Green Business
Feature
Bicycle shops such as Red Kite Cycles are key centres of expertise in cycling
‘Off the back of their own re-kindled love of the bike, individuals are restarting artisan cycle frame manufacture back here in the UK’
Full cycle: the return of bicycle manufacture to the West Midlands and the UK So, many will know that there was a time when the West Midlands led the world in bicycle manufacture. We can still see vestiges of this in the local business landscape with Brooks saddle makers still located in the city and Reynolds Tubing also here and still hard at work. In a virtuous circle the workforce of the area was
once building their own bikes, supporting local innovation and industry and solving the perennial question of just how we all move around. We would have ridden to work on locally built bikes from Dawes, BSA, Coventry Eagle and many more. All of that came slowly to an end last century, as poor strategy in UK manufacturing led to a range of industrial consequences – and cycling was right in the thick of it. Our cycle industry went down market when it shouldn’t have, it exported skills and manufacturing, followed by design, to leave a total lack of capacity. As with many other things, we retreated to become just an importer and consumer in the sector.
Bucking the manufacturing trend today Today’s rise and rise of cycling has had an unexpected impact. Off the back of their own re-kindled love of the bike, individuals are restarting artisan cycle frame manufacture back here in the UK. There are the
beginnings of a genuine resurgence of interest in UK designed and built bikes amongst both established and newer riders. For our part at Red Kite, aside from our retail
business we are investing in a separate manufacturing facility to build Reynolds-tubed bikes here in the West Midlands – this will see the launch of Bullfinch Cycles, the first new bike manufacturing business in the region in a generation. Although we are the only ones taking to
manufacturing locally in Birmingham and Solihull, we are not the only ones in the country doing this. There is definitely the start of something in the UK, and the longer-term potential for the sector is robust. As we launch our own business building road bikes,
the long-range goal has to be a shift from bespoke to small batch production, and then scaling up from there. And in the distant future the dream is for a return to the days when the people of the West Midlands could all genuinely choose a locally built bike and local bike builders become an integral part of a healthy West Midlands manufacturing economy. Surely that will be enough to tip employers further towards using cycle schemes to get their people riding!
Adrian Passmore is owner of Red Kite Cycles in Solihull (
www.redkitecycles.co.uk) and founder of Bullfinch Cycles (
www.bullfinch.cc)
February 2017 CHAMBERLINK 47
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