About Ebykr
Ebykr celebrates classic and vintage lightweight bicycles through provoking imagery and opinion. Let's roll together!
About Ebykr
Ebykr celebrates classic and vintage lightweight bicycles through provoking imagery and opinion. Let's roll together!
[…] little middle ground exists between $2,000-and-up racing bikes or cyclotouring customs such as Rivendells and Vanillas, and the cheap spring suspended tanks filling the aisles of mall-bound department […]
[…] few clever ones use names that associate the bicycle with a pleasant image — Vanilla, Ibis, Rivendell — and these keep company with Gitane. But none has chosen so perfect a name for the most […]
[…] bike design by the early 1980s, further accelerated when the beloved Grant Petersen – now of Rivendell Bicycle Works – joined the company as BridgestoneUSA marketing boss. While Petersen acknowledges learning […]
[…] few clever ones use names that associate the bicycle with a pleasant image — Vanilla, Ibis, Rivendell — and these keep company with Gitane. But none has chosen so perfect a name for the most […]
Thanks for today’s post, seriously, can you sign up as a writer for wikipedia because the current pages submitted there for our interest is quite frankly garbage. I can’t say I agree exactly with it but I agree with it on the most part and I definitely applaud your effort in putting it so clearly.
…I bought it at Yellow Jersey in Madison. It fits me perfect!
That’s great Rich — I hope to have a nice road bike in a year or so — until then, I bought a Redline Monocog on June 3 this year, and I like it, like it, oh yes I do…
Hey, Joe,
Not to get too far off topic 🙂 but I’ve got one of your Masi frames and it’s still going strong and feeling great!
Thanks!
I voted for McCain/Palin.
What’s the dillio with these new kaleidoscopey thingie avatars? I want a custom one. Turn it until I say stop.
Many artists, musicians, and artisans have been of temperamental spirit because they were habituated to marijuana and/or other drug abuse. Whatever, I don’t know if Grant Petersen is, has ever been, or will be a pothead, but I suppose it’s OK that his little company makes usable ankle reflectors. That’s what counts for the customer. Van Gogh had an attitude problem, and Beethoven had a heck of a temper, which is neither here nor there, but somewhere inbetween, for, associative marketing is, after all, about making associations. Creative mind-control people tend to have strong opinions about things – sometimes just refried.
Many great artists, musicians, and artisans have been of temperamental spirit. Whatever, Grant Petersen and his little company make great bikes. That’s what counts for the customer. Van Gogh had an attitude problem, and Beethoven had a heck of a temper. Creative people tend to have strong opinions about things – sometimes justified.
Joe, I remember your interview in the Reader. Glad to hear it isn’t me, but grant peterson. I saw many contradictions in his catalogs and readers. I bumped into a guy last weekend who knows the main builder for grant peterson( I see they have a second builder now ), he had nothing good to say about grant either. Like you, he told me that grant is a total control freak. A very unreasonable person. I am glad to be rid of the situation.
-Paul Fuller
Paul wrote:
“However, he has the thinnest skin of anyone I have ever met…he totally orver-reacted…he just freaked out…very small minded and very childish…He kicked me out of Rivendell!”
Paul,
Your comments mirror the creepy manipulations of the Grant Petersen I knew for four years; you did not witness “thin skin” per se, you witnessed a control freak — in the worst sense — his intent is to induce guilt in you for which you do not deserve. As I knew him, he’d flip-flop with guilt and praise, of entirely pathologically manipulative origins and intents in him, just to keep me off-balance — two simple, pratical, and proven tools of the controller, not unlike domestic violence histories. As a matter of fact, during the last year I worked for him, he yelled at me over the phone, “Hey! I’m the only friend you’ve got!” Curiously, during that same week, his painter, Joe Bell, screamed at me exactly the same way, “Hey, I’m the only friend you’ve got!!!” Hey, given they both yelled at me the same, I guess that means I had two “friends” back then.
Because the “membership” con means that you seek to belong to a group that gives you a great part of your identity, that’s a psychic weakness to exploit. Rivendell members don’t question, they go along with Grant, and he hates it when his copywriting lullabys miss a few, you being one of the missed. So Paul, join a health club or gym or take up poker or something. Maybe take up cycling.
-Joe Starck
I have a few comments about Rivendell. As a VERY small part time frame builder, I agree with the ideas that Grant has put forth in frame design. He didn’t invent these designs, neither did I, but they work for people who ride lots of miles and want to be as comfortable as possible. However, he has the thinnest skin of anyone I have ever met. I am the author of the letter currently on the editorial section of the Riv web site. I sent that letter because he promised 5 Readers a year. And he has never lived up to his own promise. His response to me for my question?? He kicked me out of Rivendell! It was an honest question and he totally over-reacted. He didn’t ask me what I meant in the letter, he just freaked out and terminated my membership without any discussion. Actually he made his hit-man John do the dirty work. But kick me out he did, and I find that to be very small minded, and very childish. If Bicycling didn’t publish even half of its promised issues, I bet people would be calling them too.
I guess I will wish Rivendell good luck, because with customer service like that, they will need it.
sorry, but Wald baskets aren’t “made in a Kentucky hollow”, but rather in the river city of Maysville, KY, the original capital and first major city of KY a LONG time ago. I’s not a “hollow” of the mountain ilk at all, but rather characteristic of so many sleepy river towns along the Ohio and Mississippi, ones like Madison Indiana, Portsmouth Ohio. My wife’s from Maysville, and I choose to call you out for stereotyping a decent product just b/c it’s from KY. Fact is, the only thing that consistently comes out of KY hollows now is marijuana.
[…] Perhaps this a direction too long neglected in the US, where little middle ground exists between $2,000-and-up racing bikes or cyclotouring customs such as Rivendells and Vanillas, and the cheap spring suspended tanks filling the aisles of mall-bound department stores. Kogswell has been making some inroads into this largely unaddressed market, but few small builders are able to compete with monster brands like Trek or reborn favorites Fuji and Raleigh. […]
[…] A few clever ones use names that associate the bicycle with a pleasant image – Vanilla, Ibis, Rivendell – and these keep company with Gitane. But none has chosen so perfect a name for the most perfect machine ever to spring from the minds and hands of men. Indeed, the dark-eyed wanderers of Europe – mysterious and free and a little wild – are the perfect symbol for the simple device that spread mechanized transportation everywhere. […]
I cannot follow your logic on this. How do you determine success. Rivendell has been around for a decade and they continue to bring new products to the marketplace. By all business standards I think it can be decided that Rivendell is a success. If you need to mass market a Tour de France carbon fiber 5 kg gizmo then I guess that Rivendell is a failure.
[…] Photo:Bike Rider […]
Hello Kenneth,
Thanks for pointing out the naming error. It’s appreciated and has been fixed.
Please continue letting us know about any mistakes you find.
Cheers,
Eric
Petersen = Grant
Peterson = Kent
Both are inspiring cyclists.
But they might care about how their names are spelled. Maybe not.
As one of the earlier employees of Rivendell, I can say that more than 10 years later, Grant’s philosophies are still indeed very relevant. So much so that not only do I subscribe to his bicycling idealogies personally, I was inspired to start a company called Cycles Gaansari. God bless Grant, and others like him.
Several years ago I got back into cycling. For two years I rode a cheap asia made “road bike” which was based on racing frames as most bikes today. I just felt the bike did not fit (I’m 6’5″). I found the Rivendell site and drooled over the bikes and liked what Grant had to say. I have been riding a Rambouillet for over 5,000 miles now and have to say it is a great bike. It also comes in frame sizes for us big guys although Grant is now threatening to stop making the big sizes since they don’t sell out quickly.
The combined weight of myself and a Rambouillet, is under 200 lbs.
I am a six foot tall, adult male. The Booyay is blue:)
So how much do those things weigh?
Kurt
I dig Rivendell’s style and philosophy, but the prices are way too high to spark a velorution. Sorry, fellas, but there’s still no one selling a cheap, simple, utility bike in the US. Until there is one, Rivendell must be considered a failure, even by its own standards.
I love cycling and I love Rivendell – thank you Grant for my Nitto Albatross handlebars!!!!
For me, cycling does is about fun, relaxation and enjoying life. It’s not a bad place to be.
Keep up the fun work Grant!!!
Well done. Thanks for choosing that picture to accompany the article. I’m flattered.