Right here we’re, nearing the top of 2025. I do know, I can’t imagine it both. Publish-Halloween, many people are gearing up for the vacations. And the primary on the checklist is Thanksgiving. I like this vacation superb sufficient. That’s to say, I don’t subscribe to the cherry-picked narrative of a harmonious harvest feast between Pilgrims and Native Individuals. However I do like having a full home, with all my children collectively in a single place for just a few days whereas reflecting on our previous 12 months as a household. And, after all, I get pleasure from consuming the “conventional Thanksgiving” dinner as properly.
All that being mentioned, 2025 additionally marked my thirtieth Anniversary within the bike trade.
So, I’m not going to write down about Thanksgiving per se. As a substitute, I assumed possibly I’d pen a thank-you word to the bike trade. You realize, jot just a few phrases down in regards to the one factor that I’m concurrently grateful for and take without any consideration.
I overlook my gratitude for this job on daily basis. However, again after I began, touchdown within the trade utterly saved my life. And, leaping in with each ft was the results of the one good piece of recommendation my father gave me.
“My expensive, discover what you like and let it kill you…” – Charles Bukowski.
It was the primary a part of June 1995, to be precise, and I had simply stop one and began one other dead-end job. Two weeks into the brand new job, I already hated it. I known as my dad for some recommendation, and he instructed me, “Discover the one factor you like to do for enjoyable, and work in that trade… you received’t work a day in your life”.
I’ve been in love with the bicycle since I used to be very younger. On the time, I used to be completely infatuated with mountain biking, so I relentlessly went for it. Bike Trade, right here I come.
That recommendation just about modified my life and my trajectory.
A month later, in early July, I began my trade journey at GT Bicycles. At first, it was a surreal expertise. Working for a significant bike producer was like nothing I’ve ever seen or carried out earlier than. It was each enjoyable, tremendous informal, and critical as a coronary heart assault, unexpectedly.
On the time, GT Bicycles dominated the roost. We had been untouchable. It was actually a incredible, life-changing expertise.
After GT Bikes, I bounced across the trade working for some iconic manufacturers like Bellwether, S&M Bikes, and T.H.E., to call just a few.
In April of 2016, I discovered my dwelling right here at Bikerumor. And the workforce that I work with right here is the perfect of the perfect.
It’s Concerning the Relationships (and the bikes)
After I entered the enterprise manner again in ’95, it didn’t take lengthy for me to utterly fall in love with each single side of the bike enterprise. All of the manufacturers and other people I’ve labored for and with since beginning at GT have been so completely different, so enlightening, and simply as superb. Virtually each single relationship developed throughout my time within the biz continues to be going robust all these years later.
And now, being on the “media” finish of the enterprise for that final 10 years (April ’26), I’m discovering my “contact” checklist continues to be rising. It’s persevering with to fill with superb and delightful folks.
The Ardour
The shared ardour for bicycles on this trade is infectious. It’s highly effective, and that energy is commonly palpable. You may really feel it at bike occasions like Interbike again within the day or the Sea Otter Basic, and the MADE Present as of late. It’s actually fairly outstanding.
This ardour could be discovered nearly all over the place within the bike trade, fairly actually. It’s a sense that we’re all on this bike world for one easy motive. We love the bicycle. That’s it. We love the straightforward artwork of this two-wheeled invention in all of its varieties.
That’s a strong feeling; The sensation of discovering your home on the planet. And the conclusion that the like-mindedness might change the world, if we let it.
I really feel lucky to be part of this curler coaster of an trade. I really like what I do, and I’m very grateful for the alternatives I’ve been given. It’s helped form who I’m. I do know, there isn’t a complete lot of cash to be made working on this trade, however that’s not why we’re right here. We’re all right here to rejoice the bicycle. To introduce new folks to biking. To be ambassadors to others about biking. To encourage and maintain eachother. And, most significantly, we’re right here to journey all of the bikes.
So, Thank You!
Look, I do know this wasn’t the publish you could’ve been anticipating, however I felt moved to write down it. I’ve been in search of a approach to acknowledge not solely my journey on this fantastic trade, however to precise my gratitude. I needed to say thanks to everybody I’ve labored with previously and current. To say thanks to all of the manufacturers I’ve been concerned with, and, extra lately, to these manufacturers which have trusted me with their tales.
And I needed to say thanks to the Bikerumor readers and bicycle lovers. I’ve mentioned it earlier than, you guys are the wind beneath our wings.
And lastly, an enormous thanks to this loopy trade for permitting me a house to be me for all these years.
