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Dec
9
Bonnie Tu: A Giant leap for women in the Times Online
Filed Under Cycling, Exhibitor News, Industry News, Interbike | Comments Off
Industry consultant Rick Vosper Twittered about this article that ran in the UK’s Times Online on Monday featuring Giant Bicycles’ Bonnie Tu. Their “Monday Manifesto” is titled “A Giant leap for women on the move. Taiwan’s godmother of the bicycle wants to end a male-dominated world” and is definitely worth a read.
Ms. Tu is the chief financial offer for Giant, the “godmother of bicycles” and a founder investor in the company along with chairman, King Liu. She has strong opinions about bikes, their role in society and specifically about bikes for women. Here’s a quote:
“To get more women on the road, we have to get them to think of these things as accessories,” she says. “Natural, everyday accessories, like handbags. All major brands claim they design specifically for women, but it’s not true. It means something when I say I’m the godmother — nobody should doubt that our women’s bikes are designed for women by women.”
Nov
17
Final Day of the SoCal Bike Dealer Tour
Filed Under Attendee News, Cycling, Exhibitor News, Industry News, Interbike, Photos, Rides | 5 Comments
Last day of the Bicycle Retailer & Industry News SoCal Bike Dealer Tour was a big one. Just about 15 riders on today’s route including Tony Lo, CEO of Giant Bicycles who had flown in from Taiwan. A few more Giant staffers joined us for the ride from the BRAIN offices to dealers in Dana Point and San Juan Capistrano, California. It’s been a great week of riding, chatting with fellow industry members and hearing insightful comments from retailers. I took some notes, but so far have just had time to post photos and quick comments about the shosps we’ve visited and some of the people I rode with and met on the tour.
This has been a great concept and all of us basked in the neutral BRAIN glow as dealers opened up to us and expressed their hopes, expectations, results and experiences of the past and future of the bike business. And it was a good excuse to get out of the office and ride a really nice bike for a week…
At Interbike in 2007, I was walking around with a camera crew from Cycling.TV looking for footage of interesting sites and events to capture. I led them over to the MirraCo booth where bmx legend Dave Mirra was supposed to be wrapping up an autograph session. Since the booth looked quiet, I walked up to the guy standing near the entrance to the booth and ended up asking Dave Mirra himself if “Dave was coming back to sign more autographs” later that day. Mr. Foot, meet Mr. Mouth. Without saying a word, Dave pointed to his head with both hands and smiled. Now, I don’t think I can be faulted for not recognizing fellow-bmx kegend, Perry Kramer, he of PK Ripper fame, last Tuesday on our tour, but I was darn happy to see him in the BRAIN office again on Friday so that I could properly introduce myself and express my excitement in meeting the Man. Turns out we’re almost neighbors and he offered to show me some trails near my house. The fact that he is PK would explain why he was jumping every curb and bunny-hopping sewer greats the whole ride on his flat-bar road bike.
Another very familiar face (and new ex-coworker) getting ready for the day’s ride was Robert Roman, now in the employs of Bicycle Retailer. After 9 years serving Interbike exhibitors, Robert decided to make a change and move a few exits north on the 5 freeway to our industry’s trade mag. We’ll miss his wit and sense of humor here, but will hopefully still get to experience his powerful turn of the pedals on a regular basis as BRAIN’s lunch rides frequently go past Interbike’s HQ.
Nice to see Fred Clements, executive director of the NBDA, working from the saddle of a bike. This is why we all work in this industry, right?
Mr. Tony Lo, CEO of Giant Bicycles. Guest of honor on today’s ride and inspiration for the whole tour itself. Tony’s industry tour of Taiwan last year planted the seed for this Stateside version. Tony is an avid cyclist and rides with style and class.
Nov
12
Day Two on the SoCal Bike Dealer Tour
Filed Under Attendee News, Cycling, Exhibitor News, Industry News, Interbike, Photos, Rides | 1 Comment
Setting out for day two of our tour of SoCal bike dealers, we made a friend. One of the best parts of road riding is running into other riders along the way and then spending the next few miles chatting. I forget this rider’s name, but when he heard we were all from the industry, he told us that he used to work for GT back in the day.
One constant at all but one shop we’ve visited so far is that fixed gear bikes are firmly entrenched in their shops. Most had a special section devoted to fixie gear, but even traditionally mountain bike focused shops like The Path in Tustin have seen fixie cultire become an important catgory and visible presence on the show floor as evidenced by the MKS and Nitto caps for sale.
Here’s part of The Path’s fixie parts and accessories section that was typical of most shops on out tour. And remember, this is Orange County – not New York, San Francisco or even LA. The fixed gear phenomenon has hit suburbia pretty hard.
Nov
9
SoCal Bike Shop Tour This Week
Filed Under Interbike | Comments Off
I’ve mentioned this on Twitter a few times over the last couple of weeks, but haven’t had the opportunity to get on the blog with it yet. We’re going through budget and marketing plan time here at the office for all of our 2009 shows, so time has been tight. But I’m happy to have been invited by the team at Bicycle Retailer & Industry News to take part in their Southern California Bike Shop Tour this week and get out of the office. We’ll be riding by bike from shop to shop here in Orange County to visit dealers and spend some time getting to know them better and see what’s been going on in the market place recently.
I think that it’s safe to say that the economy has suffered a bit since we last all got together in Vegas in September at the show. I guess even then things weren’t exactly rosy for the global economy, but the feeling at the show was that the bike industry could buck the trends and resist and and (even thrive in) the downturn given some of the factors in the economy and the solutions to those that we offer society.
Well, some 50 days have past since we came back from the show and things have taken a turn for the worse in economy with no short term end in sight and the gas prices that were fueling a move to bikes as a form of transportation are continuing to fall along with prices for most commodities. How is the bike industry looking now given the new challenges that all businesses in the industry and their consumers must be facing? This will be a big focus of the tour: getting a read on what our industry’s retailers are seeing in the marketplace.
The tour will not only be all gloom and doom. Another focus that I have, in particular, as a representative of Interbike, is to celebrate the independent bike dealer. There are few things I enjoy as much as visiting and browsing a good bike shop. From the smell of tire rubber and citrus degreaser to the sight of the unique mechanics’s workshop setups to the rows of shiny new bikes to the chatter about the most recent race war stories, all the senses are served. I’ve been to many of the shops we’ll be stopping at, but there are some that I’ve never had the pleasure of visiting and I’m looking forward to them. I want to learn about their histories and what makes them unique. What role do they take in their community? Do they sponsor clubs or teams or weekly rides? Do they speak Campagnolo? I’ll be posting updates along the way and hoping to record some video, too.
Giant Bicycles is sponsoring the tour and is setting us up with bikes to ride this week. I don’t think I’ve really ridden a Giant much over the years (at least one with the Giant name on it) so I’m really looking forward to spending some time on one. I’ve been told that Tony Lo, CEO of Giant, will be joining us for part of the ride and to say that I am excited to finally meet him is an understatement. Pedro’s Bike Care will be supporting the ride and their CEO, Chris Zigmont, will also be on the ride. They are a big proponent of environmentally friendly behavior on a corporate and individual level and are enthusiastic supporters of the bicycle as an agent of positive change. And it’s always a pleasure to be able to chat with Chris.
A few years back, I figured that in all my years in the industry making sales calls at shops around the country and just visiting them as a fan and customer, I’ve probably been in about 400 US bike shops. I’m glad that I will be able to add to that total this week.
Oct
19
Helloooo, Providence!
Filed Under Attendee News, Events, Exhibitor News, Interbike, OutDoor Demo East | Comments Off
Sitting in our hotel room in Providence, Rhode Island, the night before setup day for OutDoor Demo East – resting up before a busy three days. Finally got some WiFi to connect to the net and try to post something and see what’s going on in the rest of the industry. Spent Saturday and Sunday in the Boston area. Visited a few shops and stopped by the Boston Bike Film Festival in Harvard Square last night. With the enormous Head of the Charles rowing regatta going on this weekend, the atmosphere was electric and festive. Met Cat the organizer and some of the MassBike crew that were managing the bike valet program. Harpoon Brewery sponsored the event. Bikes and beer, always good together.
Had some nice comfort food in an Irish pub down the street earlier tonight with the rest of the team. Almost got kicked out of said pub for cheering on Tampa Bay a bit too vigorously in game 7 of the ALCS (our team is made up of Yankee and Angel fans). I grew up in the Yankee half of Connecticut, myself. The game’s still on so I don’t know who won yet.
But enough baseball – we’re in New england for bikes. Lots of bikes, actually. Pulling into the parking lot of the Providence Hilton, this is what we saw:
Two Giant Bicycle rigs and one from Specialized. Hidden behind them was the Fox Racing Shox truck. They’re here in anticipation of move-in day tomorrow down at the Demo site. Had a nice chat with Andy the Specialized tech who was assembling some of their demo bikes. He had a few bikes with the new 2009 Dura Ace groups and we compared notes on it since I got to ride it out in Boulder City in September. Compared it with SRAM’s Red and the Super Record from Campy (which I haven’t had a chance to ride yet). Won’t tell you what our preferences were, but we did agree that they’re all definite improvements to the breed.
From my visits and calls to Northeast shops and pre-registration numbers (over 1,200 last I checked early last week), people are pretty excited about the event coming to town and we should have a great showing. If you work at a bike shop in the Northeast you should really come on out to Roger Williams Park just south of Providence. We’ve got just about 60 manufacturers coming with big demo fleets and ‘09 gear for you to see and try. Add in the Mavic and SRAM tech clinics and NBDA Super Seminars and it’s going to be a real serious event. Show us that we were right in choosing to put on a trade event here. Here’s the latest list of exhibitors for you:
AMB i.t. US, Inc.
Action Bicycle USA Inc.
Advanced Sports Inc: Fuji, Kestrel, SE and Breezer Bicycles
American Diabetes Association*
BMC
Cannondale Bicycle Corporation
Carver Bikes
Chris King Precision Components
Civia Cycles
Delta 7 Sports
Downeast Bicycle Specialists
Earth, Wind and Rider
East Coast Greenway Alliance*
Felt Racing, LLC
Finish Line Technologies
Fox Racing Shox
Giant Bicycle Inc
Gore Bike Wear
Haro Bicycle Corp.
Highway Two
Hydrapak, LLC
J & B Importers Inc.
Jamis Bikes
KHS / Freeagent Bicycles
Kenda USA
Kuota/Eurospek Inc
Louis Garneau USA
Marin Bikes
Masi Bicycles
Mavic,Inc.
New England Mountain Bike Association*
NiteRider Technical Lighting Systems
Norco Performance Bicycles
Nuun & Co
Pacific Cycle, Inc., Schwinn, GT, Mongoose
Pedro’s Inc.
Rocky Mountain Bicycles
SRAM Corp.
Salsa Cycles
Santa Cruz Bicycles Inc.
Scott USA
Sigma Sport
Specialized Bicycle Components
Squirt LLC
Storck Bicycle GmbH
The Biking Solution
The Caitlin Raymond Int’l Bone Marrow Registry*
Thomson
Thule, Inc.
Topeak/Todson Inc.
Uvex, Sports Inc.
VP Components Co Ltd.
WTB
Yakima Products Inc
Zipp Speed Weaponry
Well, I’ve been taking so long to write this post because of the game that’s been on in the background that I now know who won the game. Sorry, Boston. At least Tampa’s manager, Joe Maddon, is an avid cyclist, right?
See you in Providence!