O’Neill Wetsuits S/S 2026 Preview

Retail Buyers Guide: Wetsuits S/S 2026 Retail Buyer’s Guide
Brand: O'Neill
Interviewee: Joe Turnbull, European Sales Director

How was the 2024 market?
2024 was hard work but it was also a period of necessary cleansing following the inventory everyone had issues post-covid. We still were lucky enough to receive Preorders from our dealers for new styles, but also sold through a lot of end-of-line products too.

How are stock levels compared to a year ago?
Our total inventory value at the end of 2024 was less than half of what we had at the end of 2023. However, we still have the Brexit effect to consider as we opened a second warehouse to deal with the UK-EU split, so we now duplicate a lot of inventory and have a lot more than we would have had before 2020.

The new rubber innovations display the picture of a segment full of vitality. Was the sell-in on the same page for Spring-Summer 2025?
The SS25 and FW25/26 Presell campaigns have been great for us. We committed to running the same wetsuit line for multiple years until the European market had sorted its inventory problem. Our dealers really appreciated our not forcing them to closeout their inventory and give them time to actually make some margin. Once we ran new styles and colourways for 2025, the investment paid off and we saw solid growth in our Preorders; +20% for SS25 and +40% for FW25/26.

Is SS26 a continuation of your current line (with some updates) or did you revamp your collections?
We tend to update our wetsuit line each winter season, and the following spring/summer takes those updates into thinner models. For 2026 we have redesigned the Hyperfreak Fire series and Psycho Tech series, now featuring increased graphene content for heat retention, and an update of our O’Riginal RG8 natural rubber series featuring the latest Yulex 2.0 foam which we laminate with our own hydrophobic microline fabric jersey. Also for SS26, we have a new Hyperfreak Skins UV protection line, which takes over from our current, very popular Premium Skins series and introduces some more advanced fabrics.

Are pricepoints on the rise? If they are, how do you justify the raise to retailers?
Pricing is pretty stable for now, but we haven’t set final pricing for SS26 yet as the factories try to deal with planning for Trumponomics before agreeing to their final quotes. We dropped the pricing on some of our top end wetsuits to help with the inventory problem after Covid, so these had to go back up for FW25/26, but we were able to hold the new prices below the original levels.

Which neoprene options did you use for SS26?
Our premium wetsuits feature TechnoButter 4 or TechnoButter 3 neoprene, and the rest are either made from Ultraflex neoprene or Yulex natural rubber.

What differentiates your steamer offer from the rest of the competition?
Ours is a performance driven wetsuit range, whether the individual model is intended for lightness, flexibility or all-out warmth. However, the biggest advantage we have over other wetsuit brands is that we handle all our fit checks and size grading in-house. Where other brands design prototypes in a single size and then hand over to a factory to grade that into the other sizes, the amazing product development team in O’Neill’s Area 52 R&D facility creates every pattern for every size of every wetsuit we sell. When fit is such an important factor in choosing a wetsuit, this has been our biggest benefit by far for over 70 years.

Which silhouettes are trending within the pure summer short-leg/arm models?
SS Spring suits have very consistent sales, but it is LS Springs and SS Fullsuits that are growing quickest for us in this category.

While the winter wetsuit offers black on black (non)colorways, did you add a bit of fun in the spring-summer ranges?
You bet! Having looked at the exact same inventory for such a long time, new colours were right at the top of our to-do list. Our women’s Bahia and Epic series feature multiple print options that carry over to the new Hyperfreak Skins rashguard series too. Men haven’t been left out though, and get a new Army Green in their Hyperfreaks and even the entry level Reactor series has been refreshed with a new graphic package and new colourways.

Do you offer repair and/or recycle programs?
O’Neill supports multiple Area 52 approved repair centres across Europe to help reduce the distance a wetsuit would need to travel and the time it would take to be repaired. These facilities are kept stocked with our most common materials and fixtures so that if you damaged your O’Neill Hyperfreak wetsuit, it would be repaired with the same TechnoButter neoprene that it was originally made from. Our wetsuit recycling is handled by Circular flow who turn our wetsuits into changing mats. We hope to expand the range of products made from recycled O’Neill wetsuits as the technology develops.

How are you expecting Trumps Tariffs to impact the European Wetsuit market?
It might be easy to think that we’re insulated from the tariff situation in the US, but we have a lot to consider. Firstly, some factories in China may close due to the cancellation of US orders from all wetsuit brands and although there may be a chance that orders from Europe might be enough to keep them going, many European brands will begin to consider whether they can risk placing a long lead time order with a factory that may not still exist when it’s time to deliver. The next concern is that the remaining factories in other countries will receive rapidly increasing order volumes, and we get a Covid-2 situation where the lead times get pushed way out and there’s a shipping bottleneck. At O’Neill, we are purchasing for SS26 much earlier than we would usually, and costing based on increased prices for both products and shipping.

Key Products:

O’Riginal RG8 Full Suit:
The next generation of the O’Neill RG8 legacy, launched in 2010, ‘Regenerate’ stands for high-performance stretch and quality made with our most sustainable materials. Featuring the latest Yulex 2.0 foam which is laminated with O’Neill’s own hydrophobic microline fabric jersey.

ORiginalRG8_Full Suit

HyperFreak Fire Full Suit:
The new O’Neill HyperFreak Fire extends sessions in bone-chilling water. The next generation, heat-recirculating TB4 Firewall, magnifies the warmth with more graphene-infused, durable fibers.

Hyperfreak Fire

HyperFreak Plus:
The HyperFreak Plus is made of Recycled TechnoButter 3 and TB3X neoprene, containing 90% or more recycled fibers in the liner fabrics. This exclusive technology weighs 20% lighter with 30% less water absorption than any other premium neoprene.

Hyperfreak Plus