New Bike Lanes

My bicycle has been the primary mode of transportation around town for about 5 years now.  One of the biggest hurdles getting other folks to jump on board has been the fear of riding in traffic.  In the last few years though the city of Ventura has been making great strides.  There are well marked bike routes that will get you to most parts of town.  In the past the routes were a mix of neighborhood streets and bike lanes on the main arteries.  The challenge was in navigating the jumble, often ending up on heavily trafficked 4 lane roads with the bike lane you were in just sort of disappearing. As part of our seasonal repaving, and thus re striping, I am really stoked to see new connecting stretches showing up every week now.  The latest is on a stretch that I ride all the time, and used to be a sprint to get past.

I had long since given up trying to count the times that cars would pinch me to the curb right underneath the share the road sign.  Thank you to the City for fixing this stretch.  Hopefully it fuels the ever-increasing number of people I see choosing the bike over their car for getting around town.

Happy Friday!  DO not forget to play outside this weekend!

Decals and Colorway

We are still in recovery mode from the SF Expo, it was a great time, and now we need to get back up to speed.  The day before we left for San Francisco the decals made it here, nothing like everything coming together at once.  Her is the slide show of the decals and colorways for the three primary combinations:

 

They are top mounted mylar printed by the last professional bicycle decal shop here in the US, at least as far as I could find, that could work in full color as well as variations for different types of application.  I am beyond happy with how they came out.  The bikes feel much more like the real deal.  Not that they ride any differently, but the branding definitely kicks it up a notch.

You probably noticed the “FOUNDER” sticker on the left chain stay, these will only be on the first run of bikes in production as well as the round coming out of Kickstarter.  Which if you missed it, our Rambler project is live:

We are getting tons of interest, likes etc. and while that is great, we need backers to make it happen.  We will take the support in any way you can give it, but without enough pledges to reach our goal, the project will not fund.  Thus, I am asking directly for your help, your pledges and to spread the word to everyone you know who rides a bike, has been thinking about riding, and wants to be able to get around on a true sport bike, that can still be comfortable and carry home the groceries.

Rambler Kickstarter is Live

The project went live last night, and we already have one backer for a frame set in the first few hours, Thank you!

Please help spread the news about the project.  The word of mouth distribution is the most powerful, blog, link, Facebook, throw it out there on the forums every little bit help to get the Ramblers out into the world.  I can not do this without your help.

The SF Expo is going great, I met some awesome people on the first day: vendors, promoters and bloggers.  Between the show and the KS project I could barely sleep, from all the energy building up, although I am sure that problem will start to ease off after today, first full open to the public day.  I am so grateful to the support of my family, friends offering us a place to stay, cousins coming up to help and all of you who have come out and been so stoked to see the Ramblers.  It is all of you that give me the energy to keep this going – Thank you!

Shirt and Bag Art Draft 1.0

I am so lucky to have friends and friends through my wife that are gifted artists and designers.  I have a heavy tilt towards the analytical side and  while I can conceptualize what I want an art project to be, it is awesome to throw out a range of ideas and to get something like this back on the first try.  Gigantic thank you to all of you who have helped me.

This is very close to what will be the shirt and bag art for the Kickstarter rewards.  There will be options of this or the porteur build, as well as a couple of color options.  Now to get the Kickstarter part launched, stuck in a holding pattern waiting for approval.

 

Rambler Decal Proof

Nothing like cutting it to the wire, but it seems like things happen that way sometimes.  Decals should be here before the show, fingers crossed, here is a preview with the proof sheet:

The top three will be the primary colors used, with a few neutral options  down the line for custom colors.  The small square logo will be on the head tube, made in Portland on the seat tube, Ocean Air Cycles on the down tube, RAMBLER on the top tube up front drive side, and Founder on the left chain stay for this first round of bikes being run through Kickstarter (soon, very son).