FEATURE SOUL SEARCHING
US bike brand Specialized has been making some notable cutbacks and changes to its business.
Rebecca Bland explores how the company is changing its philosophy for the modern world
Fanie Kok, from Specialized trail-building initiative, Soil Searching
quality, diversity and inclusion: three buzz words currently in the industry, and for good reason. In a time when getting more people onto bikes is imperative for several reasons, the industry should be doing all it can to reach a wider audience. One brand taking this to heart is Specialized, in global initiatives aiming to get more people on bikes in their own ways. Soil Searching, for example, celebrates and supports trail builders and advocates across the globe. It’s run by Fanie Kok, who set the programme up to help the brand be more “involved in engaging” with the communities it relies on – mountain bikers and trail builders, as he explained.
E
New paths “We realised there’s a massive disconnect between the people who we fundamentally depend on as an industry, a sport and recreation,” Kok said.
“That’s essentially how Soil Searching started. Obviously, there’s a play on the words ‘soul searching’ and it is literally searching for the soul of mountain biking, which, in essence, is the trail.
34 | May 2023 “If you elaborate a little bit more, it’s everything that has
to fall in place for that trail to be there: communities, the advocates who have to lobby, the trail builders who have to physically work with their hands to make it happen. I guess the mission statement of soil searching is to recognise, celebrate and support the unsung heroes of mountain biking.” Soil Searching provides support in several ways to trail builders and advocates across the globe. Rather than just throwing free kit at them, the initiative sees Kok provide personalised support, from financial stipends to dig days, which Specialized staff get involved with themselves. In the future, he suggests it will take more of a community-focused approach.
“Soil searching will eventually evolve into our connection with our communities. At the moment, it’s perceived as trail building, but in essence, it is community building within mountain biking. Then, how the trails themselves and the people looking after the trails can also play a role in conservation and environmental causes. How do we then try and evolve from trail advocacy to almost trail activism? Then there’s also the social aspect of it all which is very important.”
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