Filed under: History, N.P.D. | Tags: 1980, fixed, messenger, Raleigh, super course
Raleigh reborn
This clip on YouTube has got it all. It’s the restoration, or rather bastardisation, of an old Raleigh Super Course. It was posted on Valentines day and it conveys something really poetic. The film tracks the spiritual metamorphosis of the existing brand and takes it some where completely different. If I were Raleigh I would seriously consider investing in more films like this; very effective. First thing you see in this clip is the Raleigh name stamped on the frame. The each new part selected for the rebuild is lovingly displayed. And the last image we get is of the owner with their arms outstretched pulling a big fixie back wheel skid.
There is a growing trend for fixed wheels out there that’s been slowly burning its way up from the bike messenger community. What I’m starting to wonder is with the increasing popularity of Alley Cat races and fixed wheel mania in general, Raleigh would do well to get in on the moment.
Filed under: N.P.D. | Tags: bike biz, dave's quality meat, jay townley, trackstar
Bicycle 2.0
I found this blog post that’s dated from last year. These bikes are concept bikes put together by Trackstar courier service in NY and clothing shop Dave’s Quality Meat. The idea behind them is to fuse the 80’s aesthetic behind BMX with Track Bikes (fixed wheels being the new trend set by couriers). I think it’s a great demonstration of how bicycles can be made exciting to look at again and I certainly think the concept of fusing fashion with bikes produces vibrant results. Since the demise of the MTB and the slow burn of the hybrid, the cycle world has been waiting for the next popular thing. Following a recent conversation I had with a class mate, I got to thinking how it was possible for someone to re-interpret how we connect emotionally with the bicycle. I was reading the latest edition of Bike Biz there and something else got me thinking. Jay Townley is a retail consultant with 50 years experience in the bike industry. Addressing Independent Bike Dealers at a recent conference, he speculated on the possible future for the bike industry. The bike market in the US today is ‘flat’, a trend equally reflected, Townley seems to think, in the UK.
‘There is no reason to believe this will change in the near future, There is no
imminent bicycle boom on the horizon. Unless the bike industry changes strategy there will be no real growth in the size of the total retail bicycle market.’
Townley suggests that IBDs need to box clever in order to stay on top of their game; increasing sales in accessories, creating databases of customer contacts and pushing ‘crossover apparel, footwear, fitness’. It got me thinking back on the idea of the open source bicycle. Is it possible to purpose build an adult bicycle that allows the consumer to mix and match, creating their own styled bicycle? In earlier research I looked at the Schwinn Krate and how that was developed to mimic Chopper bikes but in this current world where we all posses customised skin settings on our mobile phones, screen savers and desktop wall paper, surely the Bike industry can give us something as equally compelling to set our imaginations alight?
Folding bicycle wheel
British designer Duncan Fitzsimmons has literally re-invented the wheel by finding a way to make it foldable. The graduate from the Royal College of Art has applied for patent and is developing it further with innovationrca. The young designers site says
“We are currently seeking parties interested in licensing the design of the crossbreed wheel or in collaborating with us on the design of an associated bike or wheelchair.
This wheel can enable a whole new type of folding wheelchair or bicycle to be designed! One which is both high performance AND practical in terms of transportation and storage.”
So is this the wheel of the future? With more people perhaps taking up cycling in the future due environmental and health concerns, this wheel may come at just the right time.
Little bird campaign
This is a campaign apparently from the 1980s, which I was able to find on YouTube. It features comedian Lenny Henry as ‘Little Bird’, the Raleigh Heron brought to life in animated style. I’m interested in the way that Raleigh appear to be positioning themselves here. Raleigh obviously did at one stage have an excellent, if not unrivaled, name in high performance bikes (namely from their division built up around Carlton and Special Products division). However, in the minds of cycle enthusiasts today, that association is no longer there. Raleigh’s brand was built on winners by associating the brand with sports men like A.A.Zimmerman right up to Reg Harris and ‘Reg rides a Raleigh’. I’m particularly interested by the copy writing on this advert
‘Always a winner, whatever your age’ followed by the Heron logo and ‘The strength of the name’
Raleigh was ‘The all steel bicycle’ so this last line makes a lot of sense and ties in with what the Raleigh brand; a safe friendly and reliable personality. I also feel that the origins of the Raleigh brand is most definitely tied in with winners; as founder Frank Bowedon appears to have gone to considerable effort in attracting renowned riders of the time. More recently Raleigh have been sponsoring British champion Nicole Cooke but I’m not sure that’s the case today. A little bird told me she was signed with Team Halford’s Bikehut.
Filed under: N.P.D.
Red in the face
Blue Peter presenter Konnie Hoq was the centre of a political row last year when she endorsed the Hovis London Freewheel. The criticism at the time was that Huq was sidelining the neutrality of the BBC by associating herself with Labour Lord Mayor of London Ken Livingston. The Times reported in August 07 that she ‘defied the corporation’ forcing the BBC to apologize to the Conservatives. But in a recent article published in the Daily Mail (brought to my attention by quickrelease.tv) Konnie Huq downplays the brief scandal.
“All I said was cycling is fun and healthy for all the family, and apparently that was political,”
Indeed, under the headline
‘How you can get a body like mine, by cycling-mad former Blue Peter presenter Konnie’
Konnie Huq describes how she has avoided the Gymn choosing instead to cycle and walk. The Mail suggests that ‘Konnie, 32, could even be labeled a cycling activist’. Interestingly, Huq herself appears to believe that she got into the habit whilst attending University in Cambridge; England’s main cycling capital
“At uni you were weird if you didn’t cycle. The police used to auction stolen bikes, which you could buy for £10. People would buy a new bike every term and then just dump it.”
Perhaps not the most shining example concerning sustainability but Konnie Huq (as it has been suggested before by The Times) is a very suitable role model when it comes to female cyclists who’s involvement in cycling represents half compared to men. The Dailymail may have their own pro-cycling agenda of course and the headline would seem to hit the bulls eye in terms of a motivator for more women to cycle. In addition to this Huq talks about her other built in fitness routine; practicing leg lifts whilst concentrating on other activities
“I devised my own technique,” she says. “If you’re chatting on the phone, you just lift and hold your legs – it makes your core stomach muscles really hard. You can do it anywhere. Maybe I should bring out a fitness video.”
Filed under: History | Tags: Gregory H. Bowden, raleigh cranks, tubular fork-crown
Crowns and Cranks
One of the most noted features of the original Raleigh bikes is talked about in Gregory Bowden’s book ‘Raleigh Cycles’. The ‘tubular fork-crown’ owed itself to new technology developed in America which Raleigh had adopted
‘It was introduced in 1892 and consisted of a length of round tube to which the steering post and fork blades were brazed. One of the advantages of the new crown revealed a short time later when the introduction of pneumatic tires necessitated wider crowns and other manufacturers were faced with the expense of scrapping their stocks of castings in favour of a wider new size.’
Another added benefit of the tubular crown fork was that it acted as a distinctive signifier. The tubular crown fork may have meant that a Raleigh bike could easily be singled out in a group of similar looking black bikes.
The other important and long standing feature Raleigh bikes employed was its famed Heron crank. In designing the Heron crank, Raleigh added yet another distinguishing feature to their bike design that is even present in the ‘Chopper’. I would like to trace exactly when Raleigh decided to stop using the Heron crank and what reasons lie behind it. Today, with a lot of bike parts becoming increasingly homogenised, you no longer see the beautifully designed chain wheels that helped distinguish bike brands like Raleigh from other competitors.
Filed under: History | Tags: Bicycle History, John Woodeforde, Raleigh advertising
Magic Carpet Ride
It is estimated, in John Woodforde’s book ‘The Story of The Bicycle’ (1970), that Raleigh controlled three quarters of the bicycle industry in Britain at that time. By that stage Raleigh not only produced bikes with the famous Heron head badge but had also swallowed up many other British cycle companies including Humber, Triumph, Hercules and Moulton. It’s worth noting here that Bowden had been so successful in building Raleigh’s brand in the late 19th century that within 10 years of purchasing it, Raleigh was the largest cycle company in Britain. According to Woodforde’s writing, Raleigh at the time of 1896, was producing 30,000 bicycles annual; a marked improvement on the four a week that its original owners capable of outputting. But far from giving into temptation to cut corners in aid of the bottom line Raleigh’s policy, according to Woodeford, was ‘quality before quantity’.
‘In its advertising Raleigh concentrated on the health aspects of bicycling.’ writes Woodeford before proceeding to talk about how the firm skillfully handles the impinging motor car market.
‘Raleigh went all out to make customers of factory workers, clerks and shop assistants. It was worth saving up, said Raleigh, to buy the means of enjoying “a refreshing weekly ride in the open air”.’
Woodeford then goes onto to provide us with even further insight into how Raleigh presented itself to the public.
‘A glossy Raleigh pamphlet on 1923 begins with the words: “Is your life spent among whirring machinery, in adding up columns of figures, in attending to the wants of often fractious customers?”‘ He goes onto quote the copy further
‘Don’t you sometimes long to get away from it all? Away from the streets of serried houses…only a few miles away is a different land, where the white road runs between the bluebell-covered banks crowned by hedges from which the pink and white wild rose peeps a shy welcome.
Sheltering amongst the trees you see the spire of the village church-beyond it that quaint old thatched cottage where the good wife serves fresh eggs and ham fried ‘to a turn’ on a table of rural spotlessness, for everything is so clean in the country…Rosy health and a clear brain is what Raleigh gives you…’
At a glance, this style of copy writing seems alarmingly innocent compared to the sophisticated styles of marketing and advertising we have today. But the psychology is quite self possessed, first depicting the prison before showing the promise of escape. The style of writing which is deliberately romantic, takes the reader on a journey, not just outside the city walls, but into a carefully constructed past; a past that offers us a less complex and all but forgotten way of life; a false yet familiar environment; eden. And in the last line of text the message is most telling, for what Raleigh really offer their consumer is simply spiritual absolution and enlightenment of the mind – ‘Rosy health and a clear brain’. What’s interesting is its literal style of the ad. Where as in hindsight we would consider this style of advertising to be rather stiff, this predates the television boom.
The advert pictured above, although drawn up some years after the above copy, doesn’t stray too far from this same theme.
Filed under: History | Tags: A.A. Zimmerman, Gregory Bowden, Raleigh, Sir Frank Bowden
Origins of Raleigh
The story behind the Raleigh company begins with Sir Frank Bowden who, after a successful career as a lawyer in Hong Kong, returned to England in poor health and an ‘inactive liver’. He was given only months to live but, determined he would find a way to stave off death, consulted a doctor in Harrogate who prescribed him what was finally to cure him
‘Taking me to the window of his study, he drew my attention to a man who was slowly and steadily driving a tricycle around the Square and told me that the rider three weeks previously could not move his legs.’ (Bowden, Gregory – Raleigh Cycle)
Impressed by this, Bowden himself moved to France and took up cycling, purchasing a trike which he had shipped. Within four months, Bowden found his health to be restored to such a level that he then embarked on a cycling tour of Arcachon; quite a recovery indeed. On returning back to England, Bowden decided to graduate to what was known as the ‘Safety Bicycle’ (standard bike as we know it) and happened upon three bike makers based in a small workshop on Raleigh Street, Nottingham. Bowden was so impressed with the bike that he bought that he then decided to buy the company and involve himself with the industry that saved his life.
Raleigh Cycles was established in 1888. Bowden quickly sought out a new premises in which the company would be allowed to expand. In his book on the history of Raleigh cycles, Gregory Bowden (Sir Franks grandson) gives a detailed account of how the company was first set up
‘In order to be sure of appealing to every sector of the high-quality bicycle market, he decided at an early stage to bring out a wide range of models – a policy which has been pursued by the firm ever since.’
Indeed by 1890, Raleigh exhibited twenty three different models at Stanley Cycle Show in London, a good illustration as the speed and appetite Raleigh had for developing competition. Like now, weight was considered to be an issue and the Nottingham Guardian wrote in a review of Raleigh’s latest offerings
‘No fewer than 12 of these machines are from new designs. They include a tandem safety [...] This weighs 73-lbs but there is also a lighter machine weighing 640lbs on which Messrs. W.C. Goulding and F.T. Bidlake have already ridden 65 miles in 4 hours 5 mins on the Great Northern Road.’
Bowden was quick to associate Raleigh with winning athletes, not only aware that it was a good source of PR but also served to strengthen Raleigh’s winning brand. In 1892 Raleigh had already managed to endorse a selection of the worlds top cycle athletes including A.A. Zimmerman who was considered to be world champion at the time.
