skatepark, and can often be found sessioning there with his good friends John R, Jesse O, Howard R, and the rest of the crew when there’s a break in the seemingly endless Vancouver rain. In addition to having been featured in Transworld, Thrasher, and (most recently) Outside Magazine, Colin has been fortunate to have had the support of Powell, Tracker Trucks, Momentum, and Manual Skateboards throughout his years as a competitive skater. He’s grateful to them all.

In addition to skating, Colin has an enduring love for the ocean, having lived for a time in Tofino, BC where he was able to surf daily, form new friendships, and explore the rugged fog-drenched Canadian Pacific Northwest for that perfect A-frame, throaty barrel, or right-hand pointbreak. Colin is also an avid fly-fisher who enjoys targeting salmon, trout, and char in local waters.

Outside of surfing and skateboarding, Colin holds a PhD in philosophy from The Claremont Graduate School, and is currently a full-time member of the philosophy department at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. He also teaches courses in the philosophy department at Simon Fraser University. Colin’s research interests range over a variety of topics within epistemology, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of religion. He has a truly extraordinary wife, Gabrielle, and a six-year-old daughter, Elsa, who would one day like to play in the NHL alongside Daniel and Henrik Sedin of the Vancouver Canucks.