The Little Shop That Could
A huge project - an impossibe deadline!
The summer of 2025 was a whirlwind at R+E Cycles. In June, I had been discussing a huge project with a company in New York. They were asking if we could build a bicycle built for 4, for an unknown high profile client (eventually revealed to us as The New York Times), and provide a modifed bike trailer to haul a heavy cooler. By late July, they were almost ready to go. The deadline was very tight: September 10 (seven weeks away). Yikes. A bike like that is normally scheduled for 10-12 weeks, and that's after all the paint, decals, and specs are finalized. This one had to be done in seven weeks---and at that point, we didn't even have a color or decal plan.
I met with Todd, Teresa, Max and Alder. We decided we should try it. We love taking on a challenge, and this was definitely that. So, we said yes...and off we went.
Believe it or not, there are many shades of white to choose from
Time Flies...away!
Unfortunately, we didn't get the final goahead until August 4th. Our 7 weeks was
just reduced to 5.
As the days counted down, decisions about graphics, paint colors, and details took a lot of time, as usual---except the completion date was suddenly moved up by two weeks, to August 29. It had to be in New York on the 29th. A bicycle built for four, in the middle of our busiest season, now in just 3 weeks? Yikes again. A seemingly impossible task. I often say, "Impossible just takes longer," but in this case, that wasn't an option.
Then came another hiccup...Murphy's law.
I had a previously planned trip to Idaho starting August 14, right in the
middle of the build. I stayed on the phone, on the computer, and fully "in
the game" the entire time---even working from the car. That lasted until
August 19 at 4:00 a.m., when I was rushed to a hospital in Twin Falls,
Idaho, for an emergency appendectomy. Before surgery (scheduled for noon),
I worked through email to get decisions finalized right up until they
wheeled me into pre-op. When I woke up, I got right back on the computer,
checking to see whether we had finally locked in the paint color.
The timeline above is from our Nextfit™ production software. It shows the date each process was finished. A bicycle built for 4, & a customized bike trailer in just 20 days.
As I headed back to Seattle after surgery, Alder, Max, and Clayton had finalized assembly, test rides and snapping a few photos before boxing the bike up for shipping. We still had the trailer to deal with. The cooler that had to be mounted to the trailer didn't arrive until Saturday the 23rd. Max finished the trailer on Saturday, and let me know the whole project was ready to ship. I worked from the car arranging overnight air freight shipping for a giant bicycle trailer and a bicycle built for four. Everyone should try that once in their lifetime... or maybe not.
On the 24th, I loaded the entire project into the back of my truck, where it spent the night parked in my driveway at home. Early the next morning I drove it down to the air freight company in Tukwila. It was rushed to the airport and loaded onto a plane. It arrived safely the next day, and Alder worked via FaceTime with Sally in New York to get the bike unboxed and assembled. Huge relief.
We weren't able to reveal that the project was for the New York Times, since they wanted to preserve the element of surprise as they launched their new family subscription, which offers up to four users access to the Times under one plan.
What an incredible accomplishment by the team at R+E. Todd, Teresa, Max, Alder, and Clayton worked absolute miracles to complete what is normally a 12-week job in just 3 weeks.
The teams we worked with in New York and California were clearly hustling too. But I have to give special credit to the dedicated, talented people I get to work with every day for pulling off the impossible---something we seem to do pretty regularly around here.
Small team, big lift!
Made possible by people who know the work and care deeply about doing it well.
A shot of the NYT Logo and the 'family subscription' decal
Alder snapped a few pictures before boxing it up
Todd snapped a quick picture after welding was done and emailed it to me in Idaho a few minutes before I was wheeled into surgery.
Photo courtesy of New York Times
The bike arrives in New York just in time fo the New York Times to kick off their new family subscription, which offers up to four users access to the Times under one plan. Check out everywhere the bike toured here https://www.nytco.com/press/familysubscription/
