Surfing Brings in $194M Annually for Santa Cruz Economy

I want you to imagine — for a moment — walking down the West Cliff in Santa Cruz at dawn.

The sky is pale pink. The sea is calm, but off in the distance you see a line of waves forming. Surfers are waxing their boards, wetsuits on, arms stretched and ready to paddle out. And somewhere, in that space between the water and the shore, is where culture, money, identity, and climate all converge.

Because as of September 2025, a new study from Save The Waves makes a startling claim: surfing is doing more than making us feel alive. It’s making Santa Cruz money — a lot of it. The report, Climate Vulnerability of California’s Natural Surfing Capital, led by Save The Waves in partnership with Integral Consulting and Black Surf Santa Cruz, finds that surfing generates $194.7 million annually in the Santa Cruz economy, with 783,000 surf visits per year.

Let that sink in. That isn’t just the tourist who drives down from the Central Valley to stand in the lineup for a few waves — it’s the gear shop down the street, the board repair guy, the café that fuels the early morning crew, the coffee shops and surfshops where wave count is strategically discussed. The report breaks it down: about $44.5 million comes from surf trips by visitors; about $150.2 million comes from local spending on boards, wetsuits, services, lessons, and the infrastructure of surf life.

But this isn’t just a brag sheet for surfers. The study also issues a warning. Sea level rise poses a direct threat to surf breaks. All 31 breaks studied are projected to suffer a loss of “surfability” with just one foot of sea rise; by three feet, more than half could be significantly degraded or gone — if nothing is done.

You might hear a voice in your head, thinking: “So what? That’s a future problem. Let adaptation take care of itself.” But that dismisses decades of work — of people and organizations who treat waves not as passive backdrops but as living infrastructure. This is where the legacy of surf stewardship comes in.

In recent years, new ventures and organizations have sprung up in Santa Cruz that aren’t just riding waves — they’re defending them, evolving them, making them sustainable. Companies like SwellCycle (which brings cycling and surf lifestyle into sustainable mobility), Treeswax (which offers eco-friendly surf wax alternatives), and nonprofits like Save the Waves and Save Our Shores are building bridges between surf culture and conservation. They’re taking the social and economic data from reports like this one, combining it with grassroots activism, and saying: “This matters. We have to act.”

That’s the quiet work behind the scenes — the meetings with city planners, the beach cleanups, the ballots, the reef restoration conversations. The waves you paddle tomorrow are shaped by them.

Because here’s what this new study confirms: a wave is not just water over submerged rock or reef. It’s value — to the individual surfer, to the small business, to the local economy, and to the identity of Santa Cruz. And if we lose these waves, we don’t just lose surf breaks. We lose a piece of ourselves.