Newcomer Business of the Year: Savannah Slow Ride pedals past obstacles to success

At least four people must pedal to power Savannah Slow Ride’s quadricycles along the city’s flat streets.
To get the contraption going, though, took just two.
Samantha Meier and Keith Snyder started their unorthodox tour company along with a sister business that manufactures the quadricycles 22 months ago. Yet in the last year they’ve grown from a two-person operation with two working quadricycles to a popular tour operator with a staff of 10, six leg-powered vehicles and a backlog of orders from out-of-town companies for their handmade “crawlers.”
Their growth and success came in a year in which they faced several challenges from city officials, led by former city manager Rochelle Small-Toney. Government leaders considered limiting their downtown routes, banning alcohol consumption onboard the crawlers and requiring a wide array of safety equipment.
“Basically, we spent half the year fighting for our own survival and the other half growing into a viable business,” Meier said. “It’s been interesting.”
Meier and Snyder’s perseverance on what has been an uphill ride makes Savannah Slow Ride and Crawler Fabrications our choice for “Newcomer Business of the Year.”
From idea to reality
The Savannah Slow Ride idea is unique but not original.
Meier discovered the touring quadricycle in 2010 while visiting family in Milwaukee, Wis. She was out for drinks at a tavern when the vehicle creeped by on a pub crawl. She chased it down the street and claimed a seat.
“I got on and had a blast,” Meier said.
Meier’s experience intrigued Snyder, her significant other. A marine engineer by trade and a tinkerer by nature, he researched the crawler and found they were popular in Europe. Invented by a Dutch bar owner in 1997, more than 100 bikes operate today, many in beer meccas such as the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.
Those crawlers were all built overseas. So was the one Meier rode in Milwaukee.
Snyder recognized an opportunity. Not only could he and Meier start a crawler tour operation in Savannah, but they could also manufacture the discount bike parts. Before long, crawler sketches covered the whiteboard in his office aboard the Diamond Casino cruise boat.
“There was a lot of downtime in that job,” said Snyder, the ship’s engineer.
Once he mastered the quadricycle’s mechanics, Snyder reached out to a friend who works as a metal fabricator in Myrtle Beach, S.C. The friend helped Snyder identify and acquire the necessary parts to build a bike. Another friend offered Snyder his backyard as a makeshift assembly area.
He assembled the first chinese wholesale bike in August 2010. Snyder and Meier, who was working in a local restaurant at the time, moved into their current headquarters and bike shop downtown later that year. They picked February 2011 to launch their business.
“We had a hidden agenda,” Snyder said. “Sam and I wanted to do something together. I wanted off the casino boat, and she wanted out of the restaurant.”
Build on momentum
Interest in the Savannah Slow Ride grew at a rocket’s pace.
Cycling enthusiasts and tourists looking for an experience beyond a motorist trolley or horse-drawn carriage embraced the crawler. Some tour customers saw the same potential in the quadricycle Snyder had. Orders for the bikes began almost immediately.
Snyder’s Crawler Fabrications has made 25 of the quadricycles in its 21 months of existence and can be found crawling the streets of Denver, Baltimore, Portland, St. Louis and Cincinnati, to name a few.
The other two U.S.-based crawler manufacturers have made one bike each, according to Snyder
“Now it’s about making it better, quicker and lighter,” he said.
Meier is just as busy in the office as Snyder is on the shop floor. The squabble with the city — and the headlines it made — boosted Savannah Slow Ride’s profile. Demand allowed them to hire staff earlier this year, and Meier went from driving the crawler to driving business.
She’s expanded the Slow Ride’s tour offerings beyond the city’s history and pubs to include church, shopping and haunting circuits. She’s also marketed the business as an option for corporate outings, wedding parties and family reunions.
“The real challenge we face going forward is to keep the creativity going and not let people think it will be the same over and over,” Meier said.
Expansion is another Meier focus. Every crawler order Snyder receives from a new customer is a reminder quadricycle tours are a growth industry. She’s identified several “virgin markets” where the crawlers would have the best chance of success — cities with compact historic or entertainment districts.
“Now it’s a matter of figuring out the best approach,” Meier said. “We like challenges. As our experience has shown, if we want something, we get it.”
BEST OF SAVANNAH BUSINESS 2012
All this week, the Savannah Morning News will profile companies and organizations that made major contributions to the local business environment in the past year. The Exchange staff chose the honorees — from a list of nominees submitted by local business and community leaders — utilizing broad criteria, from growth and success to philanthropy and community involvement.
2012 Accomplishments: Meier and Snyder established Savannah Slow Ride in February 2010 with one quadricycle designed and built by Snyder. The business offers tours of the historic district on the “pedal-powered contraption” and was a hit not just with visitors but with entrepreneurs elsewhere. Snyder has built 24 quadricycles through his Crawler Fabrications brand since the prototype hit Savannah’s streets, selling 19 of those to start-up operators out of town.
The couple began to expand Savannah Slow Ride early this year. They added 10 staffers and five quadricycles and Meier developed themed quadricycle tours, including those featuring Savannah’s favorite haunted sites, fashion boutiques and churches.
Meier and Snyder also prevailed in a dustup with city officials over passenger safety and tour routes in 2012. Former City Manager Rochelle Small-Toney and a few members of City Council expressed concerns over pedalers consuming alcohol during tours, the safety equipment on the quadricycles and the impact of the crawlers’ routes on vehicle traffic. Those issues were resolved without doing harm to Savannah Slow Ride’s business.

‘Bike Angel’ Turns Old Bikes Into Christmas Cheer For Burbank Kids

BURBANK (CBSLA.com) — For most kids, there is nothing quite like finding a new bicycle under the tree on Christmas morning.
KNX 1070′s Diane Thompson reports the “Bike Angel of Burbank” is behind an effort to turning old bikes into a holiday blessing.
Elaine Pease, a Building Division inspector for the city of Burbank, started a small project in 2008 to restore used bicycle parts wholesale and answer the Christmas wishes of children in the San Fernando Valley.
Since then, the program has expanded under the direction of Pease to 50 “Bike Angel” volunteers restoring and refurbishing 200 bikes in 2012.
Pease said what makes the year-round effort so rewarding is the reaction she sees from struggling families who receive a bicycle through the program.
“I’ve seen war whoops of delight, I’ve seen tears of joy, I’ve seen parents who break into tears and hug me, and it’s things like that that make working with this program all year round absolutely more than worthwhile,” said Pease.
Pease first came up with the idea after seeing gift requests from children that were hanging from the Salvation Army’s “Angel Giving Tree” in the lobby of the city Administrative Services Building.
While Pease had never refurbished a discount bike parts before, she said the program immediately drew volunteers from the Burbank Police Officers Association, who provided bikes, tools, and money to purchase helmets and locks.
The program also received help from Burbank Fire Fighters Association 778, including donations for seats, tires, and grips.
“We’ll take a bike and we’ll clean it, we’ll assess it, we’ll change out any parts it needs, tubes, tires, seats, grips, whatever,” Pease said. “We’ll go through it completely and then we’ll detail it so it looks like new.”
Donated bikes range from BMX bikes and cruisers to bicycles for young children to ride.
Anyone who would like to donate to the Bike Angel program is asked to call the Burbank Recycle Center at (818) 238-3900 or visit the city’s website for more information.

Telford designer Levi’s clothing line hits fashion big time

An aspiring designer from Shropshire has hit the big time in the fashion world – after being asked to sell his clothes in London by one of the biggest names on the High Street.
Levi Thomas, 22, from St Georges in Telford, was contacted by officials at Topshop to see if he would like a space in their flagship Oxford Circus store in the capital to sell his clothes.
He travelled down to London last weekend for the launch of his Monroe Apparel line, which went on sale yesterday.
The former Lord Silkin and New College pupil said: “It was really good. There was a lot of people there from all over the world and some high fashion labels too.
“There were people from fashion labels in Russia and France. It was amazing.
“Topshop contacted me and it just went from there really. Basically, they lend me space and then take a percentage of my sales.
“Hopefully they will sell quite well and I will be able to roll this out across more stores across the country.”
Mr Thomas has managed to make his major breakthrough while working from home in Telford.
He said: “I’ve been working from home just drawing and sorting everything else out from here.
“We are hopefully moving into some offices soon, but we will still be based in Telford.”
Mr Thomas has been selling his mens clothes china wholesale through his online shop for almost four years and has set aside some special items for Topshop.
He said: “There will be a few things that you can only get online, a few things you can get in both the store and online, and some things only available in Topshop.”
His first piece of clothing was a picture of Marilyn Monroe, which is where his label got it’s name, but he said he has moved on from then.
“I used to create T-shirts with pictures and I’d put them together to make the piece to put on the shirt,” he said.
“But now there are so many people doing that it’s just got a bit boring.
“They will just take some pictures off the internet and stick them on a T-shirt.
“There’s no fun in seeing someone wearing something you can find on the internet. I prefer to draw my art now and put it onto a T-shirt that way – it just makes me feel like I can connect with the person who is wearing my art.
“If I see someone wearing my shirts it’s almost as if I’ve walked up to them and drawn on them.”
But it took Mr Thomas a while to find his feet before really breaking into the fashion world.
He said: “I’ve been doing it since I was 16 but I never knew how to get things manufactured and how to go about doing it the right way.
“When I was 18 I started seeing how people reacted to my wholesale women dresses and started playing a lot more and being a bit more creative.
“I have always been quite passionate about being creative and art.
“I used to watch quite a lot of films, especially films from Japan.
“I haven’t really got any influences in the fashion world, apart from maybe one. They’re called Lazy Oaf, and they started underground and built themselves up – they’re not obvious cartoons but they’ve not gone back on themselves either.”
But when it comes to the world of art, there are a lot more influences that spring to mind for Mr Thomas.
He said: “I wouldn’t call my dad an influence necessarily, but he was quite a good artist. He is the one who put all the art around me, especially in the films.
“I really like Yoshitomo Nara and quite a few other Japanese artists, but at the same time I like lots of other artists. There’s too many to name.
Back in school, I was always into art and I thought, what better way to get it out there than by putting it on T-shirts.
“My favourite piece I’ve done at the moment is one of a Bambi like figure with a cap on and axes underneath it.
“On the cap it says ‘revenge’ and I like to think people will think of Bambi going to look for revenge for his mother being killed.
“I think there is a bit of sense of humour in it so I like it.”

Lacoste imagines some truly techy clothing

Good news: An eye-opening concept video by Lacoste teases fashion from the future. Bad news: The unreal wear will still probably cost an arm and a leg.
In the video below, Lacoste suggests a shirt with a dynamic sleeve that can run long or short depending on the wearer's mood.
(Credit: Screenshot by Christopher MacManus/CNET)
Regardless of my clothing brand preference, I can't help but get when excited major players in fashion tease a future filled with techy wholesale women dresses that change color or size with a flick of the wrist.
To celebrate the 80th anniversary of the Polo shirt in 2013, Lacoste collaborated with ad agency Mnstr on a video that envisions a future in which the high-end shirts contain some extraordinary technology.
In the short clip, the French apparel company teases several exciting possibilities such as being able to resize clothing with a simple tug, or change the color of a shirt with a swipe across the alligator logo. Another scene shows a group of people riding bikes down the street while their shirts glow neon-bright.
While this is all but a concept for now, some of these ideas don't seem too far-fetched given our previous stories about the intersection of fashion and technology. Considering the rate of miniaturization going on with components and the explosion of nanotechnology research, some of these futuristic features could show up in a department store near you before long.
For more on this subject, check out the below gallery, which looks at a techy fashion exhibit in Vienna earlier this year that featured some actual chinese fashion mens clothing infused with gadgetry.

H&M Becomes First Fashion Company to Launch Global Clothes-Recycling

Is H&M doing some damage control? In the wake of a Swedish broadcast that accused it of facilitating sweatshop-like conditions overseas, the fast-fashion giant has reaffirmed its commitment to increasing fire-safety awareness among its suppliers and their employees in garment factories in Bangladesh, announced the formalization of a human-rights policy based on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and unveiled a sustainably produced urban-cycling capsule collection for men. The retailer’s next charm offensive is a biggie: The launch of a first-of-its-kind clothing-collection initiative that spans all 48 of its markets worldwide.
RETURN TO SENDER
The company says it will help its customers avoid textile waste by accepting items of china wholesale clothing from any brand and in any condition. Beginning February, for every bag deposited, the customer will receive a voucher to put towards a future H&M purchase. The collected garments are then handled by I:Collect, a clothing-recycling firm that will reprocess the materials and make them available for new use.
The company plans to help its customers avoid textile waste by accepting items of mens clothes china wholesale from any brand and in any condition.
“Our sustainability efforts are rooted in a dedication to social and environmental responsibility,” says Karl-Johan Persson, CEO of H&M. “We want to do good for the environment, which is why we are now offering our customers a convenient solution: to be able to leave their worn-out or defective garments with H&M.”
While this doesn’t change the fact that H&M mostly traffics in disposable clothing, the retailer claims it wants to reduce the environmental impact of its garments by creating a closed loop for textiles.
There’s also a question about the recyclability of cheap, low-grade “Frankenfabrics” that contaminate natural fibers with non-biodegradable synthetics. But H&M insists that as much as 95 percent of the clothes we landfill can be reworn, reused, or recycled, depending on their condition.
H&M follows the lead of Marks & Spencer, which in April introduced a U.K.-wide clothing-recycling program, dubbed “Shwopping,” that rewards shoppers who surrender an unwanted piece of clothing every time they buy a new one.