Mar
31
GM Buys Specialized?
Filed Under Exhibitor News, humor | 2 Comments
Elaborate April Fools hoax with BikeBiz.com, the San Jose Business Journal and Specialized all in on it? See BikeBiz’s news flash on the historic announcement on the Northern California bike company here.
The dead giveaway is the quote from supposed GM VP, “Flora Lopi” - an anagram of the words April fool.
Carlton at BikeBiz sent his news flash out just after midnight in the UK, so he’s safe, but what about the SJBJ sending there’s out on the 31st? Did they jump the gun or did they fall for it (like I was for a bit I’ll admit)?
If it were true, that would be quite the little family of brands: GMC, Buick, Pontiac, Hummer, Specialized…
At least we got an Interbike mention circulating out there.
Update: Looks like the hoax is more elaborate: the url given for the SJBC is fake. A certain bike blogger has been pretty sneaky. Nice job…
Mar
18
Thank You Dick Burke and Trek
Filed Under Cycling, Deep Thoughts, Photos | 5 Comments
Chip Smith, our main PR guy and great friend at SOAR Communications, wrote a nice story on their blog last week about hearing of Trek founder Dick Burke’s passing recently and his memories of his first bike - a Trek - and how it inspired him to start riding. My plan was to just re-print an excerpt here and link to the whole piece and as I started writing this, I remembered that it was a Trek that got me into riding, too. While Chip’s was a ‘79 touring model, mine was a circa ‘90 930 mountain bike. Here’s a picture of Chip and his bike (and a bit more hair, as he put it):
My Trek was definitely a child of the late ’80’s. And not just because it was a mountain bike. It was mostly black, but had fluorescent green lettering and highlights. I thought it was a hot looking bike at the time.
Not having ridden since I was a kid back in junior high, I borrowed by Brazilian college roommate’s bike for the Summer. I was staying in my college town to do an internship and said I’d hold onto his bike for the Summer while he was back home in Rio. I was on the rowing team in college and thought that the biking would help me stay in shape for my senior year season. Even though it was an mtb, I don’t think I took it off-road once that summer. The Trek and I just did long rides on the road everyday. The bike had those crazy Scott mtb handlbars (with lime green grips and bar wrap) that curved around to the front into an aero-bar position that I used alot. I thought I was all aero on my off-road bike with knobby tires. Groups of roadies going the other way gave me funny looks. The baggy soccer shorts probably added to the visual humor.
One of the things on that bike that got me hooked on riding and on bikes themselves was a piece of technology: push-button Rapid-Fire shifters. Not the more-recent trigger-style, mind you, but the original two thumb-actuated button shifters. I thought it was so cool that you could just push a button and the bike would shift. That was my first experience with indexed shifting. And while the shifter self-destructed later that Summer, it was enough to get me hooked on bike technology.
When I graduated from college a year later, my parents offered to buy me a graduation gift. I asked for a bike. And since I only ever rode on the road, I asked for a road bike. Even though I lusted after those carbon tubes-bonded-to-aluminum-lug Treks that my college town shop sold (Bicycle Alley in Worcester, MA), back home at my local shop (Greenwich Bicycles in Greenwich, CT) I ended up buying another brand (a ‘92 Bridgestone RB-1 that I still have, btw). My dad was so impressed with that Trek I borrowed, that he bought his own Trek mtb (”for more than I paid for my first motorcycle!” he commented) that same Summer and eventually an OCLV road bike (the’99 Lance Armstrong Tour win commemorative model) and got into riding seriously.
So while I never met the guy and didn’t have an opportunity to meet his son John at the BLC recently, his efforts in founding Trek back ‘76 played a role in Chip and I getting into cycling. Thanks, Mr. Burke!
Mar
5
The Bike Summit is On!
Filed Under Advocacy, Industry News | Leave a Comment
The National Bike Summit is in full swing today. Just want to wish all of our advocates there a productive day full of meetings with influential people.
A site to visit for coverage of the event is Jonathan Maus’ (or is that Maus’s?) BikePortland.org site. If you know of any others, let me know.
Lance, Robert and Andria from Interbike are there. Don’t be shy about going up to them and saying hi.
Update:
I found a nice list of bloggers that will be attending the Summit at the Commute by Bike site. Didn’t see any coverage there yet - just the “We’re heading off to the Summit this week” posts. Hopefully the posting will kick in soon.
Mar
4
SRAM: “We Are Porsche” in Business Week
Filed Under Exhibitor News, Gear, Industry News, Interbike | 5 Comments
In another of my non-original posts here, I’m going to reference and plug another’s work again here in scooping this story. This article is right up our alley here at Interbike since it’s a great bike industry B2B story that is playing in the national non-endemic media. If there’s any way we can help promote or facilitate more of that for our industry members, we’re all over it. This is a little late - I was hoping to get this out last Friday when I first heard about it, but well, sometimes life just gets in the way of blogging. Still worth mentioning, though, in case our little site reaches some corner of the world that Bike Biz UK’s does not…
The article that appears on Business Week’s website is titled: “SRAM - A Bike Parts Tour de Force.” Stan Day, the co-founder of SRAM along with his brother and a friend, is the focus of the piece. Obviously written from a non-endemic point of view, there is still plenty of interesting background information about the company (I finally know where the name SRAM came from).
Not to call anyone out here, but there is an intriguing quote from a product manager at one of the major bike manufacturers about SRAM’s place in the OEM market:
“They are not really credible yet.”
While I understand that, from a sales standpoint, Shimano still dwarfs them, I don’t see how SRAM could not be considered a credible player at this point. Now I’m just a marketing guy and have no experience wearing a product manager’s shoes, but I’ve seen plenty of great brands spec’d by people I know and have great respect for with SRAM OEM componentry. [Shimano: I still love my Dura Ace pedals and shoes 
] Plus, they’ve got a beer vending machine in the office! Instant cred right there.
By the way, we’re big fans of BikeBiz UK here. Carlton Reid - a great friend of the industry, and burgeoning internet cycling media mogul - got wind of this Business Week article about SRAM’s emergence as a player in the bicycle components game. Definitely worth the read. Check it out here.