As Kucharik Goes, So Has The World Of Bicycling Gone

Steel to aluminum to carbon.

Hand-built wheels to boutique wheelsets.

Hubs and freewheels to freehubs and cassettes.

Quill stems to threadless; threaded headsets to threadless.

The "baselines" for bikes and components have changed so much in the past couple of decades.  While some of those changes are beneficial to some cyclists, too many simply added cost and complication for others.

Those changes have also brought innovators and investors with deeper pockets than the mom-and-pop operations that dominated cycling until the 1980s.  One way you can see what I mean is to look at the sponsors of riders and teams:  Jerseys in the 1960s and 1970s bore the names of local or regional enterprises like Molteni and the bikes and components were made by companies (or sometimes individuals) that were involved mainly, or solely, in the bike industry.  Now bike and component makers tend to be parts of larger conglomerates, and sponsors include them as well as large companies (like Coca-Cola) that have little or nothing to do with the design or manufacture of bikes or parts.

Like all changes, the ones I've mentioned have brought casualties, if you will.  Some once-revered bike, component and accessory makers no longer fabricate their wares in Europe, Japan or the United States--or might build one or two of their most expensive models in their home country while outsourcing the manufacture of their mass-market goods to low-wage countries.  Still others are no longer in the bike business--or in business at all.  

And then there are smaller (what might be called "niche" in other industries) enterprises that ended when the main or sole proprietor--or even employee--retired, died or simply wouldn't or couldn't change with the rest of the industry.  I think in particular of small-scale frame builders like Ron Cooper and Brian Bayliss who had small but devoted followings.

Another change came with the ones I've mentioned. When I first became a dedicated cyclist, nearly half a century ago, high-mileage cyclists almost always wore wool--year round.  Those black shorts you see on cyclists from the 70s were made from it; so were there jerseys.   That, of course, is why bike kit of that time wasn't as flashy as today's:  Since colors and patterns have to be knit into wool, it's much more difficult (if not impossible) to include some of the intricate (or busy) graphics and loud colors you see on the "billboard" jerseys and matching shorts (or bibs) of today.      

During the North American Bike Boom of the 1970s, some companies got into the business of making bike clothing.  Most are gone now--offhand, I can think of Protogs and Weyless.  And there were the European, mostly Italian, makers. One reason the American apparel makers--aside from one I'll mention--didn't last more than a few years was that many cyclists had an attitude expressed by one shop employee I encountered:  "Buy right, buy Italian."  Also, Weyless (which made some nice components) claimed their wool clothes wouldn't shrink.  Well, shrink they did, and it's said that the warranty claims torpedoed a business that was already sinking as the tide of the Bike Boom receded. 

And, honestly, most of the Italian clothes fit (at least folks like me in those days) better. But one American company, almost entirely unknown save to dedicated cyclists, made wool shorts, jerseys, arm and leg warmers and other apparel that were better-constructed with higher-quality wool.

That company was based, seemingly incongruously, in Southern California.  Well, that location seems incongruous to anyone who doesn't understand wool:  Because it wicks moisture, it helps to keep you cooler.  And it keeps more of its insulating qualities than other materials when wet.  That is why it's been worn by people who live in areas that experience both extreme heat and cold, as well as other kinds of harsh weather.

John Kucharik Jr. has been extolling those virtues for the past 50 years.  He's about to turn 69 and, he says, he promised his wife they would "travel and do some stuff." So, although his company's sales grew during the pandemic, he is about to close the business his father, who died at age 93 in 2008, founded 88 years ago. 

That anyone can keep a business going for that long, with the family's surname, while making products that changed little, if at all, is an achievement.  And he's done it with the same workforce--seven people--for the past thirty years.  That, I think, may be a reason why he's closing up rather than selling out:  They're "my family," he says.  "I tell people:  They don't work for me; I work for them."

It will be sad to lose one of the last companies to make bike apparel from wool, or any other natural material (e.g., cotton and leather in the gloves).  But the cycling world will lose something else:  a place that repairs bike bibs, shorts and other items.  "I don't make money on repairs," Kucharik explains,  "I just do it because I do it.  My dad did it; I did it."  Their repairs include replacing or re-sewing pads and fixing zippers.  "[T]hese guys pay $200, $250, $300 for a bib short. They ride it once and they can't ride it again.  A bike shop doesn't want it back."  He said his shop was averaging about 40 such items--none made by his company--a week.

The closing of Kucharik Bicycle Clothing company also is another change in the bike industry.  Call me a cynic, but the more expensive bike clothes (and other items) become, the less durable they are.  And the bike industry has become more like the fashion industry and others in that it seems more oriented to affluent cyclists who won't ride a jersey, a pair of shorts or bibs--or a bike--for more than a season.

 

   

Flying Fish, Submerged To The Depths In The Sunshine State

I am usually sad to see a mom-and-pop bike shop close for the same reasons I lament the loss of most independent book stores:  They are the source of a family's ( or a person's or community's) pride as well as livelihood.  But, too often, those closures are inevitable.

Such, it seems, is the case of Flying Fish Bikes in Tampa, Florida.   Opened in 1963 as Dud Thames Bicycles, it has served generations of the area's cycling community.   But even the area's year-round climate for cycling wasn't enough to keep it going into another decade.

Two of the usual culprits were blamed:  mismanagement and the proliferation of online retailers.  Indeed, some people who showed up for the auction of Flying Fish's remaining inventory admitted that they do most, if not all, of their shopping via touchscreens. 

But there were two other factors in Flying Fish's demise that caught my attention.  One is the machinations of a much larger retailer.  Now, the big-box stores like Wal-Mart can be blamed for the loss of some shops' sales, but one would think that even if people bought all of their bikes and accessories, for their kids or themselves, at Wally World, at some point they'd need a real bike shop for service.  

Unfortunately, such people might visit a bike shop once or twice, and may not spend very much money.  Still, the "big boxes" I'm talking about aren't just the retail behemoths we see along the interstates.  Instead, I'm talking about the giants of the cycling industry.  Though they are miniscule in comparison to Walmart and other mega-corporations, a few of the largest players in the bicycle industry can have the same power to destroy independent bike shops that the "big box" stores have to annihilate smaller shops that sell hardware, clothing and just about anything else.

The giant that vanquished Flying Fish is not just a giant in the industry: It's Giant.  In 2012, Giant Bicycle, Inc., made a deal in which Flying Fish owner Francis Kane agreed to buy and sell $120,000 of their bicycles in the Spring of 2013.

In a subsequent lawsuit, Kane said that Giant agreed to promote Flying Fish as the dominant Giant dealer in the area.  Moreover, Kane said, Giant did not disclose that it was planning to terminate its relationship with Flying Fish and open a "concept" store nearby.   

After a two-year court battle, a jury awarded Kane $250,000 in compensatory damages and $3 million in punitive damages in September 2015.  But even such a settlement ultimately wasn't enough to keep Flying Fish in business:  Giant countersued for the $120,000 in inventory Kane didn't pay for, as well as "compensatory" damages.  And, of course, there were legal fees. (Contrary to public perception, few people get rich by winning lawsuits.)

The court battle, though, wasn't the only thing to ground Flying Fish.  Performance Bicycles opened a mega-store in the area.  Last year, the company went bankrupt, but their Tampa store was falling to another force that contributed to the demise of Flying Fish.  Some would argue that it was an even bigger factor than the Internet, the business practices of Giant or big-box stores.

Even though cities all over the US are building bike lanes and starting bike-share programs, the number of people who commute by bike fell from a high of 904,463 in 2014 to 872,000 three years later, according to American Community Survey.  In the Tampa Bay area, the decline was even more precipitous:   According to ACS, the number of people who ride their bikes to work fell by 50 percent.  That, even as the League of American Bicyclists declared Tampa and St. Petersberg "Bike Friendly Communities" in 2016 and 2017, respectively.


One probable reason for that was, ironically, expressed by some of the people who showed up at the Flying Fish auction.  They said that they never depended, or stopped depending, on their bikes for transportation because doing so is "too dangerous."  If they ride, they stick to pre- or post-work training rides on bike lanes, or they drive with their bikes to ride in other places.

Their perceptions have some basis.  As I've mentioned in other posts, Florida has, by far, the highest per capita death rate among cyclists in the United States.  And the Tampa Bay area's statistics are in line with the rest of the state, meaning that a cyclist has a much greater chance of being killed there than in almost any other part of the nation.  I've never cycled in the Tampa Bay area, but my experiences of cycling in other parts of the Sunshine State make it easy for me to see why there's such a high mortality rate, and why, even though there are many casual or recreational cyclists, few people depend on their bikes for transportation.  It's one thing to go for "fun" rides on trails and bike lanes; it's another to navigate, day in and day out, roads with no shoulders or sidewalks and 55 MPH speed limits--and drivers who, usually, haven't cycled since childhood, if they ever rode at all.

So, while the Internet, big-box retailers and shady practices by one of the "giants" of their own industry may well have led to the closure of Flying Fish Bikes, it might have ultimately been done in because, as we have seen, a thriving bicycle culture doesn't exist without people who depend on their bikes to get to school or work, to shop or to get to the places where they get their entertainment or other social interactions.  No declaration of "bicycle friendliness" from the LAB or anyone else can make it otherwise.