Save yourself: Get UVSunSense Wristbands

With the passing of Memorial Day Weekend, it's safe to say that summertime at the Jersey Shore is heating up—literally, too. The sun is shining bright, and some days the heat reaches well above 90 degrees. The consequences of too much sunbathing can already be spotted on the faces and bodies of many people at the beach. Heat exhaustion and sunburn are the most prominent of these after-effects.

So how does one properly prepare for a summer of outdoor fun, while also avoiding the repercussions of dehydration, sun poisoning and, in a worst case scenario, skin cancer? You can start by picking up a pack of UVSunSense UV Monitoring Wristbands to help remind you when to reapply sunblock.

The UVSunSense Wristbands monitor a person's UV exposure by simply changing color. All you have to do is fasten the band around your wrist, printed side up, and apply sunscreen. Freshly out of the package, the band is a light pink color. When exposed to sunlight, the band will turn dark purple (or blue, depending on your definition of the color). When the band fades to a lighter shade, it's time to reapply sunscreen. When the band becomes yellow, it's time to get out of the sun. If you forget to apply sunscreen, the wristband will go through the necessary color changes, but at a much quicker pace. The wristbands work only with an SPF of 15 or higher.

Photo by Ryan Morrill 
Supino tries on his own product for
the first time.

UVSunSense Wristbands, made of nontoxic and recycled materials, are perfect for any outdoor occasion, whether you're hanging out on the beach, riding your bicycle, fishing at the dock, joy riding on a boat, watching an outdoor baseball game, putting golf, waiting in line at a theme park or swimming in a community pool. John Supino, owner of Buoy Beach LLC, owns the exclusive rights to UVSunSense in North America and Australia. He announced the UV Monitoring Wristbands are a win-win for everyone.

“The nice thing about these (wristbands) is that they're attuned to the individual,” said Supino. “It's not a timer; it chemically determines how effective the sunscreen is. So if you sit in the sun and go in the water, everything's going to wear out; it's going to change color faster than if you were sitting in the shade. If you have two kids that are in and out of the shade and doing different things, each one is going to get their own personal monitor. It really focuses on the person that's wearing it and their sunblock. If you're using 50 (SPF) and I'm using 30 (SPF), it's going to work differently for the both of us.”

Having grown up renting on the Island with his family during the summertime and lifeguarding in Surf City and Long Beach Township during his high school and college years, Supino knows just how badly the sun's rays can affect a person.

“Sitting down here (on LBI) as a lifeguard, we used to use what we called 'negative sunscreen.' I used to go home looking like that color,” said Supino, pointing to a glass of freshly brewed iced tea. “I think things change when you have kids. I think that's kind of why I picked up (UVSunSense) and why I believe in it. Primarily because when you're a kid, you don't know any better and parents have to try to track them down. Now I can throw (a UVSunSense Wristband) on my kids' wrists and say, 'When it turns blue, come see me.' I know I don't have to say, 'Come here.' They'll come back when (the band) is blue. I'll slather them up again and say, 'When it turns yellow, come see me.'”  

“My wife was constantly putting sunscreen on (our kids), but now she can lay off and let them enjoy themselves a little bit. It's a pain in the neck for the kids, too, when their mother keeps saying to them, 'Come here, come here, come here.' Every time they get out of the water, my wife is putting stuff on them. So now they can say, 'I'll be back when the color changes.'”

After graduating from William Paterson University with a bachelor's degree in communications, Supino started out working in Corporate America, managing and creating high tech companies such as Glowpoint, Inc., formerly Wire One Technologies. But after 20 years, “the tech market fell out and the money dried up.” Left to his own devices, Supino decided he was finished working for other companies; he was going to start his own business.

“I was managing the North American arm for an Israeli company,” Supino remembered. “When I came in they were managing $300,000 (a year), and when I left they were doing $10 million a year. When I told them what we needed to do to rebuild the company, they didn't want to make the investment and closed the office.”

Supino and his work partner started up Buoy Beach in 2010 with Shade Anchor—the company's first outdoor-themed product. Shade Anchor, which Supino owns globally, works as a ballast for any standard beach umbrella. It doubles as a tote bag, complete with straps, perfect for carrying over the shoulder. Made with “tough 600D military grade material,” the anchor also includes mesh and zippered pockets, is collapsible for easy storage and comes in an assortment of colors. Buoy Beach sold nearly 11,000 Shade Anchors during the product's first year on the market.

“I had already started doing the (Shade Anchor) bags on a part-time basis, and at that point I decided I was going to do the bags on a full-time basis,” said Supino. “As a result of doing Shade Anchor, I met a lot of people. The Shade Anchor is in four catalogs now: Solutions, Brylane Home, Whatever Works and Fresh Finds. Working with the catalogs, I met the guys who made UVSunSense, and as a result of finding them I negotiated an exclusivity deal as a distributor in North America and Australia. So now this is (Buoy Beach's) second product.”

Supino ventured along LBI with Shade Anchor and UVSunSense prototypes to see if retailers were interested in the products. Luckily, many of the area's shops were intrigued by them. Shade Anchors can be found in Farias, Wave Hog and Silver Sun Mall, and in Hands and Surf City 5 & 10, along with UVSunSense Wristbands.

“Years ago, I came down (to LBI) and went door to door with these products to a lot of the stores around here,” Supino pondered. “Five years ago, I never thought I would have been selling things door to door. That was just so far away from where I was at, and now it's socially acceptable. I think if we can make it through this year and the next year, the rest will be easy.”

Photo by Ryan Morrill 
A package of five UVSunSense Wristbands costs
around $5 in stores.

Supino hopes to introduce at least one unique, patented outdoor product every year to Buoy Beach's customers. He's currently working on an updated version of the Shade Anchor, made out of cooling material to carry food and beverages, which he hopes to “roll out” next year. He's also in the process of acquiring a hands-free board snap for carrying your body board, a towel clamp, to keep your beach towel from blowing around in the wind and an umbrella, complete with hammocks for stowing personal belongings.

“The focus of (Buoy Beach) is to find really cool products that have a theme, and I'm going for an outdoor theme,” explained Supino. “It's hard to be a one-product company because you have to make your entire living on that one product, and what it does is drive your price up because you have to make money on every one you sell. By having multiple products, you can make a little less on each product, bring your price down, sell more and be accepted by national chains. National chains don't really like to do business with one-product companies. That's why the (first) product is Shade Anchor and Buoy Beach is the company; we did that intentionally. Now (UVSunSense) is the second product.”

“We're constantly looking for what other people have done like this. If we see something really good, we jump on it. We're trying to have a little more vision than your standard retailer. A basic retailer tries to do what's been proven; we're trying to get ahead of what's been proven,” Supino added.

Supino hopes the innovative products will help Buoy Beach obtain global recognition, and he soon hopes to maintain sole ownership of the UVSunSense patent.

Of course, he also hopes to someday purchase a house on LBI so he can spend more time waking up to the sound of rushing waves. Until then, he's content working from home up north in New Milford and spending time with his wife and two children at the beach on LBI, teetering on the edge of Surf City and Ship Bottom, boating around on Barnegat Bay and spending the night at his parent's second home in Beach Haven West, which the family had built in the late 1970s.

“LBI is unique. It's not as commercialized as some of the other beaches, and you don't see a lot of those cheap, gimmicky, tourist-trap shops that advertise 'three T-shirts for ten bucks.' I don't like them; it doesn't attract the right kind of people,” said Supino.

"Long Beach Island is a very unique place in New Jersey, and even more unique is the community. And the reality is, without the people that come down here with money, this place would be a second rate sandbar filled with mosquitoes off the coast of New Jersey. It's not the same as Seaside (Heights), and it's not the 'Jersey Shore' yet,” he added, referring to the hit MTV show.

UVSunSense Wristbands and Shade Anchors can be found in stores worldwide. For more information about these products, or about John Supino himself, visit buoybeach.com.

This article was published in The SandPaper.