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Senior business student commemorates his father with Slick Riders LLC

“The difference between good and great are (the) little things.”

entreprenuer — Trent Crider sells his Slick Rider hoverboards around campus. Photo credit: Michela Diddle

Entreprenuer — Trent Crider sells his Slick Rider hoverboards around campus. Photo credit: Michela Diddle

Rick Crider used to say this often. And now his son, senior at Liberty University, Trent Crider, takes this motto to heart and has applied it in a business venture he shares with one of his brothers, Ryan Crider.

Their company, Slick Rider LLC, sells a newer technology know as “hoverboards.” These vehicles operate much like Segways and are propelled by forward and backward shifting of the body, but “hoverboards” do not have any handles like Segways according to Trent Crider.

After Ryan Crider had purchased a “hoverboard” this past summer, Trent Crider had seen the technology used by Casey Neistat, someone he follows on YouTube, and instantly caught on to the user-friendly device.

“(Then) I was like ‘Ryan, we need to figure out a way that we can buy a bunch of these not only … so we could sell them and make money, but also to spread them and that way we could share (them) with other people,’” Trent Crider said after using a hoverboard for the first time.

Trent Crider also wanted to endorse the product to allow for inspiration and innovation stemming from this technology.

“I want to share with people that this is a new and trending product,” Trent Crider said. “And I think it’s going to be something that evolves into a different technology that helps us to get a step further to future technology, so that can propel us to something new and (more) exciting.”

Trent Crider’s business with his brother operates from wherever he is at — which happens to be his dorm room at the moment.

Trent Crider teamed up with Sam Stone, Austin Shaffer and Joel Miller — people he believed had a good amount of influence — and allowed them to ride his hoverboards around campus to promote and sell the product. Trent Crider said by dividing up the responsibility, stress is taken off his shoulders.

Although not all the selling may be his responsibility, Trent Crider does take on the role of repairman for his boards. Since Trent Crider orders the boards in bulk from China to keep the price low at $375, he learned the technology in order to fix any potential issues. Because he does not actually make the hoverboards himself, Trent Crider checks every board by test driving it for about 30 minutes to make sure there are no issues before he makes a sale.

“By the time you buy them from me, you know that they run, and you know that they are going to work,” Trent Crider said.

Currently a senior majoring in finance and economics in the business school and a Resident Assistant, Trent Crider said he puts about five hours a week to the business, but he does not want the idea of money or love of the idea to take over his life.

A downside for Trent Crider though is that he sees negativity from people, but he hopes that people would give “hoverboards” a chance. In recent media, Trent Crider has seen quite a few skeptics of the “hoverboard,” but he believes they are safe and innovative rather than harmful to people.

Trent Crider still believes that people will catch onto this trend.

“If so many people make fun of this, what were the people (saying) that made fun of long-boards or bicycles or anything (like that),” Trent Crider said. “ … I wonder what was the stigmatism towards those things at the beginning. But there had to be somebody who was like ‘I want this to innovate, and I want this be something that we embrace and that we can use for great things.’”

Trent Crider also dedicates most of this to his father who passed away during the spring of 2015. Even the company, Slick Rider LLC was named to rhyme his father’s name, Rick Crider.

Since his father encouraged innovating in little ways, Trent Crider wants to take hoverboarding as more than just a business venture and use it to better others.

“I do see this as a stepping stone,” Trent Crider said. “Somebody’s going to take something they learned from (hoverboards) and apply to something else … (This) may not be a big step, but it’s an important one (to innovation.)”

To purchase a Slick Rider hoverboard, email trentcrider@gmail.com

TILLER is the feature editor.

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