Jun
27
In digging through the archives for classic Interbike photos and stories, I came across a quote from Interbike’s founder, Steve Ready:
“Interbike is a cultural event as well as a business event. At the close of each show, we want people to return home feeling a little better about the business they’ve chosen to be in.”
As an exhibitor from 1999 through 2005, despite all the hard work during setup and tear down, I know I’ve always felt better about the industry while at the show. Usually, this as a result of some great people that I met at the show. At the last show in 2005, I had the pleasure of running into Tim Jackson of Masi Bicycles the morning of the last day.
At every Interbike, I always made a point of arriving super early on the last day of the show before the doors were opened to attendees to walk the floor while it was quiet and mostly empty and I had no work obligations of my own yet. I could drool over the bikes and components without bothering the company reps that were trying to do business with their customers during show hours, while vacuums ran in the background and the BRAIN crew were passing out copies of the latest Show Daily to each booth.
This last year, on the last day, I ran into Tim who happened to be doing the same thing - 2 bike lovers looking at lots of great bike stuff. 2 kids in the proverbial candy store. He just posted a nice a comment on this blog about his experiences at IB. I recognized him from a BRAIN article about his new (at that time) blog. I introduced myself and then we walked the aisles and talked bike stuff for about an hour.
The only specific topic I remember talking about was sloping road bike geometry. Other than the fit issues for a 6′3″ rider like myself, I said that I thought sloping bikes just looked slow compared to the level top tubes on “traditional” road bikes. Tim, from his perspective as product manager of an important brand of road bikes, was a little more thoughtful in his discussion of the issue. Whatever the outcome of that debate, it was a great hour spent talking bikes in the biggest bike shop in the world. Tim even generously gave me a Masi logo’d espresso cup when we ended up back at the Masi booth. Now that’s a cool piece of schwag.
When you put nearly 20,000 bike people together for a week, you’re bound to meet up with some great people, like Tim, unexpectedly. Do you have any stories of great chance encounters with fellow bike lovers at Interbike?
Comments
4 Responses to “Interbike as a Cultural Event”
Wow, thanks for that series of compliments and generally cool post. I’m blushing… and I clearly remember the entire conversation and the walk through the halls. I agree; it’s great to have those chance encounters with fellow bike geeks. It happens every year for me. I can’t hide the fact that I love bikes as much as I do and the sport as well.
Interbike really is the ultimate social event for the industry. There is a lot of debate over how much business is actually done at the show now, with model years being launched months before the show by most manufacturers, but there can be no debate over the importance of the show as a way to bring all members of the family together.
Thanks again for the retelling of the encounter and for the refresher on why the show really is important and relevant still.
This is a great post about the true core of Interbike, for me anyway. Sure, the show is about showing your new widgets for the year, but it’s about relationships more than anything. Strengthening relationships with your distributors, dealers and partners as well as connecting with some industry folks that you may only see once a year. There are some smart, interesting and funny people in this industry including, as you mentioned, Tim. It is a pleasure to see them at the show every year and reconnect with them - Marilyn Price is always a delight to see come into our booth, too! Thanks for reminding us all that this is a big part of what the show is about, too.
Oh, and I was lucky enough to get one of Tim’s unique schwag items, too. They are very cool. Wonder what he’ll come up with this year!
All the best for this blog - I look forward to reading more from everyone in the industry!
[...] I just got off the phone with Steve Ready, the now retired founder of Interbike 25 years ago. He currently lives in Washington State enjoying his passion for vintage motorcycles. The other day he read Rich Kelly’s post Interbike as a Cultural Event where Rich attributed the quote, “Interbike is a cultural event as well as a business event. At the close of each show, we want people to return home feeling a little better about the business they’ve chosen to be in” to Steve. Steve told me that quote was actually Kathy Newkirk’s, Interbike’s sales manager from 1987 to 1999. Steve said Kathy has a knack for boiling things down to what’s important and he was just repeating her vision for the show. [...]
Like everybody else, I have lots of fun Interbike memories, too. Here are a few in no particular order that people might enjoy: –I recall Giro founder/inventor Jim Gentes telling me that on the drive down to Anaheim he was actually spray painting one of the important show-sample helmets in the back of his car. I found and find that image pretty funny and a great example of how hard everyone works to make the show a success. –GT & RockShox threw quite a party one year. It was held in a huge industrial building and the place was absolutely packed with people. Suddenly, the guys from RockShox opened a roll-up garage door on one side of the building and idled slowly in on a classic flat-bed truck piled high with one-off RockShox beer in boxes, which they started handing to the crowd. But, they couldn’t drive too far into the crowd so they started throwing the beers and people were catching these 20-ounce beers flying through the air. –Allenax’s lever-drive bicycle booth showing up year after year after year. –All the wonderful and amazing Robert Egger of Specialized concept bikes. –The incredible Tour de Sewer group rides we used to have at the Anaheim show in the mornings; sometimes over 100 riders strong and some of the top pros, riding a double paceline with Swiss-like precision on the winding bike path toward Huntington Beach. –Bruce Gordon’s SOPWMTOS awards were/are always a kick. –Discovering the secret “kitchen” in the Italian pavilion and sitting down for a plate of delectable pasta. –Taking a wide berth around the Taiwan pavilion to avoid the cigarette smoke billowing out from above their hidden smoking chamber. –Test riding the latest and greatest at the Outdoor Demo and elsewhere. –Getting by by eating the Hershey’s Kisses Bike’alog gives away every year in that huge glass bowl and munching the free Clif Bars and PowerBars.. and sipping the free java. –Discovering back at the hotel on the last night that we had so much product literature, we had to get boxes to ship the stuff back to the office. –Getting to discuss the products with all the ingenious product managers, too numerous to mention, who don’t mind explaining in detail how their stuff is designed and why. –Listening to Ernesto Colnago introduce his 50th Anniversary line-up. –Watching the mechanics trying to win Park Tool’s Fastest Mechanic contest. –And, finally, experiencing Interbike first as a bike shop grunt, then as a bike shop manager, a journalist, an editor, and now as an exhibitor. I could go on, but suffice to say that I’m sure this year’s show will be full of fun memories, too!