Shortly after arriving in San Francisco in July, I met Zack Rosen and Matt Cheney (founding partners at the web-development company Chapter Three LLC) through my girlfriend Aimee and her brother / Zack's roommate Tony. Matt, Zack, and I had a mutual fascinations with aesthetically beautiful custom fixed gear bikes, and in conversation we started wondering why bike companies didn't seemed to pay them much attention. For my first couple months in San Francisco, when we got together we would usually end up talking a big game about how awesome it would be to start a company to build and sell these beautiful bikes.

The time is now

In the last week of August, right before Matt and Zack left for a two week company retreat in Mexico, we took the conversation to Zeitgeist and started getting down to business. Pitchers were ordered, great big bike company ideas started flowing, bad company names were proposed, and business plans were scribbled on soggy napkins. Matt and Zack agreed to put up the money for our first run of bikes, and I started working out what it would take to really get this company off the ground.

The basic idea was simple. We were going to build high quality fixed gear city bikes with no visible branding and custom matched paint jobs. We would build a small run of bikes, see if we could sell them to friends, and take it from there.

Interbike

While on the phone with my old boss Jason Reser, the owner of Reser Bicycle Outfitters, he suggested that I attend Interbike Conference to get the pulse on the bike undustry and to meet with parts distributors and manufacturers. Interbike is the biggest bicycle convention in the world and a perfect venue to start the relationships we needed to get our company off the ground. Going was a great idea, but the show was only a couple weeks away and all we had for our company was a previously soggy napkin with lots of big unspecified ideas. Everyone hustled to get me prepared to go and my plane ticket was booked a day before Interbike would get under way (I would have been taking a greyhound if Expedia didn't pull through with the $200 plane ticket).

After a short flight and a quick shuttle ride to the Sands Convention Center I met up with Jason Reser to start the tour of the show. The show floor was packed with booths and the size of the convention center made it nearly impossible to navigate unless you have a map. Over the next few days I found my way around, met with many companies, and made several key contacts required to get Mission Bicycles up and running. The show was a wonderful experience. Special thanks to Jason Reser for letting me crash in his hotel room and thanks to Jon Shell of Orbea Bicycles for the excellent dinner at the Venetian!

Building a Bicycle Shop

Meet Christina, our awesome small-business banker.

The day after arriving back from Interbike (last Friday) we went to Bank of America (2701 Mission St.) to up a business checking account for Mission Bicycles so we could start making parts orders. Christina Mena, their small business banker, was really helpful and got us get set up in no time.

The afternoon still had plenty in store. Mission Bicycles is being set up in the Chapter Three offices, and we needed to construct some workbenches and shelves. Zack, Matt and myself made a shopping list and headed to the hardware store. After getting together all the lumber, an employee cut everything to length for us. After a long day, we dropped everything off at the shop and headed home.

We're setting up the bike work area by the kitchen area. It will be a lot more fun when we have bike parts lying around everywhere.

The next day, after purchasing the workbench materials, Zack, Matt, and myself began construction of the benches. The benches were a basic frame and assembled really quickly. When working with bikes, there are a variety of small parts that can be mis-placed quickly if the shop is not in order, so I started a shopping list for parts storage.

Starting the business

9PM Tuesday in SF = 1PM Wednesday in Taipei. This is John is calling the frame manufacturer from Zack's dining room table.

This past few days has been a blur. We're getting all the paperwork filed and accounts set up at manufacturers, getting the shop in working order, and getting ready for a full court press getting the word out about the bikes. We've been working until midnight most nights and I am getting pretty beat, but am more excited each day we get closer to getting these bicycles built.

More later!