MICROMOBILITY
Dutch e-bike brand Knaap aims to appeal to a wider audience than conventional bike brands
TWO YEARS ON A
n amazing journey,” said Steven May, two years after Knaap Bikes picked up the Innovation from a Newcomer trophy at the 2020 BikeBiz Awards.
May, UK country manager at JDM Products, the distributor
of Dutch e-bike brand Knaap Bikes, said winning in the BikeBiz Awards was a key step in the company’s development: “The award did a huge amount for us, the first part would be awareness in the cycling industry, then the engagement because of the awareness,” May told BikeBiz. “Over the course of the last year and a half, we’ve now got 150 dealers around the country.” The brand also has a number of sports, entertainment, and social media stars on board, including footballers Phil Foden and Virgil van Dijk, and rapper Tinie Tempah. “They are all people who you wouldn’t have thought would ride bikes,” May said. “That’s kind of our positioning, to try and take the visual impact of a Knaap bike. “What I try really hard to do is help dealers understand
40 | December 2022
JDM Products’ Steven May tells Rebecca Morley what Knaap Bikes has been up to since winning Innovation from a Newcomer at the 2020 BikeBiz Awards
the marketing element of what we’re trying to achieve. How I explain it is we teach, train and coach our partners - that’s teach them a new way to work, train and practise what we’re doing, and then coach from the sidelines on how to improve it. “Because our bike is different and our seat is not a saddle, we need people to sit on it and see the difference.”
Niche to norm May continued: “The Knaap bikes have now been seen throughout the UK by pretty much all cycle store owners, with riders in all cities around the country, and we have brought the brand and 20 x 4 bike style from niche into the norm. “These store owners can see that Knaap Bikes are a growing
sector, particularly in the category of people that have either previously stepped away from riding or are coming into it for health, wellbeing, and wellness reasons.” Both of Knaap Bikes’ models, the AMS (non-suspension) and the RTD (full suspension) can accommodate up to 28
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