BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
Silverfish
Three-time UCI DH World Champion Fabien Barel has been confirmed as a Silverfish special guest at the forthcoming Core Bike show.
Barel’s two decade-long career saw him take the Mondraker Factory Team to a multitude of podium finishes for three seasons until he announced his retirement from World Cup racing at the end of 2012.
Fabien will be attending Core Bike from Sunday and will be available to chat in either S1 with Mojo Suspension Hoodoo or Bentleys with Silverfish UK, Mondraker’s UK distributor.
“Having Fabien attending the show is massive news," enthused Silverfish marketing manager Pete Drew. "As well as being heavily involved with the design, development and refinement of the Mondraker range Fabien really is a man who has well and truly been-there and done-that when it comes to mountain biking. Make sure you stop by either the Mojo or Silverfish rooms to say hello.”
Fabien will continue his riding career with Mondraker and Fox Suspension in 2012 competing in Enduro DH, Gravity DH and other multi stage competitions around the globe. He will also continue his role within Mondraker’s R&D team developing and working on new frames and projects as well as testing for Fox Shoxs.
Hotlines
Hotlines has equipped its sales team with iPads in an effort to reduce waste, increase efficiency and improve service.
Hotlines said that traditionally sales reps are armed with a mountain of paperwork, a dusty old laptop and a van full of samples, but with advances in mobile technology there are now alternative means of presenting product from its 57-strong brand portfolio. It is estimated that they will save well in excess of 100,000 printed pages a year by switching to iPads as well as hundreds of hours of printing time and considerable delivery costs (and associated CO2 emissions).
The distributor will officially launch the new iPad-equipped sales team at Core Bike.
“The iPad is helping Hotlines to further differentiate itself — and increase sales," said Hotlines Europe marketing manager Martin Astley. “My vision was to dramatically shorten the time it takes to present to a time starved dealer, never leave the customer’s side, and create a more interactive method of presenting. As I have a history in Ecology and waste management the quantity of paper required to equip our sales team with catalogues and pricelists for presentations has always bothered me, I was looking for alternatives. iPad presented the perfect opportunity to streamline our operations, increase sales and reduce our impact on the environment.
“When meeting a customer for the first time, it’s important that they know who we are, what we do, and how we do business. iPad allows us to convey this message and create a level of comfort before we start talking about bikes and accessories. Presentations themselves are a breeze with iPad. We can hold huge amounts of information in an organised, easy to access format. We have PDF’s of all the brand catalogues as well as corresponding pricelists and order forms. The PDF catalogues allow customers to explore entire product ranges in a matter of minutes, touch technology allows them to zoom in on details, see colour options and compare to alternatives quickly and easily.”
Sales team leader Dieter Pullan added: “All the Hotlines sales reps use iPad to educate customers, sharing pictures of products and available options. We like to provide our customers with the information they need to make an informed buying decision. iPad also gives us more options; we can take orders and e-mail them to the office throughout the day. If a dealer prefers to have a paper copy of a catalogue or pricelist for reference we can still post them out on request. It’s a great way of presenting the finer details of a product range.”
sales@hotlines-uk.com Tel 0131 3191 444
