Paul Vella
Bachelor of Commerce (Marketing) 1993
When Paul Vella was a student at the University of Wollongong, he combined his marketing studies with a lot of surfing. Six years after graduating he decided to combine his marketing expertise with his love of the surf, and hasn’t looked back.
Paul and his friend Guy Oldbourne established Surf Camp Australia in 1999. Over the past 10 years more than 20,000 people have learned to ride surfboards through Surf Camp Australia, and it is well-established as an important attraction for international tourists.
The company runs its two and four-day surf camps at Seven Mile Beach at Gerroa, around 50km south of Wollongong, catering for up to 48 students at a time. Surf Camp Australia works closely with inbound travel companies, and most of its clients are young tourists or students from the United States, Britain, Ireland and Scandinavia.
Paul said his time at UOW helped formulate the idea for the surf school.
After graduating Paul spent six years working in various marketing roles in Sydney and London, but always wanted to start his own business.
“I had met a lot of international students during my student days in Wollongong, and sometimes used to take some of them for weekends down the coast, teaching them to surf on an old mal (malibu surfboard),” he said.
“In 1998 Guy and I were travelling through Ireland together, and started tossing around ideas for a business that would combine Guy’s experience in the hospitality industry with my marketing background and our interest in surfing. Remembering how much those international students had enjoyed learning to surf, we came up with the idea of the surf camps.
“We returned home to Australia in 1999 to give it a try. After a couple of false starts at Thirroul and Ulladulla, we settled on Gerroa and the business just took off from there. Seven Mile Beach is the best place in Australia to teach people to surf, because it is shallow for a long way and has nice, gentle waves so it is safe.
“Our schools are all about fun, but safety is also a high priority.”
Paul’s company also provides surf safety tuition for a number of educational institutions, including UOW. The classes are an important feature of the orientation program for the University’s international students – some of whom also enrol in the surf camps.
“I really enjoy doing the surf safety classes at the University, but it is a bit surreal standing up in a lecture theatre in the McKinnon Building in front of 300 or 400 students. When I was a student I certainly never envisaged that I’d be doing that one day,” Paul said. NH
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