On October 27th online cycling retailer behemoth Wiggle has entered into administration due to financial turmoil at its parent company Signa Sports United.

This news sent shockwaves through the cycling industry as Wiggle is essentially the 500 pound gorilla of online cycling retail.

I spoke with industry veteran Jonathan Sherwood to try to make sense of the news.

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Rocket Espresso is a darling of the cycling world and the coffee machines could be found in every pro cycling team bus starting in the 2010s.

In the podcast I speak with Rocket Espresso founder and New Zealand native Andrew Meo about how he captured the imagination of cycling.

We also discuss Andrew's early career as an auto repair and restoration shop owner and restaurateur, how he left a profitable business in New Zealand to start Rocket Espresso in Italy together with his wife, Nicky. How they grew the brand and eventually exited in 2018.

We also dive into his latest project Box Altitude which makes high altitude simulation equipment for competitive athletes.

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Mark Hopkins is an expert in carbon fiber production and design. He spent much of his career working as a composites engineer at DuPont. In our conversation, we talk about how he came to design the three spoke bicycle wheel in 1989, which was sold by Specialized.

The wheel was a huge innovation at the time and was the first composite bicycle wheel to be commercially available. We talk about how DuPont spun off its composites business in 1995. And how he started up a factory in Spain to make bicycle wheels, which eventually became HED bicycle wheels.

Mark is currently a consultant at 3T where mark and his team are working to bring the production of their historic brand back to Italy.

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Jacob Kennison is the Communications Manager for Trek-Lidl Cycling Team. He previously held the position of press officer and had some time in the agency world for Fusion Media Services.

We dove deep into the specifics of how a pro team communicates, the technical aspects of channel strategy, social media campaigns, and an all around look at the inner workings of the marketing and communications of a cycling team.

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John Watson aka John Prolly aka The Radavist is a pioneer of online cycling content creation. His blog prollyisnotprobably.com was one of the most visited cycling blogs in the early 2010s. The site morphed into The Radavist in 2015 and sits among the top cycling blogs worldwide.

We discuss the origin of his blog and the reasons he made the transition to The Radavist. We also discuss his decision to sell the site to Pro's Closet in 2021.

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Gary Fisher is a living legend. He is widely considered one of the inventors of the modern mountain bike. He played a large part in popularizing the first ever downhill mountain bike race, the repack race.

He founded Gary Fisher Bicycles and eventually sold to TREK where he stayed on as a consultant for several years. His passion for cycling is deep and his mind is as sharp as they come.

He currently lives in the bay area of California, and it's hard to overstate how big of an impact Gary had on cycling as we know it today.

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SIDI CEO Davide Rossetti is among the most experienced managers in the cycling industry. He has worked in Sales and Marketing in multiple multinational Italian brands such as Safilo(eyewear), COIN, Cisalfa(Intersport), Invicta, AlpineStars and Northwave.

In this wide-ranging discussion, we dove into topics around career growth, distribution, collections, and his leadership strategy. We also discuss succession of family owned brands and how holding companies differ from private equity in terms of strategy.

The Italian brand SIDI Sport is among the top shoe makers for cycling and power sports for over 60 years.

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Bastian Dietz is the Director for Global Business Development for SQLab part of Boards and More GMBH.

We discuss the bankruptcy of e-bike brand VanMoof and aim to understand the reasons behind the downfall of one of the darlings of the cycling startup universe.

We talk about how their proprietary parts strategy and lack of a strong service network led to cashflow issues.

We also discuss how the problems were clearly visible on forums like Reddit and Trustpilot months before the company showed any signs of trouble.

Follow Bastian on Linkedin here

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Fergus Niland is the creative director at Santini Cycling Wear. Fergus is among the most experienced cycling clothing designers in the industry.

We dive deep into the current state of cycling clothing, how clothing for professional teams is made, and what makes a great piece of kit. We also dive into the details of Santini’s collaboration with ASO and the Tour de France.

Santini has been making premium road cycling clothing since 1965 from their headquarters in Bergamo. They are the official clothing supplier of Ironman, the UCI, Vuelta and the Tour de France. They also provide clothing for team Lidl Trek.

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Slate Olson held some of the most important marketing roles in cycling thoughout the 2010s.

He started the US office of Rapha in 2010 and then he moved to the role of CMO in 2015. He took over as CMO of Specialized in 2015, reporting directly to Mike Sinyard until 2017 when he decided to be closer to family in Portland.

Other notable roles included Sr. Brand Director at Nike and President of Chrome Industries.

He accomplished all this while being of the kindest, most sincere people in the cycling business.

Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/slate-olson-bb21171/


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