BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news

No need to carry a mini-pump when there's one always available hidden in the seat-tube. Phil Robinson has formed Zorin Innovations to get his first design to market. The £29.00 seatpost (at retail) will later be joined by Zorin bike lights and a Zorin bike lock.

For the third year running, Shimano Europe is to run the 'Shimano Cycling Concept Award', a pan-European search for the most innovative ways of getting more people on bikes, more often.

That's according to Sustrans, and this contradicts official government stats that claim to show that cycling in Britain is stagnating. Sustrans believes the biggest growth in cycle usage is happening on traffic-free routes, away from the number-crunchers of the Department of Transport

Jim McGurn's Company of Cyclists recently banked a fifty grand handout from the government. How? Jim applied for it. There's no more of those awards until next year but, in the meantime, why don't you apply for a SEED programme grant? Cheques of up to £5000 need no match-funding and are fast-tracked in 4-8 weeks. To get £100k, you'll need to cough up £30k in cash and £20k worth of help ‘in kind’...

That's the guiding principle behind Tim and Judith Johnson's self-confessed "tiny" bike shop in Alsager, Cheshire. The shop has sold eight Maverick American MTBs (and they're not cheap) and Tim Johnson tied up a one-shop distribution deal with Independent Fabrication at the recent Interbike show. Sideways Cycles is also a sponsor of Singletrack magazine's art exhibition: "I was cheesed off that no suppliers were supporting the event so we volunteered," said Tim.