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Aug
10
In one of the most anticipated announcements leading up the 2011 edition of the show, Interbike organizers today announced the line up of beers that will be available in the new “The Pub” on the Street Level of the show. The pub will feature a wide selection of beers – listed below – and pub-style food such as brats for showgoers.
The new Pub will be a place where retailers and exhibitors can relax, have a casual meeting and grab a beer, drink or quick bite to eat on the floor of the show. The Pub will be located between the new street level Urban Yard and Circulus Velodrome. For more food options, there will also be a new Interbike Cafe also located on the street level show floor. I’ll post more food details as I get them. This will be a big upgrade to the dining options and also eliminate the need to walk back to the food courts in the Venetian hotel.
Here’s what we have lined up for beer choices:
Fat Tire
Blue Moon
Bud Light
Sam Adams
Newcastle
Stella Artois
Heineken
Corona
Tenaya Creek
Widmer Bros
Jul
25
Circulus at Interbike
Filed Under Attendee News, Events, Interbike, Video | 1 Comment
Yes, it’s true. Circulus is coming to Interbike!
As soon as I heard about Circulus last year, I picked up the phone and called Dan at Portland Design Works. It’s not trivial shipping a velodrome 1,000 miles so it took a bit to iron out the logistics. But we knew we’d get it done. As PDW co-owner, Dan Powell, just wrote, “Circulus is going on a little road trip.”
Along with co-sponsors Paved magazine, All-City Cycles and Yakima, we’re super excited to have Circulus at the annual industry gathering this year. What do we have planned? We’ll have open riding sessions available at various times throughout each day of the show. You’ll be able to grab an All-City bike from the pit and hit the track.
We’ll also have a couple of featured events – one each on the first and second days of the show. On Wednesday we’ve got the PDW/Paved Pro-Am Classic at The Circulus. Described as “Quite possibly the first annual celebrity micro-velodrome pursuit world championships, featuring stars and others.” More details about the event (and about those stars we mentioned) are still to come.
Yakima’s got the reigns for the Thursday night festivities, and I hear that it might involve some form of bike roulette… Stay tuned for more on this as it develops.
And while the events are nominally competitive, we’re shooting to focus more on the fun than on hard-core racing. Look for MC’s Chris DiStefano and Stevil Kinevil to keep the feats of strength in check.
This last Saturday, PDW hosted a little get together up at their place featuring Circulus. Hers’a little write up by BikePortland.org.
And finally, here’s a little sneak peak at Circulus in action:
PDW Circulus Promo 1 from James Wilson on Vimeo.
Where will you find Circulus at Interbike? It’ll be on the street level of the show (this year’s show is on two floors of the Sands Expo, remember?). Walk through the Urban Lounge near registration, through the new Pub beer garden and you’ll run into it.
But first, you’ve got to register for the show. You have registered already, right? www.interbike.com/register for those in the business of bikes.
Jul
1
WSJ Video: Bike Fashion Loses Spandex
Filed Under Industry News, Interbike, Video | 2 Comments
Just caught this early this morning while reading the news online while eating a bowl of cereal. It’s a video from the Wall Street Journal on casual cycling apparel that they posted last week on their site. It’s a concept we know well: you don’t need to dress like a pro in Lycra and spandex just to ride your bike. In fact, the assumption that they will have to get kitted up like Lance actually turns people off to riding. We’re definitely bullish on the category, and have been featuring it in our annual urban fashion show at Interbike, returning for the fourth year in 2011. There are some great new bike-specific yet casual looking styles and brands out there to appeal to both the recreational and commuting cyclist that needs to look just as appropriately dressed off the bike as when on it.
WSJ journalist, passionate cyclist and frequent Interbike attendee, Reed Albergotti, steps in to comment from a cyclist’s perspective with the two other more mainstream journalists.
Cycling apparel brands: submit your pieces to be considered for this year’s Interbike City Style Fashion Show, produced in partnership with Momentum Magazine, by downloading a submission form here.
Jun
29
Fox Racing Shox Truck Stolen
Filed Under Exhibitor News, Industry News, Interbike | 1 Comment
Just received the following news from Fox Racing Shox. Not sure where you hide such an obvious rig, but let’s see if we can help them find it. Fox is offering a reward:
Drummondville, Canada – The entire FOX RACING SHOX RACE Trailer and FORD F550 Truck was stolen late Monday night 6/27, in route to the UCI World Cup event in Mount Sainte Anne, Canada. The truck cab is a white FORD F550 Turbo Diesel with beige interior, CA Lisc #. There are many distinguishing features with this cab such as all FORD logos have been converted to FOX logos, FOX custom embroidered seats, FOX instrument cluster and custom FOX footwheels. The trailer is a 28ft FEATHERLIGHT flip down door. The trailer contained custom proprietary racing equipment as well as two YETI bicycles, a medium ASR-5, and medium ARC hardtail. A reward is being offered for any information that leads to the return of the vehicle. The Race Rig was last seen at 6/28/11 at 4:30am traveling West on Hwy 20 just outside of Montreal.
Contact Jim Noonan at Fox with any news or information:
Direct 831.274.8346
jnoonan@foxracingshox.com
Jun
24
Preview of the Las Vegas Ironman 70.3 Worlds Course
Filed Under Interbike | Comments Off
Our friends over at Wattie Ink have posted a video preview of the Ironman 70.3 World Championship course that will held held in Las Vegas this year for the first time on September 11, the day before our OutDoor Demo opens. The race will be centered in Henderson at Lake Las Vegas, not too far from Bootleg Canyon, the home of the Demo. The bike course will take racers down around Lake Mead, a place many in the industry are familiar with from the annual Tour de Lake Mead industry ride on the second morning of the Demo.
We’ve made arrangements with Ironman to provide a retailer-exclusive viewing area at the race at the finishing straight – so consider coming out a day early if you’re into tri. It’s a limited opportunity and we’ll be sending out details soon.
We’ll also be having more news and details on some more awesome triathlon-focused events and content at Interbike 2011 coming soon!
Jun
22
Bicycle Retailer’s Philadelphia Dealer tour took place a couple of weeks ago. It was a great three days of riding from shop to shop in this strong bike region. I’ve been swamped with work and haven’t been able to finish editing all my photos and thoughts from the tour (I promise to finish it up soon…), but here’s a cool brief video that photographer Jake Orness put together of our little trip in the meantime.
Jun
14
Stroke of Greenius: Repurposing Paper Bags
Filed Under Green Efforts, Interbike | Comments Off
Every once in a while you run across a really great idea. This one comes from Golden Saddle Cyclery in Los Angeles.
We’ve all read about government efforts to reduce or eliminate shopping bag use by retailers including outright bans of their use in some areas. I think we can all agree, in principle, that less bag and packaging waste is good, but in many cases, shoppers still need something to carry their goods in. Golden Saddle has come up with an elegant solution for repurposing paper nags.
They encourage customers to bring in a paper shopping bag in good condition and, in return, they offer a one dollar discount on an inner tube purchase. Once in possession of the bag, they brand it with a Golden Saddle Cyclery logo courtesy of a custom rubber stamp and reuse it. Bags handed out by some of the high end retailers as shown in the photos are pretty well made and durable and make for a nice branding statement with the new stamp.
I’m sure not all bags brought in are from Bloomingdale’s and REI, but most paper bags – especially of the craft paper type – should look decent with a fresh stamp. Probably even clean grocery store bags. Though you get extra points for Whole Foods bags, of course. I mean who would you rather associate your store’s brand with: Albertson’s, Kroger, Stop-and-Shop or Whole Foods?
Nice job, guys. Reduce some waste, save some money, encourage customer loyalty, promote your store. Love the logo designs, btw.
May
19
The Art of Bike to Work Day
Filed Under Advocacy, Cycling, Green Efforts, Interbike | Comments Off
On my commute to work, I ride through two counties, San Diego and Orange, each with their own government and transportation authority agencies tasked with promoting Bike to Work Day. I’ve signed up in that past with both the San Diego Association of Governments’ and Orange County Transportation Authority’s BTW programs, so I receive postcards and emails inviting me to participate each year. Being a marketing guy, SANDAG’s effort this year stood out as especially nicely done. They definitely have a real graphic designer work on it, and it made me think about how other regions do on the design front for bike to work day.
Here’s this year’s San Diego County logo from a postcard they sent out to promote the day. I also like their tag line for the program: “Bike to Work Day: Give it a Spin!” Cute, right? Local SD bike company, Electra, is a sponsor.
Orange County has a more generic, on-going bike to work theme. They seem to do nicely with the local OC-based bike industry sponsors, though, with Jax Bicycle Center, Nirve and Oakley on board. Not the most stellar of efforts from a design standpoint, but I’ll give them props for past efforts where I’ve received buttons from them along the lines of those “I Voted” stickers you get on election day letting you feel smug and superior among your coworkers. At least in the bike industry your coworkers will consider you superior for biking to work.
And let’s not forget our friends just south of us in Tijuana who are also promoting bike to work day this year in conjunction with San Diego’s. About 90,000 people cross the border into San Diego on their commute to work every day. Some of those must be on bikes. Judging by the border wait times I hear on the radio each morning, I would definitely try to ride as much as possible to avoid the 2 hours sitting in traffic. Anyway, back to the design element, I think TJ’s work is great. Very clean and professional:
Have you seen any other good design efforts for Bike to Work promotions in your area? Let me know and I’ll share and help recognize and celebrate the quality work on our behalf.
May
16
Are We There Yet?
Filed Under Deep Thoughts, Green Efforts, Interbike, Photos | Comments Off
Now is it high enough now to get people to step away from the car?
Happy Bike to Work Week!
May
6
The Industry Loses a Legend
Filed Under Industry News, Interbike | 1 Comment
When you need to hire a new sales rep in the bike industry, my favorite method was to call the good shops in the area and ask who they like dealing with. “Who treats you right?” I’d ask. You sign a rep because of the relationships they have with the retailers. Cynics might say that you’re buying (or renting) their relationships with the dealers. And, in many ways, it’s like the role of your broker when you’re shopping for a new house: on the surface it may seem like they’re working for you, the buyer, but they’re officially representing (and getting paid by) the seller.
Back in 2000, as national sales manager for a previous employer, I was in need of a new rep in the Illinois area. “You want Larry the Legend,” was the response I got from the most of the shops I called. Over the years people who knew well would joke that he was a “Legend in his own mind’” but he truly was a great rep for us, became a good friend and he seemed to be universally respected by the stores he served in Chicago and the Midwest. (Even though he loved to poke fun at his neighbors to the north in Wisconsin…)
Over the years and since I’ve been at Interbike, I’d call him occasionally to chat about the industry as he drove his territory. He was never shy about voicing his opinion or sharing the criticisms or comments he’d been hearing from retailers about a particular issue. He was opinionated (boy was he opinionated!), but always reasonable in a discussion.
Thinking about times I had spent with him, I remember working with him in 2000 at his booth at the Chicago Bike Show. It was a consumer event at the Rosemont Convention Center outside Chicago where the old CABDA show used to be. As a rep for Sinclair Imports and Profile back then, he had the coolest booth at the show with lots of great high end and Euro road brands like Campagnolo and DeRosa. His exhibit was always one of the most popular at the show.
I also remember that he loved that Merlin he’s on in this photo. Back at that show he was proud of the Profile fork he had just installed on it since it was one of the first all carbon models and crazy light for the time.
As is always the case when someone you know passes away, you realize that you didn’t stay in touch with them enough. I last spoke with Larry about 3 months ago looking for his take on show dates and location (he always lobbied for Chicago, of course) and I was looking forward to more discussions on the subject with him. I’m glad that I was able to connect with him recently after a few years of only really speaking to him at Interbike each year. We’ll miss him and his insight. Rest in peace, Larry.
You can read his obituary and leave a note here.
Here are some of the brands that I know of that he represented over the years: Sinclair Imports, Profile, Sportworks, Shimano, Pearl Izumi, Speedplay, Lone Peak Bags, Haro, Spinergy, Serfas, and Yakima.
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(I borrowed the photo above from another blog and I’m not sure who took it originally, but it’s the only one of Larry I could find. I like that it shows him with his bike.)