Skateboarders of all ages looking to land their first ollie have a new place to learn the fundamentals of the sport. Workshop Skateboard Club, located at 124 Sydney St. S. in Kitchener, is the region’s first private indoor skate park. It opened in November 2024 and offers group and private lessons, camps and party rentals.
Josh Fine, owner of Workshop Skateboard Club, has taught skateboarding for 14 years. Originally from Toronto, Fine and his family moved to Kitchener in 2022, and he continued teaching in Kitchener, Cambridge and Guelph.
He is also the co-founder of the not-for-profit organization Waterloo-Wellington Skateboard (WWSB), which advocates for the skateboarding communities in Guelph and Waterloo Region.
The idea for the Workshop Skateboard Club began while fine worked at the City of Kitchener with its mobile skatepark, the Skatium. The program initially brought the park to neighbourhoods throughout the city but did not have staff instructors.
“It’s a great program, but they never had an instructor. When I started working there, I taught them how not to die on a skateboard and showed them some things they could do on their boards,” Fine said.
Fine said finding places to teach and skate during winter was always challenging. He asked his supervisor, Nathan Moore, what happened to the equipment during the winter and if there were potential uses for it.
“If we could find a place to put it, it would be a popular program. That’s when I connected with Dan Maloney and Ariel Stagni to launch WWSB. We started a petition for an indoor skatepark and got over 200 signatures,” he said.
Moore liked the idea, but the indoor park’s location remained a question. Fine had heard the ice had been removed from Queensmount Arena, so he and WWSB decided to rent the space and insurance to host the indoor park themselves.
“Once we had laid all that groundwork, Nathan said it was great and offered to take it to his supervisor who said it was great, and helped secure funding to make it happen,” Fine said.
The Queensmount Arena skatepark operates three days a week and is free to the public. Fine said they have between 30 and 60 skaters out on an average night and include people of all age ranges and experience levels.
While the Queensmount Arena skatepark has been a success, Fine saw an opportunity to build an indoor skatepark business that would complement the public park. Multiple private indoor skateparks have closed over the last few years, including The Ward Skatepark in Guelph in 2020.
Fine looked at what worked and did not work to help refine his business plan. He said he changed his mindset after looking at the numbers for other parks.
“There’s a limit to how many people you can fit in a space, and just opening for people to come in and skate for five bucks is never going to pay the rent. But lessons and camps do. You don’t need 5,000 square feet to run those programs,” he said.
Fine changed his model to a smaller space with room and equipment for small group lessons. He joked that he would teach for free, but still needed to eat.
“Sitting somewhere five nights a week to watch people skateboard doesn’t sound fun to me. But doing lessons and teaching people how to skateboard is what I love, and I don’t need a huge space to do that,” Fine said.
Visit steponeskateboarding.square.site to learn about Workshop Skateboard Club’s lessons and camps.
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