Fyxation spins growth from customized bicycles
It’s sold about 1,000 branded bikes so far
Fyxation Bicycle Company in Milwaukee’s Riverwest neighborhood, is enjoying solid growth by supplying branded bikes to corporate buyers.
The firm has sold about 1,000 bicycles through the effort, including some 500 in the last several months. That has Fyxation well on track to hit an aggressive 2017 growth target the company set following its recent completion of a business-coaching program operated by Scale Up Milwaukee.
“The way that the custom bike program is going … it’s going to account for about 50% of our growth goal,” Fyxation coowner Jessica Ginster said.
Co-founded by brothers Nick and Ben Ginster — Nick is Jessica’s husband — Fyxation imports partly built bicycles and finishes them at its design center and retail store, 2943 N. Humboldt Blvd.
Started in 2009 as a homebased bicycle parts outfit, Fyxation moved to a small south side shop tucked away on the edge of the Menomonee Valley in late 2012, then to the higherprofile Riverwest spot two years ago.
With the relocation came the foray into supplying bikes not just to individual buyers but to companies. Located in the same building is a Colectivo cafe and coffee roasting operation, and Fyxation pitched the local coffee chain on having some Colectivo-branded bicycles.
“We worked with their graphic designer and came up with a few bikes for them,” Ginster said. “From that point, it started to grow very organically.”
Fyxation has been setting up commercial clients with custom versions of its Eastside model, a single-speed bike that Ginster called “simple, nimble and easy to navigate the city on.” The Eastside typically retails for $450, but larger purchasers get competitive pricing.
Lakefront Brewery bought about 50 bicycles last year, using them for promotional purposes, said Matt Krajnak, who handles sales and marketing support for the brewer. Lakefront will order another 100 or so in 2017, Krajnak said.
Goose Island Beer Co., in Chicago, is another of Fyxation’s larger customers, Ginster said.
Rishi Tea, which built a 50,000-square-foot headquarters and plant in Milwaukee’s Menomonee Valley and moved there in 2014, bought four customized Fyxation bikes for its staff to use.
“Down there in the valley, we’re kind of off on our own in terms of not (being) near everything,” Rishi marketing manager Heather Torrey said. “We’re definitely a group of sporty people and want to encourage our employees toward wellness.”
Employees have been using the Rishi-branded bicycles on their lunch hours, “taking a little pedal just for some exercise and clearing their head,” Torrey said.
Also buying four bikes was Hovde Properties, which has installed them for residents of its Brix Apartment Lofts, 408 W. Florida St. in Walker’s Point. Use has been strong, and Hovde now is looking to get another set of branded bicycles for its Ovation 309 apartment complex in downtown Madison, said C.J. Wessel, a vice president with the firm.
Across town, Ben’s Cycle, 1013 W. Lincoln Ave., has provided branded bikes to Eppstein Uhen Architects in Milwaukee and is working on an order for Auer Steel, Ben’s owner Vince Hanoski said.
Around the country, other small bike-makers also have been seeking corporate business, said Jay Townley, a partner in bicycle-industry research firm Gluskin Townley Group.
Detroit Bikes, which manufactures its own frames in Detroit with U.S. steel, has sold about 6,000 bicycles to corporate customers, president Zak Pashak said. He said about three-quarters of those have gone to a single client, Colorado’s New Belgium Brewing Co., which uses them for promotions and gifts to employees.
“These locally made brands are cropping up all over the place,” Townley said. “And … if they get some traction, they’re going out and saying I’ll do corporate business, and they end up with an order for a thousand bikes. That’s a big deal for them.”
A major slice of the market that neither Fyxation nor Detroit Bikes has yet to exploit to any degree involves companies with large campuses, where bicycles make sense for internal use.
Locally, Kohl’s Corp. has a fleet of 45 bicycles at its Menomonee Falls complex, but two-wheelers for employees probably are most common in California’s Silicon Valley.
Tapping the likes of Google or Apple may be beyond the reach of Fyxation, but the Milwaukee shop will keep pressing for more commercial sales.
“I think it’s really important for downtown businesses and urban Milwaukee to just get on their bike more because it’s faster, it’s quicker, it’s more efficient,” Ginster said. “It’s really good for your mental health as well as your physical well-being.”