Many readers responded to our recent story on bicycle manufacture in Portland, suggesting that it inaccurately presented the local industry as exclusively male. While it was never Neighborhood Notes’ intention to do so, we hope this follow-up piece will serve both to fill in some of the gaps in that story, and to address some of the larger issues underlying one of Portland’s most passionately discussed topics. One recent article in Oregon Business suggested that women lag in both bike riding and the bike industry. Yet another recent article in The Oregonian presents the exact opposite view. So, where do we stand as a city, and how can the media improve its coverage of the full diversity of the bike world? We took our questions to just a few of the industry’s greats—who also happen to be women.
Elly Blue: PDX by Bike, The Portland Society, Taking the Lane
“I’m a little chagrined about women and bikes becoming a thing,” says cycling advocate Elly Blue.
We’re talking over coffee about her work as a cycling advocate, writer, and business owner, and about a profile piece she wrote on Jude Kirstein of Sugar Wheels for the BikePortland blog. The comments that ensued suggested that the article wouldn’t be relevant if it were about a man.
“The nonprofit world tends to be mostly women, so no one bats an eye,” Blue says. “But if you’re a bike mechanic or in some other part of the bike industry? That’s the first thing people notice.”
Asked how the media can do a better job in its coverage of minorities within the bike industry, Blue makes a wild suggestion: that the writer cover a story as though the minority perspective offered were actually the dominant one.
“I wrote a piece for Grist on bicycling when you’re bigger-bodied, and I just went ahead and wrote it from a woman’s perspective,” she says. “I wrote about clothing as if all clothing were women’s clothing, and with a female audience in mind.”
Blue has long been active in the cycling community, covering all manner of topics as a columnist for BikePortland, publishing zines on cycling and feminism in particular, and taking Portland cycling culture on the road with last year’s Bikestravaganza: Off the Chainring Tour and this fall’s Rambling Road Show, a traveling dinner theater/bike edutainment tour.
You’d think all of this would keep her busy enough, but Blue also had time to co-found The Portland Society with Ellee Tallheimer, a nonprofit business alliance for women who are passionate about business and bicycling in Portland. The Society holds monthly meetings, and through its parent nonprofit organization, Umbrella, funds yearly grants to award-worthy local projects working to make the city a more livable place using the bicycle.
Blue’s newest business venture is PDX By Bike, which aims to help locals and visitors alike discover the city on two wheels. The business encompasses a zine, website, and custom itineraries based one people’s interests.
“When it comes to industry, women need an extra-thick skin,” Blue says. “It’s hard to talk about what you do when a reporter comes to you because you’re a woman. You want to be seen for the quality of your work, rather than your gender. The Portland Society does a great job at that. It’s a space where women are suddenly not in that dynamic. It’s a room full of women, but it’s not about gender. That’s empowering.”
Laura Koch: Program Manager, Community Cycling Center
One of the Portland Society’s first round of grants went to Laura Koch, to fund her attendance at a Winnings Campaign Training in Seattle, offered through the Alliance for Biking and Walking. Koch says the training helped her to see her work at the Community Cycling Center (CCC) in the context of a campaign. In particular, she picked up new tools and activities for implementing necessary changes to policies identified by two communities the CCC works with in Northeast Portland. The training helped Koch and her team define the issue, set clear goals and targets, and draw a power map for how to influence changes.
“Our organization is really shifting from a strictly service delivery organization to take on more community work,” Koch says. “So for us, this was a helpful process to gear us up going beyond delivering great programs, to advocat[ing] for bigger changes.”
The CCC’s mission is to broaden access to bicycling and its benefits, and Koch says that means doing more to reach customers who may not feel comfortable walking into a traditional bike shop. The center is conducting a customer survey to actually identify who they are serving and how they can attract diverse audiences, including more women.
The media’s role in all this? Showcase the diversity of cyclists, Koch says. “Health behavior research shows that the more people see individuals like themselves engaging in healthy activities (like bicycling), the more likely they are to try and adopt those behaviors.”
Jude Kirstein: Owner, Sugar Wheel Works
When it comes to encouraging people to ride, a bike well-suited to the rider’s body, habits, and needs can be highly motivating. Helping the cyclist find the right fit requires a skill that can be a bit of an anomaly in the bike world: listening.
“The conversation starts around the table. I sit and talk with the customer, and then I make some recommendations,” says Jude Kirstein, custom wheel builder and owner of Sugar Wheel Works (formerly Epic Wheel Works). “A customer comes into my shop, and no one has explained to them how or why wheels work the way they do, or offered some kind of solution based on their relationship to their bike.”
In addition to dramatically improving the ride, Kirstein says, hand-built wheels are more sustainable and durable than boutique wheels: many of the components can be reused at the end of the wheel’s lifetime. In the light-filled studio she shares with Natalie Ramsland of Sweet Pea Bikes, Kirstein shows me several cross sections of rims in profile. I notice for the first time the wide variety of shapes a rim can have—an aspect of just one component of the bicycle that many riders don’t even think about.
Sugar Wheels and Sweet Pea opened shop in the Hub building on North Williams this May—on the same day Ramsland went into labor with her first child.
It has been a busy couple of months for both shop owners. In addition to custom builds for individual clients, and offering comprehensive building and truing classes, Kirstein now builds all of the wheels for Sweet Pea’s custom bikes.
“I’ve never built so many wheels within such a short time-frame before. My hands are so calloused and swollen, I have to sleep with them elevated at night,” Kirstein laughs. “But it’s wonderful. I love working with Sweet Pea. We both want the experience of buying a bike to be a meaningful, fantastic experience.”
When the shop is closed on Tuesdays, Kirstein goes over her current list of questions about wheel building with a local engineer. Even after three years of wheel building, Kirstein says she still has much to learn.
“I think in any field, all you need is curiosity—but a consistent curiosity,” Kirstein says. “And that’s what I have for the wheel.”
Kirstein says this passion for the bicycle can often manifest as ego in the bike shop, and that’s where things can get heated—especially in Portland, where strong opinions about the best bike components abound. This is where discrimination can be an issue, and get in the way of welcoming more people into the cycling world.
“[Gender] is just not a topic I think of all the time,” says Kirstein. “I’m here to provide you with kickass wheels. That’s it. I have to concentrate on learning, and if I’m fighting an image, it takes away from becoming an expert in my field.”
Tess Velo: Shop Manager, Joe Bike
Joe Bike shop manager Tess Velo grew up surrounded by bike culture, working in her dad’s bike shop and repairing her own bike from an early age. Velo completed UBI’s two week Pro Shop and Operations course in 2003, and worked for the Bike Gallery for six years after that, before becoming Joe Bike shop manager in 2009. Women in Portland’s bike industry? There are plenty.
“I think it would help for the media to focus sometimes on the common-ness of women on bikes and working on bikes and in the industry, rather than focusing all the time on numbers and statistics,” Velo says. “I don't feel weird for having spent a decade almost making a career of repairing and selling bikes, especially due to something like gender.”
Instead of the media’s focus on how relatively few women there are in the industry, Velo says, she’d like to see more coverage of how active and effective they are. Standing out can sometimes work to one’s advantage in the business world.
“Men actually can have a harder time being noticed individually, because they are more of a mass,” she says. “Women stand out, and by standing out they can, if they choose to, do much, much more.”
Martina Fahrner: Co-Owner, Clever Cycles
What stood out to Martina Fahrner, her husband Todd, and friends Dean and Rachel Mullin was a niche market that seemed—at least to them, if not to many skeptics—like a no-brainer in Portland: utilitarian bicycles for family transport. The four friends opened Clever Cyclesin 2007, and the shop has grown so much since then, they’ve expanded three times. The latest manifestation (on the corner of SE 9th and Hawthorne) boasts a full service bike repair shop, clothing and gear, and the wide variety of utilitarian transport bikes and folding bikes for which they are well-known.
When it comes to better serving women and families, a little market research could go a long way, says business owner Martina Fahrner. Manufacturers, for example, might take into account that for women, the average size is now 14, and offer a greater range of cycling gear in larger sizes. Years of retail experience have shown her that women value form and function equally: the bike needs to live up to expectations: ”5'4", four kids on the same bike and it has be easy to pedal”—without losing aesthetic appeal. She’d like to see a little more follow-through from the industry as a whole.
“What I’d like to see is an opening in the bike industry towards women and riding with children [and] cargo,” Farhner says. “For that, the big firms have to overcome the fear of liability suits. They also need to back up their products with user research. They do it for racing bikes, so why not for cargo bikes?”
Clever Cycles’ success despite an economic recession reflects an important, growing market that shows no sign of slowing.
Becky Morton: Owner, Bikeasaurus
“Prior to opening Bikeasaurus, I had no bike industry experience,“ says shop owner and founder Becky Morton. “I have a background in art and education and a passion for everyday bicycling. I created Bikeasaurus as a combination of my two greatest interests: biking and handmade crafts.”
The self-professed mission of Bikeasaurus (located just under the Hawthorne bridge on the corner of SE MLK and Madison) is to get people excited about riding their bikes, through locally made, bike-related gifts and accessories.
Bikeasaurus employee Jaya Skinner-Maginnis says that while gender issues are generally underrepresented in the discussion of local bike culture, Portland on the whole is doing a great job of encouraging diversity. He cites the Portland Society and the Bicycle Transportation Alliance as important local engines for change. “City Bikes walks the walk, employing half women, half men,” Skinner-Maginnis says. “Bike Farm makes great strides in encouraging an all-inclusive atmosphere, and educating and empowering newcomers to DIY bicycle culture—of both genders—to feel more comfortable tackling bike-building, maintenance, and repair.”
Skinner-Maginnis says men have a greater responsibility to face the inequalities within the bike industry and work for change, precisely because sexual politics may be invisible to men, who are often over-represented. He’d also like to see more coverage of the aspect of intimidation in the male-dominated world of the bike shop.
“As a male, I often felt intimidated in bike shops until recent years, as I was not as well-versed and felt stupid and bothersome asking questions,” Skinner-Maginnis says. “I can only imagine this intimidation is increased for women to whom the gender gap is more apparent.”
Tori Bortman: Educator, Gracie’s Wrench
Tori Bortman echoes this sentiment.
“There is sometimes a hoarding of information in bike shops or an expectation that customers should magically be endowed with the knowledge the staff took years to learn,” Bortman says. “Gracie’s Wrench came from the struggle I experienced trying to find a mechanic to mentor me, answer questions, show me the way. Here, anyone can learn, everyone is mechanically inclined and there is no magic.”
A hub of bike education programs and clinics, Gracie’s Wrench offers small classes in basic tune-ups and wheel building, plus opportunities for advanced learning, special projects, and one-on-one tutoring in specific aspects of bike mechanics. Bortman also works with individuals on overcoming barriers or obstacles that may be hampering their enjoyment of everyday riding.
On the issue of gender within the cycling industry, Bortman says there may be statistically fewer women than male riders, business owners, and mechanics, but those numbers often overshadow another story: the many new entrepreneurs in the industry who are women, and how that segment of the population is contributing to the growth of cycling.
”I find that many of the women in the industry I know tend to forge their own paths because the cycling industry is not inviting to them,” Bortman says. “Similar to fitting bicycles into car culture, we can't change the reality that's already there, so we've taken it upon ourselves to create a new one. I think we'll be seeing more and more of that in the coming years.”
