Selling bicycles, especially in a city with distinct and temperamental seasons, like Chicago, is a highly cyclical business.
We get unceremoniously shaken out of our winter slumber by the throngs of cyclists who one day simply decide that biking season has arrived, and who continue their relentless onslaught from the early days of spring right through the hottest weeks of summer, and sometimes even into early fall. Then they forget about us for a few weeks.
That violent assault, however, has the unintended result of making our bike shop staff extremely cranky, if not downright surly, by sometime in August. It also makes the shop itself a rather sorry sight, as if a dog had chewed it and decided it wasn't to his liking.
We are truly in sad shape.
And, believe it or not, what recharges our batteries every single year, is the trade show. Yes, we find solace, release, even inspiration, in the annual bike extravanganza known as Interbike, and, though we complain, we dutifully travel to Las Vegas every September, where we talk too much, eat too much, drink too much, and sleep to little. And then, after returning to Chicago, we use the winter time to slowly rise, like the phoenix, from our own ashes, and re-create ourselves as a fully functioning bike shop to face yet another season.
What about Interbike has this amazing power?
It's not the stuff. It's never about the stuff.
Sometimes the stuff represents ideas, but these ideas come from people. And meeting people, people who live and create bike culture, from all over the country is what we go to the trade show to do.
People like Laura.
(Laura is lightyears ahead of me in cycling footwear)
Chris was hanging out at a vendor booth, filling out some forms with my name, when a woman happened to glance over his shoulder "That wouldn't be Justyna who writes the Chicago Bike Blog, would it?"
(wow! someone knows me!....)
Turns out that Laura used to work in a bicycle shop in San Diego. Customers, especially "non-cyclists", used to love to come and see her there, because she, well, essentially, she treated them nicely. She didn't treat them like "customers" (ie. people on the other end of a deal).
She aksed them about their needs and concerns, about their fears and their dreams. She explained to them the terminology that other bike shop personnel took for granted. With frankness and empathy, she discussed issues like pain, weight, fitness level, saddle comfort. Through simple dialog, she began to dispell their fears, and lift the veil on their dreams.
It turns out, that perhaps the middle-aged, slightly heavy woman, did not see herself tooling around on a comfort-hybrid on a Sunday afternoon. She dreamt of leaning over the handlebars in a sleek jersey, cruising for miles on an open road. The athletic guy in a baseball t-shirt didn't want to jump boulders in the woods. He wanted a simple bike he could ride one-handed to the ballpark along a quiet neighborhood street. The student in torn jeans didn't want a cheap fixie. He was planning all aspects of an efficient commute to his new job at a law firm.
Unfortunately, Laura's boss did not share her enthusiasm for finding out about people. He wanted her to sell bikes. Only he called them "units". Laura wanted to solve problems, and to build relationships; he prized the sale of a "unit" today, over the value of a lifetime of loyalty.
So Laura left, and went into business for herself. And I wish her great success, because she has a lot to offer.
But it makes me a bit sad. Sad for the shop owner, who may have missed the opportunity to make his business extraordinary. We, as bicycle shop representatives, are at the forefront of
bike culture in our communities, and have a genuine opportunity to shape
that culture. If we really expect new people to come to cycling and
embrace it as part of their lives, we have to make them feel at home at
a bike shop. We can't bombard them with technical details or overwhelm them with products before we have extended the courtesy of learning a little bit about them.
For heaven's sake, let's not "convert" them. Let's listen to their
questions, concerns, ideas and fears. Let's not translate their needs
into dollars, and immediately turn them into Customers.
Let's earn their trust, and see if they'll tell us their dreams.
