Vicious Cycles off as of late. Just because Vicious might fit into New Paltz, New York Framebuilders the handmade label doesn’t mean the Years in Business: 13 company doesn’t offer a bevy of differ- Fab 5 Number of Employees: 7 ent riding options including the afore- Soulcraft they are making, which is so rare these any in the industry might not mentioned full suspension, a 29er, Petaluma, California days,” Walling said. realize that Vicious Cycles a cyclocross and a women’s-specific Eight years later he still sees his M has been ahead of the curve mountain bike, just to name a few. Years in Business: 8 Number of Employees: Just business as one step above a garage when spotting trends. “We’ve developed our production the owner builder, but he’s making a good living “We were among the first four build- methods to allow us to easily switch and loving the business. ers to display a 29-inch mountain bike from making one frame type to anoth- hen he worked at Marin “I’m only one guy but I always an- at the 1999 Interbike Show,” said Carl er, so it’s become possible to offer all Speed Machine grinding swer the phone when I can or return Schlemowitz, founder and owner of the models we do,” Schlemowitz said. W out parts for hot rods, Sean calls and email quickly. Why make a Vicious Cycles. “We were the first to “Over the years our selection of prod- Walling was living the dream. But the big deal about your individual level offer a 29-inch mountain tandem. We ucts has grown to keep pace with our oil, smell and dirt of an engine shop of service when you don’t deliver? I were the first company day after day began to tarnish the make sure I deliver,” he said. to have a rigid disc dream. While liability insurance and rent fork.” Thumbing through a Bicycle Guide checks add cost over working out of a From a one-man feature on American garage, it pales next to operation in 1994 to framebuilders, Wall- the cost of running the employing seven to-

Handmade Business ing noticed that many Soulcraft racing team day, Vicious Cycles shops used the same and attending Inter- has grown to be a na- equipment he used in bike, Sea Otter and tionally recognized the engine shop. That the Handmade Bike bike brand thanks to got him thinking. Show. But spending Schlemowitz’s vision He picked up a this extra money adds and love of biking. Carl Schlemowitz frame he had at Bruce professionalism and “My interest in Gordon’s shop for re- passion to his com- mountain bikes began in the late customers’ desires, not just to fill space painting and asked pany, and Walling said 1980s and came about by combining in the market.” Gordon if he needed it keeps his customers camping trips with off-road cycling,” Vicious Cycles has all the capabili- help. And as things go, coming back. Schlemowitz said. “Cycling became ties of the larger U.S. manufacturers, Walling left hot rods But if there is one a lifestyle for me, more than just a according to Schlemowitz. for Gordon Cycles. thing that keeps Wall- sport.” “All the models take about the same “I left Gordon to Sean Walling ing up at night it’s the Schlemowitz’s love for fabrication amount of time to build,” he said. work with Ross at thought that his pric- came from his father, who was a sculp- “Custom geometries take a bit more Salsa, but it was all great time. I was es might be too low. tor working in metal. time, and tandems take the most de- working with bikes and doing what I “The last thing I want is customers “I watched him work and was in- sign and production time. A standard loved. There was a bit of a panic when that search me out because I’m cheap- spired to start building my own bikes,” geometry frame is usually delivered in Ross sold Salsa, but I knew frame- er than other builders. Those value he said. “My first successful efforts in- four to six weeks.” building was what I wanted to do,” customers are so much extra work. In spired me to make biking my life and Schlemowitz said he has no inten- Walling said. addition to a good price, they want a work. Now my main focus is on grow- tion of going into production with his Salsa founder Ross Shafer sold his whole bunch of other extras for free,” ing Vicious Cycles so I can get more bikes. “We’re growing while maintain- company to Steve Flagg at Quality Bi- he said. of my bikes out there for people to ing the high quality of our frames and cycle Products in 1999, and days after “So rather than getting you more enjoy.” forks,” he said. “We continue to keep it Salsa closed, Walling and fellow Salsa business, letting your prices lag ends Schlemowitz said he continues to all handmade.” employee Matt Nyiri founded Soul- up costing you business and eating up see his business grow. Especially lately In the handmade business, a lot of craft. Five years later Nyiri left Soul- your time,” he added. as his company builds a stronger deal- competition exists for a very tight dol- craft for a sales position at Camelbak. Soulcraft works with about 10 deal- er network. The Handmade Bike Show lar, Schlemowitz said, but that doesn’t “When Matt and I got started we ers, but from a business standpoint, doesn’t hurt either. seem to bother him in the least. had no business plan or strategy be- Walling said it’s hardly worth it. After “It’s an additional venue for gain- “Our customers come to us for our yond figuring that there were more he figures in a dealer’s 35 percent mar- ing exposure with both the consumer product’s reputation,” Schlemowitz people like us who are willing to pay gin, little if any profit is left. For that public and potential dealers,” he said, said. “They’ve seen our bikes on the a bit more for something made by reason, Walling said he greatly prefers adding that his full-suspension and trails and roads, and appreciate the someone that really cares about what doing customer-direct business. 29er models have been really taking style, personality and ride.”

lege, he spotted an ad Unemployed but un- “To me, bikes were so beautiful. I Richard Sachs in New York’s Village daunted, “I went to the had this vision of them being made in Cycles Voice for a wrenching library and wrote to 25 some antiseptic arena with tile floors, job in Vermont. With to 30 bike makers in by people in lab coats. I had no idea Chester, Connecticut confidence that only England and France, it was a labor-intensive job by people Years in Business: 32 a bike-crazy 18-year- basically saying ‘Will in dirty shop aprons on floors coated Number of Employees: 1 old could muster, “I work for food to learn with metal filings,” he laughed. t makes you ponder predestination: bought a one-way about bike making,’” he Not a formal understudy, “I glom- A serendipitous series of naïve but Greyhound ticket to said. med as much information as I could I gutsy decisions set Richard Sachs, Burlington thinking Amazingly, Witcomb and picked up basics, but I was not a beginning bike racer just out of high I’d go up and ace this Cycles of London wrote there being taught so much as exposed. school, on the road to becoming one job. When I got there, back, “We’d love to have No way did I come out of there a frame of America’s pre-eminent custom bike they looked at me like you.” Using college tu- maker,” Sachs said. builders. I was crazy,” Sachs ition money, he went. Tuition money running low, he re- With time to fill before entering col- said. Richard Sachs It was an eye-opener. turned to New Jersey, but soon joined

34 Bicycle Retailer & Industry News • March 1, 2007 www.bicycleretailer.com Bruce Gordon Cycles Last year for the North Baylis Cycles Cycles. The venture lasted about two American Handmade Bi- years. Howard moved on and joined Petaluma, California La Mesa, California cycle Show, Gordon con- Medici in Los Angeles, but Baylis Years in Business: 31 Years in Business: 30 structed a tubular titanium wanted to make his own frames. Number of Employees: Besides Bruce, Number of Employees: Just cantilever brake that was Baylis, in his early 50s, estimates one part-time employee the owner such a hit, he decided to he has built anywhere from 300 to t’s no surprise that Bruce Gordon make a CNC’d aluminum version. rian Baylis is the first to admit 500 frames in his lifetime—a lot less has a good sense of humor. He is, “I like making new designs of parts he’s not a modern or techno- than most custom framebuilders. I after all, the “co-dictator” of SOP- that have a more classic aesthetic than Blogically savvy guy. “I like to “There’s no way to make large WAMTOS (Society of People Who many of the parts made today. They stay in the past in some ways, while numbers the way I work,” he said, Actually Make Their Own Shit), a look better on classic lugged frames,” still refining my work,” he said. “I adding that the minimum time he tongue-in-cheek club that recognizes he noted. haven’t changed and adapted to puts into a frame is 80 hours. But he individuals and companies in the bike Although he occasionally works with some modern looks and some mod- has put in up to 120 hours on a single industry with spoof awards modeled titanium and aluminum, Gordon’s ma- ern materials.” frame. after the Razzies. While technology is progressive, Aside from custom framebuild- Still, his assessment of the that doesn’t mean new product is ing, Baylis also has a paint business, financial condition of most always better than older product, he where he does mostly restoration, handmade framebuilders is said. And Baylis is unconventional painting and frame repairs of collect- candid and insightful. in other ways as well. ible vintage Italian, French and early “I should have been a “I don’t give a damn about profit American lightweight road frames. plumber,” he said. “Making or business. I loathe the term busi- Because of the time he spends Handmade Business bikes in this country on a ness. I’m anti-advertising. I’m an painting, and the time he devotes small level is a really tough odd duck,” he admitted. to each frame he builds, Baylis pro- way to make a living.” Baylis, who describes himself as duces only about two to 10 frames a Gordon, 58, has been in the an advanced hobbyist, learned the year. business of building bikes for craft of framebuilding in 1973 as one Upon occasion he cuts and shapes 33 years—31 years as owner of the earliest Americans hired dur- dropouts by hand but he always of Bruce Gordon Cycles. Be- ing the startup of Masi USA, where shapes his own lugs. Even his paint fore starting his company he he worked at two different times for colors can’t be easily reproduced spent two years as vice presi- Bruce Gordon a total of three years. since he doesn’t do paint formulas or dent of Eisentraut Bicycles in charts, so touchups Oakland, California, where he learned terial of choice is steel. “I guess I’m just become impracti- how to build frames in 1974. traditional,” he said. cal. “It is very hard to compete with the This year, Don Walker, founder of His material of big boys—especially when their stuff the NAHBS, is providing Gordon with choice: vintage is made in Taiwan or China,” Gordon floor space to show a retrospective dis- steel. “I don’t use said. play of his work, a collection that will modern lightweight Although Gordon knows the chal- include 23 bikes and five frames dating thin wall very of- lenges of being an independent frame- back to 1974. ten, if ever,” he said. builder, he chooses to continue be- The display will feature lugged, ti- “Nowadays, I like cause he enjoys designing and building tanium, road, track and touring bikes, vintage standard things. plus a chopper he built in 1994. Gor- retro type of mate- Gordon, who specializes in custom don will also showcase a 29er he built rials.” His specialty lugged frames and touring bikes, builds in 1990—perhaps the first 29er ever is fixed gear, track between 40 and 100 frames per year, made. Brian Baylis and traditional road along with racks and other component “The North American Handmade bikes. parts. Chris Hayes, formerly of Ibis Cy- Bicycle Show is a perfect place to bring Masi’s painter took him under his While he has a three-year backlog cles, drops in once or twice a week to out all the bicycles I’ve made for myself wing as an apprentice. He started and has to turn down orders, Bay- assist with welding. over all these years, all of which I still off building wheels and assembling lis still attends the Handmade Bike “I have spent my career trying to re- ride,” Gordon said. bikes, but within a couple of weeks Show not to sell bikes, but to be part fine my products and come up with new “I think the cyclists, engineers and he had moved on to other tasks. of a community. designs. A few years ago I got back into designers who come to the show will “Apparently I was good enough “I go because I’m a figure and rep- making fancy lugged frames, which is enjoy seeing a few decades’ worth of to learn other jobs,” he said. “I was resentative of craftsmanship in an what I did exclusively for the first 16 techniques and styles in handmade lucky in that everything I did was ac- age of old-school framebuilding” he years of my career,” Gordon said. frames,” he added. cepted. So I kept learning.” said. “I have to be there to represent In between his stints at Masi, Baylis the fact that there is another way to Witcomb USA, his mentors’ new im- Cycles in late 1975,” he said. and Mike Howard, a friend and fel- do the bike thing. There isn’t any port branch in Chester, Connecticut. A racer himself, he already knew low Masi alumni, launched Wizard money, but it’s a different direction.” “It imploded pretty quickly; Wit- riders who needed frames. Sachs had comb wasn’t sending enough frames. orders before he lit his first torch as an frame at a rate of about eight to 10 Taiwan, both for his own use and as a The boss said to me and Peter Weigle independent. per month. supplier to other makers. ‘You’re going to make frames. Get some “I took a proactive approach to mag- “The last thing I wanted to deal More recently, he and famed Ital- torches,’” Sachs said. (Weigle had also azine advertising—Velonews, Bicycling, with was ‘How fast, how many, how ian bike maker Dario Pegoretti col- worked with Witcomb and is still a Bicycle Guide—everything,” Sachs said. quickly are you going to get a help- laboratively designed tubesets specif- frame maker himself.) Favorable product reviews, numer- er?’ All I wanted was to be left alone ically for builders who use lugs and Sachs improved his craft, but soured ous magazine articles and, more re- and make my bikes and make them braze frames, then persuaded Italy’s on the job. cently, complimentary postings on the better,” Sachs said. Columbus to make them. “I didn’t have the stomach to see Internet kept orders flowing. Frame making is the core business, “I got my first set of 70 tubes last such a fun thing made all business. It For three decades, he’s stuck to one but he’s long sold peripherals such as August, and it’s the best thing to hap- was taking all the love and passion out clear principle: he works alone, with- softgoods, and five years ago added pen to us artisan builders in the past of it, so I left and started Richard Sachs out assistants, personally building each lugs that he designs and has cast in 10 or 15 years,” Sachs said. www.bicycleretailer.com Bicycle Retailer & Industry News • March 1, 2007 35