Shaun White’s new clothing line for Target has prompted some aggressive criticism among snowboard and skateboard purists who claim the red-headed rider has sold-out. I disagree completely and support rider/brand partnerships for the following 3 reasons.

1. Board sports are now mainstream. Snowboarding and skateboarding are as mainstream as baseball and football. Skateboard parks have shot up in virtually every community and skateboarding is even taught in gym class. When chubby kids in Houston are playing your sport on XBox while eating pizza rolls, it no longer belongs to an exclusive underground community. Rather than protecting the sport, we should promote growth by teaching friends and welcoming beginners. After all, we were once beginners in a sport that’s been around at least 25 years.

2. Other mainstream athletes have huge endorsements. While no one bats an eye when LeBron James endorses Vitamin Water or Nancy Kerrigan sips Campbell’s tomato soup after a killer sit-spin, snowboarders and skateboarders get their undies in a bunch when “their” athletes support national brands. While football stars sign contracts for $100 million, the best snowboarders in the world perform risky stunts for a shot at the measly $2.5 million purse of the upcoming Dubai X-Games (the largest prize in X-Games history, BTW). And while $2.5 million is a large sum of money, most of the athletes competing won’t see a dime from the tens of millions that advertisers shell out to be featured beside their misty-flips and 1080s.

3. Extreme sports have been exploited by brands to sell products. As millions of fans guzzle Mountain Dew, the athletes are not getting anything from incremental sales driven by their image. We each sellout every time we drink Monster Energy Drink and eat Xtreme Fajitas. In my opinion, the Target/Shaun White partnership is great because a rider finally has a creative voice and can collect fair profit from the use of his name. I would rather see my money go to the athlete instead of the executives at Taco Bell, Axe, or Jeep. Big brands have jumped on so called Xtreme sports as faceless, conceptual visual-candy to capture the advertising impressions of men 18-49. They are using the images of board sports to sell countless products without even understanding or respecting the riders. Shaun White is showing big brands that he has control over the way his image is used to make a profit and deserves a piece of the resulting sales.

As a community of riders, we should acknowledge the mainstream appeal of our sport, encourage growth by welcoming new participants and allow our top atheletes to capitalize on their talent.  Pro riders should be able to retire with more than just a garage full of free gear and, if they’re good enough, a few mansions too.