If you are as obsessed with all things bike, like me, you might remember a little over a year ago, Brooklyn Industries engaged in some "edgy" advertising. Specifically, they had a spring window display at their Brooklyn store that featured tall bikes or mutant bikes. Tall bikes, made from recycled/discarded bikes stacked on top of each other, are mobile commentaries on waste and excess. Rusty relics of consumerism... on wheels! The irony of the advertisement was bittersweet and shortly lead to an prominent, permanent acid scrawled decree, "Bike Culture Not 4 Sale", most probably perpetrated by a member of Brooklyn's own Black Label Bike Club.
Yesterday, as I was walking around SoHo, I couldn't help be reminded of this incident when, within a few block radius, I came across these two window displays...
One at Camper:
And one at Stussy:
Let me start by saying, I understand and support promoting eco-friendly transportation methods and Bike Month and, in most circumstances, proceeds from a store's sales benefiting certain bicycle advocacy groups or programs. I have found no evidence of this being the case with Camper and Stussy, please feel free to email me if you've found anything to the contrary. So, what this leads me to is that, when it comes to trying to sell your product to the public as a super hip, have-to-have item (whether it be shoes or shirts or bags) why are bikes being used to grease the wheels- pardon the pun- of commerce? When did advertisers decide to use bikes, shamelessly, as tools of product plugging and pumping? Specifically specialty bikes like tall bikes, fixed gear/track bikes and chopper bikes?
Bikes are cool. They are fun to ride and make and fix and crash. So, can we put a stop to the slow transformation of bikes into symbols of brutish mercantilism? And how?
UPDATE (6/10/07):
HA! (thanks to whoever posted this on bike forum)
UPDATE (6/13/07): Reaction to this post from good friend, rad cyclist and active member of the messenger comunnity, Dagga, and it goes as follows (unedited, fools):
"i for one remember the stunt that b.i. pulled last year and remember being amused both by the ad and commentary afterward. As an active member of the messenger and bike scene, honestly i'm torn when it comes to companies and their use of bike culture to promote whatever. On the one hand, it is important to remember that bikes are a business thatneeds to be promoted in order to be sold, to keep the culture alive and accessible to people. Also important is how high end of a culture, cycling really is and when more mainstream companies put out the word , it brings people who would not necessarily know what's going on into the light; which in my opinion is pretty necessary. However there is something to be said about the exploitation of the bike. B.i. went too far with the tall bike they are a part of the scene that revels in its obscurityand has ties to gangs that promote self sufficiency with regard to clothing, transport and healthy living; which made it totally against everything that b.i. was trying to do with the bike. with regard to camper and stussy- i've seen both windows and well... not too sure what camper is trying to pull, it seems though in going with their style they are still trying to go for the baby boomers. Many of them have toddlers on those little wooden bikes. But honestly ad, shoe and bike alike are not practical for true cyclists. Stussy however is up on their shit - they teamed up a while ago with about two fixed gear specific clothing companies and have put out gear. Long known for its place on the surfing scene it seems like they are trying their luck with the bikers, which is cool i guess. They have definitely teamed up with a small shop in baltimore called "shop,gentei" and put out some shirts. gentei is pretty commited to the messenger scene as they are run by and cater to messengers. They put on races and other events that definitely keep the culture alive. I'm not sure but they might also have done stuff with cadence clothng based out of cali, i'm not sure about that one so don't quote me on it. But one thing that i have learned on the bike scene is that it does need that extra support from major companies sometimes. There are definitely boundaries that have to be respected, but its always nice to have friends in high places. If stussy wants to team up with smaller companies regarding designs that help small business profit, more power to them for giving the cyclist a bit more power; but if its just a bike display to jump on a culture that people are beginning to respect, thats pretty wack. thats pretty much what i think of that. "
Keep the reactions coming folks!
