NAHBS Coverage

Or lack thereof! Another year passes where I’m not headed to NAHBS, and that’s okay. This year, it’s totally understandable — Eddy is home, and even if I’d had a spot registered at the show, I wouldn’t be going. Right now, I’m at a stage where I want to get ahead of the curve on my work queue, and then start thinking about growing the business a bit. Maybe next year for NAHBS, huh?

So like the rest of you, I’ll be poking around in Flickr and on Facebook, etc., drooling over the various pictures. I’ve got some compadres that are there: Erik of Peacock Groove, Vincent of Dominguez Cycles (who won in the Best Fillets category last year!), Dave of Anderson Custom Bicycles, and Matt of Appleman, will all be there representing the Twin Cities contingent. So as you can imagine, I’m enthusiastic about seeing how this all plays out.

Been thinking about a couple of things, otherwise.

Item the first: running a Kickstarter to raise the funds I need to get the last of the equipment I need. In exchange will be all manner of awesomesauce — schwag, frames, even the chance to come in to my shop for a weekend and get an overview of how to build frames (and we work on one for you together).

Item the second: been thinking about hosting a Framebuilders’ BBQ and MTB Ride at my place in the summer. Have some guys over, drink some beer, eat some grilled meats, and hit up the Murphy-Hanrehan singletrack. I’m going to send around an email sometime next week and see what kind of traction the idea gets.

NAHBS and Other Shows

I have opted to not attend NAHBS this year — originally, I wanted to attend as a builder, but didn’t have enough built or the money for a booth. Then I wanted to attend just to see what the fuss was about. Again, money. Also: lack of PTO from regular job and other trips already in planning stages (Las Vegas/Fort Irwin, and a trip to Moab for some MTB riding and a side-trip to see Carhenge).

Minnecycle also drops in March this year. And there’s another local show firming up for sometime in the summer. So those are my priorities.

Will I show at NAHBS someday? Yes, absolutely. Earliest it’ll happen is 2012, and it may be another year after that. We’ll see.

Minnecycle and More…

Due to my workload at the office and my wedding preparations, I am likely end up in a position where I am unable to make it to Minnecycle this year. The 29′er is further behind the curve than I’d like, and as a result, I don’t think I’ll be able to get it into a paint booth with enough time to be ready for the show. A little frustrating, but I am unwilling to cut corners on it in order to get it in front of eyeballs.

What I’m opting to do instead is to get the 29′er and the commuter done-up right, along with the other a few other projects I have kickin’ around in boxes, and take them to NAHBS in Austin in 2011. It’s certainly nothing against Minnecycle, mind you — Erik Noren runs a fantastic show, and it’s something I’m very much looking forward to showing at come summer of 2011.

So what I’m hoping to take to NAHBS 2011 is:

• the fully-rigid 29′er
• the lugged commuter bike
• the track bike
• the Bridgestone XO-1 tribute I’m building for Jim Oliver
• my personal singlespeed belt drive road bike

NAHBS

NAHBS is underway, and I’m not there.  However, my teacher, Paul, is.  I hope things are going well.  I’m sitting here waiting for photos from the show to start trickling in, and I’m pretty jazzed to see the stuff that’s being produced this year.  And I hope to be ready to show stuff next year.

That said, I’m hoping to show stuff as early as Minnecycle 2, which is coming up this summer.  Erik Noren of Peacock Groove organizes that, and it’s where Vincent Dominguez introduced me to Paul last year.  That was the jumping-off point where I decided to finally do something about that urge to start framebuilding.

The 29′er is about where it was last time, as are all the other frames.  The soonest I have another session with Paul is about a week away.  In the meantime, I need to provide feedback to an artist that I have doing prototypes of my head tube badge, and delve into the process of starting an LLC, which is the last step I need to make before I start taking reservations for a spot on the waiting list.

The website needs to get done, too — part of me wants to wait for WordPress 3.0, as it is rumored to support new “post types” which would play into functionality I already have planned.  Really, the smart thing to do will be to go ahead and get the HTML/CSS/Jquery stuff done this weekend, make it work for WP 2.9.x and then make changes when WP 3.0 comes out.