Season 5, Episode 174 : Broken Chains: the highs and lows of the sustainable cycling industry

Will Richardson 00:10

Hi and welcome to Sustainability Solved, the Sustainable Business Podcast. I'm Will Richardson. Many of us dream of shaking up the existing capitalistic consumer model, creating products that last with sustainable supply chains, minimal impacts on the planet, and a positive contribution to the people involved, but is the business model in itself sustainable? Over the last few years, Shelley Lawson and Rob Webbon have both been on a journey to build sustainable businesses in their respective parts of the cycling industry. Rob's journey hit a stumbling block earlier this year when the founding team of Presca sportswear made the difficult decision to close the business. Whilst Shelley's company frog bikes that she founded with her husband Jerry continues to grow. Today, both of them are joining me to talk about the challenges and lessons learned on the journey to be a sustainable business. Rob, if I may start with you. Where are you right now? Can you tell us a bit about the journey? You've been on? Please?

Rob Webbon 01:11

Well, yeah, so we're we're in a position right now where we've run essentially a closing down sale. And we're kind of working out what next steps but having actually genuinely got the business to the best place we've ever been in team wise, product wise, in terms of impact and community size as well. Late last summer, we were feeling very buoyant and feeling great. And then well, we all know what happened cost of living crisis, consumer confidence disappeared overnight. And that was coupled with a double whammy. And specifically in I suppose, the clothing sector, but I'd be interested to hear from Shelley as well, in the hardware sector of the cycling industry where everyone was sitting on so much stock, there's suddenly there's a glut of stock, people, of course, aren't able to pay full prices, because, you know, we've all got our worries about what's going on. And so, you know, it was it was really a kind of a perfect storm for us. So, yeah, having been, you know, six, nine months ago, feeling Wow, we're going to make this now, the through to today, where we yeah, we've just run a closing down sale. And it was wildly successful. But you know, that was probably because of the pricing is much else.

Will Richardson 02:11

And if I may ask, How are you feeling?

Will Richardson 02:14

Now?

Rob Webbon 02:15

Do you know?

Rob Webbon 02:16

Well, I'm, I'm fine. Now. I'm fine. It's been a journey. For sure. I would say I've been through the grief cycle and back a number of times. I mean, in the run up to Christmas, it was feeling like oh, this, this is not going to great, you know, Christmas was was was not as strong as it should have been by any stretch And so that was difficult. early January, very tough. And, you know, I'm not afraid to admit it. It's okay. Now to say that, you know, mental health struggles are a thing. And I certainly had that for a little while. But no, I'm, I'm good. Now. I'm solid. I'm, I'm, I feel bittersweet, because like I say, the sale was so successful, we had so many people come out to say, I can't believe you're going, I've only just found you and I can't believe you're going you're the best thing since sliced bread. You know, we had some lovely messages from the industry and from our existing community, which is certainly helped ease of the pain.

Will Richardson 03:11

Brilliant. Okay, Shelly, where are Frog Bikes now?

Shelley Lawson 03:15

Well, we just celebrated our 10th birthday. So we've been through all sorts of cycles in the in the first excuse the pun, some periods of very high growth. And then I guess the last three years have just been characterized by continual global shocks that are well outside our control, like every business, so still kind of rolling with it. And we enjoyed pretty strong, pretty steady growth for the first few years sort of hockey stick style growth at the beginning. And then during the pandemic, of course, everybody wanted bikes. So the roads were nice and quiet, people had time everyone is desperate to get their kids off their screens. We couldn't sell bikes fast enough couldn't make bikes fast enough. And that led to a general shortage of componentry for our whole industries. And none of us could make as many bikes as people wanted to buy. And all of our lovely bike stores switched to refurbishing old bikes, because people were finding rusty old things in the shed and going can you turn this back into a bike so people could get out. So the industry kind of enjoyed that for a while. And since then, we've been able to get our hands on all the stock that we need, kind of coinciding with consumer confidence taking a hit. So exactly as Rob said, we found a lot of our stores started to buy lots of stock as soon as it became available. And we're not shifting it as fast as they'd anticipated. So the industry enjoyed a huge peak kind of 2021 and then a slump last year. And I guess we're all just clinging on at the moment to say how long is this slump going to last? What are we going to do about it? How can we all be as lean and as nimble as possible to ride this out and which sections of which market are going to recover quicker? How can we capitalize on any opportunities that might be out there? So it's... We're still learning every bit as fast as we were 10 years ago. I'd say it's it's just different challenges all the time. I'd say that's almost every business, because that resonates with me as well.

Will Richardson 05:13

Could you tell us both of you a bit about your target customer, and the role that has played in the outcome of both businesses?

Rob Webbon 05:21

Yes. So for us, I mean, I think it's a really important question. Our target customer is a very environmentally engaged sustainability minded, predominantly 25 to 45 ish, but we have plenty of people at either end of the scale, are equally engaged, and they love their sports, they're not dyed in the wool cyclists must go and ride 200 miles at the weekend, but they love being outdoors, on their bikes, or running. And, you know, I think that the common thread for everyone is genuinely looking for the most sustainable get they can find, which is amazing, with our community are so great, so supportive, it does mean that they're not the type of person who will just go and buy more and more stuff. And they shouldn't, and society shouldn't. So we encourage that. But then it doesn't mean, you know, everyone's locked up during the pandemic, or immediately after that. So everyone's got kicked out, and they don't need more. And they're saying, well, we love Presca so much. But yeah, we don't need more stuff now. So I think that has kind of been a third factor. If I'm totally honest, those people who might still be able to pay the prices are just like, well, I don't need more, and we wouldn't necessarily encourage them just to buy for the sake of buying. So I think our natural consumer is the kind of person that we want to encourage in society in general, but that makes it difficult for a sustainable business.

Will Richardson 06:33

And Shelly, what about you?

Shelley Lawson 06:35

So our target market is reasonably young families, so anybody with a child between about 18 months and about 15 years, when we first started, and when we first go into new countries, our kind of early adopters are the really sporty families, where the adults have probably got some quite decent bikes of their own, and want their kids to have a good lightweight bike where they'll make great progress, and they'll learn to enjoy cycling, as well. But as we kind of mature in each market, we become more mass market. And actually, you don't need to be an expert cyclist to recognize that giving your child a really heavy piece of machinery that's kind of made out of scaffolding poles and they can't reach the brake levers. And you know, it's a really almost a dysfunctional product is going to lead to lots of tears, lots of unhappy family bike rides, and probably lead to it just being left in the shed. So increasingly, we we just talked to a wide range of families who just want their kids to get outside and be active, which is which is almost every family. We've also in the last few years, we've developed a big customer base amongst people like the city council's so Cardiff is an example that just down the road from our factory in Wales, they've bought 1000s of our bikes to put in all of their primary schools, alongside funding for cycle coaching, and cycle maintenance. So that's been a fantastic way to begin to transform a whole community to take more daily sustainable activities better for everybody's health, better for city congestion, better for air quality, better for mental health. And it's fascinating to see that the council's even even with this current funding squeeze, they're finding the money for things like cycling, because they see what a massive long term benefit is. So that's been a really interesting, slight pivot in our business to talk to some of those big corporate customers as well.

Will Richardson 08:24

Okay.Employing people in sustainability, I'm acutely aware that we're not paid huge amounts of money. We're not, you know, this isn't an industry that you go into to Megabox. And therefore, do you think there's a danger that sustainable products appeal to sustainability professionals, who sometimes themselves don't have a lot of cash to spare? Because we do know that sustainable products do cost more because they last longer?

Rob Webbon 08:56

From our perspective? Yes, I mean, just by way of context, are fabrics sourced in Italy from recycled materials, I could get the same fabric from let's say, China for a quarter of the price. Or I could get a virgin fabric from you know, just virgin polyester from crude oil for an eight or 10 to the price per meter. Labour, far more expensive European labour, lovely family owned factory renewably powered, as cost upon costs upon costs. So the cost to make a lot are a lot higher, but the quality is fantastic. And we really have always focused on longevity and making sure that our kit will last as long as possible. So yes, 100% that there are people who just can't buy, quote unquote, sustainable products because you know, there is no price barrier to entry on clothing specifically. But what I would say is if for people who can afford it, then actually the kind of the false economy of buying cheap, is it well, it is a false economy and actually, if you buy well buy once, then you really are buying products that will last for a long time and so you need to spend a lot less than you know on buying and re buying and rebuy again,

Shelley Lawson 10:03

I'd echo absolutely Rob in in the sense that a well made bike, whether it's for a kid or an adult, but particularly kids who grow out of their bikes long before they've worn them out, a good quality bike will hold its value, you'll get back probably 60 70%, or more of what you paid for it. And because people know that they will last through many lifetimes of kids, if they're well looked after a well made bike really lasts through siblings, cousins, friends, secondhand market, whatever. I would also say that some of the things that we've done to make our bikes more sustainable in terms of the reducing the emissions from the embedded materials, we first started looking at improving the designs of the bike so that we used less material in each bike. So as an example, we challenge our r&d team to look at the spoke pattern in our wheels. And just by rethinking how the wheels at least, we've taken eight stainless steel spokes out of every wheel, and they are just as robust, they go through the same ISO testing that we've always done. So that makes the bike, obviously, there's less emissions associated if you can take out some stainless steel. But from our point of view, it makes it quicker to build each wheel. And it makes it a lighter bike, which is everything that we're trying to achieve for kids, and therefore reduces the cost of making it to some extent, we're seeing the same thing in our switch towards recycled aluminium. So we're putting pressure on our Far Eastern suppliers who make our friends at the moment to say, can we move towards recycled aluminium postconsumer recycled aluminium. And we hit a lot of resistance initially, even to the point where they said oh, you can't recycle aluminium. Really? I'm fairly sure you can. So took a lot of it really a couple of years of continuous badgering and showing them why it was possible. And few months ago, we got our first part recycled frame through as a prototype for us to test. And not only did it actually surpass our previous safety testing, which is amazing, it's a slightly stronger frame than our original, which is not what we expected. But it's also slightly cheaper as well, it's about $2 per frame cheaper, probably because they're using a lot less energy to process it because you don't need to get to the same high temperatures when you're recycling aluminium is to create aluminium the first time. So for us, we're in a kind of on a different journey to Rob because we didn't start trying to source the most sustainable materials at all, hands up, we really didn't do that. That's something we've come to as we've grown as the scale of the business has grown, Jerry and I've become more determined that we reduce our footprint, because just the quantity of materials that go through our hands, we make about 50,000 bikes a year. So that's a lot of aluminium and rubber and stainless steel and cardboard boxes, and so on. So we have we trying to migrate our bikes to become less emitted in the way that they're built, as well as designing them so that they are more long lasting, which makes them both better value for consumers and much better for the planet.

Rob Webbon 13:05

Can I just jump in there. I mean, isn't that the the mark of a great designer? Someone who can take stuff out of the design and still end up with the brilliant product, as opposed to just putting more stuff in more frilly stuff. And then the other thing I was just reminded me of I was lucky enough to go to Nepal a long time ago. And there was a family sitting beside the road there. And they were literally collecting aluminium cans, they were melting them on a little crucible over a stove, you know with a little set of bellows. And then they were casting them into forks spoons, and you know, cutlery and crockery and various different things. I love the kind of education side of things and how very simple messaging can actually be extremely impactful when I was there thinking that's a perfect example of aluminium recycling, isn't it, you know, that literally people doing besides history? I mean, health and safety wise, not brilliant. But I did think there's a lot of people that could learn from that in terms of Oh, wow, this is this is easy. We're seeing a plastic box going into a thread. It's actually not complex, but very impactful.

Will Richardson 14:00

And because of that intuitiveness or ingenuity that you possibly see more so in sustainable, designed products, I think I could see that from talking to for a long time with Rob about how he built Presca up and what they how they did the materials and talking to you as well surely about putting everything together there is an ingenuity there. Is it harder for or easier for a sustainable business to get financial backing? Rob?

Rob Webbon 14:34

I think it's increasingly easier. We actually got we've got two private individuals who are kind of our main backers, American guys who took a punt on us because they love cycling. They kind of have invested in the past in the clothing industry. And this was a little while back and so they've been brilliant and massively supportive. And I think at the time we discussed going for vehicle, you know, early in early days, we talked about B-Corp, and the kind of the sentiment then was, well, look, guys, you've got an awful lot to do. And is this gonna, you know, is it gonna be a benefit for you in the long run? I think actually, in hindsight, yes, of course, we had that same discussion a year ago. And they will say yes, absolutely all over it. There's a lot of information that shows that, that sustainably minded businesses are more investable in the long run. I mean, the clothing industry is a funny one in itself. It's just it's a very tough industry. So that will always pull up its its own challenges. But I do think increasingly, there's the whole impact investing side of things. And you know, that desire from financial houses is towards investing in sustainable businesses. Absolutely.

Shelley Lawson 15:39

Yeah. I'd agree with that as well, Rob, I think in terms of the kind of the more traditional sources of funding, so various bank loans, all the high street banks now claim to have green loans, green financing available, I think that's reasonably accessible if you're doing some quite straightforward decarbonisation. So if you want to put solar panels on your factory, if you want to, essentially anything that reduces your scope two emissions, I think the banks are ready and willing to lend that because it's probably got quite predictable payback periods, and they're quite short. Now, energy so expensive. So that's quite easy to do. But as all of us start looking beyond our scope two into our much more difficult to tackle scope three. Honestly, I think the bank's lack imagination there. It doesn't fit their standard business models. But I completely agree with what Rob was saying about private investors. So we're just about to launch a crowdfunding campaign at the moment. First time we've done this from Jerry and I still wholly owned the business, it's quite a departure for us bringing some other people on board is quite exciting. And it's really interesting how many of them want to hear about our sustainability. That's definitely a driving factor. So you know, the more imaginative investor and the more creative sources of finance, I think they're all over this and recognize that it might be a different risk profile, it might might have a longer payback. And the results are maybe not immediately measurable financially, but in terms of consumer engagement, customer loyalty. And honestly, I think longer term supply chain resilience as well, because none of us want to go through what we had 18 months, 24 months ago, where globally, we were all reliant on one particular supply chain, which was creaking, our supply chains are too long, too fragmented, we need to shorten our supply chains dramatically. And that will give us so much more resilience. And that's that counts for a lot in volatile times.

Will Richardson 17:31

And Shelley, on the crowdfunding route. Why crowdfunding? And also, why are you raising money?

Shelley Lawson 17:38

Yeah, crowdfunding, because we want to accelerate our growth in some of the big European markets like France and Germany, where we've been fairly small for a number of years, we've not had the resources to really go out with a lot of sales and marketing power into those markets. They're both a lot bigger than the UK market, they're really well developed in terms of kid cycling, the infrastructure is great, the appetite is there for good quality kids bikes. So we want to be able to invest more in those markets to grow them. equally true. In the US, again, we've been in the US about four or five years. And we just need a bit more firepower than we've been able to afford up till now to make the most of those markets. So that's pretty exciting, but also in terms of moving into sustainable aluminium. Because our frame manufacturers are not used to working with recycled aluminium. They've required that we buy billets of recycled aluminium, which normally we don't pay for them until they're made into frames, they need us to buy the actual raw aluminium, that they will then turn into frames and give back to us, which is an a bit of a bit of a just a cashflow nightmare, because normally we we don't have to pay for the materials so far up the supply chain. Again, it'll wash through pretty quickly. But just there'll be that a little bump in terms of working capital, while we migrate to that.

Will Richardson 18:57

That makes sense. And going into the supply chain with manufacturing in the UK. If we could talk about the supply chain, what impact did COVID And the grounding of Evergiven in 2021 had on your business? And what are the lessons learned from that. And just as a side note, for those that don't know, the Evergiven is the biggest transport ship in the world. The ever given us the same ship that launched 1000 means when it got stuck across the Suez Canal on March 23 and held up nearly $60 billion of trade. And it took weeks of tugs dredging and salvage experts to free the 220,000 tonne mega ship.

Rob Webbon 19:43

Yeah, so from our perspective it directly there was very little impact. Some of our components sometimes come from China, but most a source from Europe. So there was no point where you know, our factories our mills were saying we just can't get the zips, we can't To get the, the yarn we need, but the indirect impact was other companies couldn't from their usual sources. So they were looking for different sources, which happened to be our sources. So we did find that there was a bit of a knock on impact. And we certainly found that, that, but also the pandemic, of course, you know, we would normally be at, let's say, a month turnaround time for knitting new fabrics. And it was up to four months, I would say more actually, from the pandemic, just because of factory closes, as opposed to from the Evergiven. But yeah, I know it was a hell of a thing.

Shelley Lawson 20:31

Yeah. Yeah, it affected us directly, because a lot of bike componentry comes from the Far East. So we buy from people like Shimano, and Tektro. And we'd whole way through COVID, with a lot of Chinese factory and port closures, and peculiar patterns of consumer purchasing. Essentially, all the containers were already in the wrong part of the world before that happened. So shipping prices went from what would normally be about $2,000, a container to get a 40 footer from China to the UK, it had gone up to between 15 and $18,000 per container for exactly the same amount of goods, and it was taking longer. So that's a that's a shocking thing to have to try and absorb before the Suez Canal got blocked. So as soon as that happened, everything was delayed by many more weeks. And of course, the shipping containers are pretty tightly managed and ships docking and departing again, is is a well oiled machine. That was just carnage for weeks. So a real nightmare at a time when, as I said earlier, time and demand has never been higher. We were all desperate to make as much product as we could, it just wasn't possible. So there were times when we had our factory teams sitting idle, they couldn't make bikes at a time when we'd never seen so much demand. So crazy,

Will Richardson 21:47

We learned to last about supply chain didn't really drain money period, and the risk involved with different supply chains. And so if you're trying to build a sustainable business, is an ethical supply chain, by its very nature slower and more expensive?

Shelley Lawson 22:03

No, I don't think so. I don't see why it should be no. And as I said, if you can source a little bit smarter, especially in very energy intensive materials, like aluminium, in our case, but a number of others, then no, you can actually take some of the costs out of it. I don't see why people working in decent conditions, costs more than people who are working in unsafe conditions where there'll be high levels of absenteeism, there'll be a lot of inefficiencies, and quite apart from all the reputational risks, etc. It's absolutely worth the investment in that, of course.

Rob Webbon 22:42

Yeah, I would say slower. No, not necessarily. I would say, again, in the clothing industry, yes, it is more expensive, because I suppose if you look at the kind of the worst of our competitors, chasing the cheap dollar, literally, you know, finding the cheapest factories in any part of the world with zero regard for the externalities, you know, how people are treated, how the environment is treated, then you can lose a lot of cost in there, you know, not that we ever even considered taking that route. But I think in clothing, specifically, where you don't necessarily have those big wins in terms of, you know, we can save on fabrics that say because they're recycled, actually recycled fabrics are more expensive. Frustratingly, because it's such a labour intensive process compared to just oil from a well refine it, ship it out as quick as you can. So yeah, sadly, it's quite a lot more expensive. But, you know, as Shelley, why wouldn't we need to, someone said the other day, if you can't pay people to look after their families, then of course, they're not going to look after the local environment, because, you know, that's not their primary concern. So social and environmental goes hand in hand,

Will Richardson 23:46

having spoken to both of you in depth about the different products that you both sell, if I could call them products. You've both really, really thought about the environmental implications, minutest details, just so the listeners know, and Shelley, I was cycling with Rob, and asking him question after question about what it was that they did and how they did it. Because I wanted to find out if they actually practice what they preached, and they absolutely did. They really, really do. And so I am just curious to know how that fits in that whole lifecycle analysis. And everything fits in with supply chain and your thoughts around it.

Shelley Lawson 24:32

It's deeply embedded in Frog's culture and all the decisions that we make. It's a conversation we have on a daily basis about the measurable impact that we have on the environment, and therefore, every team with any spending power whatsoever is absolutely empowered to make the right decision. So we rely pretty heavily on the r&d team in terms of design improvements, but equally the buying team and we've had some interesting sourcing successes Recently, so our pedals, for example, used to be plastic, as most pedals are there now 50%, plastic and 50% rice husk, because we had a fascinating conversation with a guy from Taiwan that takes the waste material from the rice growing industry, it's just the husk of cellulose husk. But when it's processed, it behaves exactly like rigid plastic. So we've been able to blend rice husk with plastic to make pedals that now and you have pretty much half the carbon footprint of our original pedals. So you never know what you're gonna stumble across and what's going to be around the corner in terms of novel materials. I think we are increasingly seeing as an industry we're working together, we're all trying to solve the same problems with very much the same materials, at least in bike manufacturer. And all of us are fairly small and not not big enough to do it on our own. But we're all largely talking to the same kind of suppliers. So we we tend to, to work quite constructively together, sharing what's good practice sharing our frustrations and working together. So particularly across Europe, there's some great initiatives is one called shift cycling, where I think 80 of us now at Brands have signed an open letter to all of our suppliers to say, we require materials that have a lower carbon footprint to have our emissions by 2030 and, and get to net zero by 2050. And because each of us individually is going out with exactly the same message and the same kind of skills and techniques to our suppliers, that's why we're going from that whole stonewalling, you can't recycle aluminium to much more constructive discussions. And that's fantastic for our team because they can come to work and know that they're making a positive impact on the environment. We always say whatever you do at home, whatever good practices you have, in terms of, you know, how you travel, how you recycle, how you heat your home, when you come to work, you can have a much bigger impact on the planet, just because of the scale in and we're not the biggest business out there. But we really encourage people to feel that they can make a big difference.

Will Richardson 27:03

And that open letter with lots of organizations talking to their manufacturers, offsetting is contentious. But the reason why I'm bringing it in is lots of organizations do put money into offsetting. And it's scientifically, for the most part, unproven, but what we do see is by greening up making the supply chain more sustainable, is that something you're seeing so because it's all very well for us as a British company to go cut factory in China, please, can you be more sustainable, but they can't afford it? So what we're seeing with our larger companies that they're actually putting money back into the supply chain, to green up those said, factories, is that something you're seeing,

Shelley Lawson 27:44

I haven't seen anything in the bike industry like that yet, and people like Ikea are helping to fund some of their smaller suppliers, aren't they so that they can invest in renewables. Honestly, I haven't seen that yet in the bike industry. But I have seen some quicker wins, where all of us put pressure on our shared suppliers to take unnecessary plastic outer packaging. So that's all of our inbound goods being shipped around the world, saddles used to all come in a plastic bag, they didn't need to come in a plastic bag. And it wasn't until all of us wrote to our suppliers jointly. And it's a again a CONEBI is the European bike industry group, all of us committed to reducing unnecessary plastic in the supply chain by 2025. And we're very close to it now. So it's smaller steps like that. But it proves that there is quite substantial, widespread demand. And when suppliers keep hearing that, then they're going to be a bit more proactive. And because we're all asking them now, well, what energy are you using? And what conditions are your workers working in? And you provide us with evidence and measures on all of these things? Of course, that's accelerate the rate of change. Okay,

Rob Webbon 28:49

so yeah, I there's so many things in there that that I'd love to get into. But we haven't got an hour or two for me to say. Honestly, it's so exciting. All the stuff at the shift is a brilliant organization with partnerships as well. I agree with Shelley that the way that the industry, the cycling industry and wider industries have the biggest impact is through collaboration. And I think in the sustainability space, and those conversations, there's much less competition is much less kind of looking over your shoulder competitive advantage as opposed to guys, we just have to do the right thing here. And because like you say, a lot of companies just use the same factories. There's not many factories that make frames, you know, that's where you can have real impact. Coming back to the the LCA side of things. Yeah, that's kind of just critical for us really, when we started the business we we've always only used recycled fibers for every fiber that we could use recycled we have done. And that's not to say that's the end game, but it was a very good way of of having lower embodied energy and low resource use in our garments. So we knew that from the outset, we did the LCS later on. I suppose the challenge for Presca has always been because we set out from that position, then those kinds of quick wins of let's say transitioning from a virgin fiber through to recycled which can knock off the emissions by save 40 50% of your garment. They weren't there for us. And, you know, we certainly haven't ever been unfortunately, the company that has deep enough pockets to be able to do that, in setting that you talked about, well, within the supply chain, I think there's something in there, which is interesting. And it's something I started to hear a little bit about, which is brands working with impact investors, you know, normally the bigger financial houses, to turn them up with the supply chain to say, Okay, so we've got this amazing factory or die house, let's say because they use a load of energy. Actually, there's a business case for sure there for putting solar on the roof, we're getting as much of that energy generated on the sides as possible. Now, if that fact you aren't able to do it, just from a fans point of view, then connecting the dots between all the people that we know throughout various different parts of the industry and business, I think there is a way that you know, bigger change can happen there throughout the supply chain. But I would also say in terms of that LCA side of things, it's really important tool. It's not perfect, by any sense. And there's so many different LCA standards, even in the clothing industry. So it's slightly confusing. It's a really important tool for business. If they are using one specific standard to be able to identify right, this is a bad area, this is a good area, let's focus on on the worst areas. But then also things like the packaging discussion was really interesting, we ummed and ahhed so long about how we package our clothing. And eventually, we moved from Virgin plastics, the poly bags, 100 and 80 billion poly bags made every single year, we transition to compostable bags made from potato starch. On the face of things, absolutely the right thing to do, you know, is a very strong message for our community, and everyone loved it. But actually, who was then when we had the the LCA data, they actually use more energy to produce those things, there's more impact to produce them. We looked at soluble plastic bags that you can essentially pour hot water on and they disappear. But it was eight times as much energy embodied energy as a as a standard poly bag. So we were like, Oh, God, you know, where's the right choice. In the end, we had packaging expert come to us it a waste expert come to us and said, the best thing you can do is 100%, post consumer recycled plastic, essentially, because it's got the lowest embodied energy, it's the most recyclable, you know, all these various different elements. So the decisions that we all make, for the right reasons needs to be backed up by I suppose that data which you know, LCA is very, very,

Will Richardson 32:30

yeah, that's really important. I think that's a really important point. You see this all the time, with people wanting now to have a paper bag instead of the plastic bag? Yeah. And you're just like, really, it's worse for the environment. And you can only use it once brilliant. For the most part,

Shelley Lawson 32:45

and there's a there's a real concern about how much consumers understand all this because it's complicated. As he as he said, Rob, it took you guys a long time to work out what the best option was, I can completely understand why consumers make assumptions, perfectly, perfectly reasonable assumptions. And this there are experts on this stuff. Labeling is so hit and miss at the moment, isn't it? There's no standards. It's not like nutritional labeling, where we all pretty much trust what it says on our packets of biscuits. There's nothing like that in terms of impact labeling. And I think until there is it's quite difficult for consumers to know what to get behind.

Will Richardson 33:20

Yeah, as a small business, how easy is it to look into your lifecycle analysis and the footprint of the products that you're selling? Is it an easy journey is that help out there for you,

Shelley Lawson 33:31

I think there are improving tools all the time. But when we started doing this, there weren't, there's plenty of tools that are great for scope two, and energy usage. But inevitably, for most manufacturers scope three, and our supply chain is aware of a vast quantity of emissions. For us, it's more than 95% of our emissions are from our materials and logistics. And honestly, when we started doing it, there weren't great tools out there unless I was willing to spend a lot of money, which I wasn't. So instead, I built a kind of Heath Robinson spreadsheet. And we started by just looking at all of our skus and calculating what weight of each material went into each bike. So how much is rubber, aluminium, stainless steel and cardboard packaging, and the mileage approximate mileage that each item travels into us and each bike travels out to the customer. And that kind of gave us all the raw data we needed. It wasn't immediately available. I didn't have a neat report from our ERP system, but it wasn't impossible to get it internally. And then we applied emissions factors that were publicly available. So none of our suppliers when we first asked them were able to say oh, yes, you know, for a bottom bracket that we make in Germany, this is the emissions you need to apply. Nobody had that. But I could get publicly available from people like the aluminium Federation. In our case, if I could say our aluminium comes from this region in China, then we can guess that it'll be processed using coal fired power sadly, and therefore for every each kilogram of aluminium we use, the emissions would be about 17 kilograms of carbon dioxide, which is horrific, really, truly horrific. So we were quite quickly able to make a profile of each bike. And it was very obvious what our hotspots are. And that data was not 100% accurate. But it was close enough to say, Okay, we knew we know where we need to focus clearly. And I'd suggest that's probably true for any manufacturer, just get started, use whatever data you can access, don't pay people to do this for you, because it's not impossible, didn't take huge amounts of time. And it was fascinating learning it and play this back to your supplier saying, Well, we think the emissions are this, if you've got better data, please give it to us. So keep challenging them on it as well. And that will continuously improve I think over the years, I expect we'll have better data to play with. Anyway, that gave us a focus. And as I said aluminium was was our clear focus. And we know that recycled aluminium, the footprint can be as low as four kilograms per kilogram of aluminium as opposed to 17. So that's what we're absolutely focused on using less aluminium and every bike and improving the supply chain, and eventually, potentially even green shoring it getting aluminium made in the UK, recycled aluminium, using hydroelectric power, and doing all of that close to home. So we can longterm properly close the loop and take back old bikes that have got to the end of their useful life, break them down and put them back into our supply chain. And we can only do that when that's local. So that's the Holy Grail. That's when we'll we will get closer to net zero. It's exciting. Yeah, that's probably game changing. And I don't think we'll be able to do that on our own as from bikes, I think we will be really will be collaborating with a lot of other manufacturers by that stage, but it's not impossible.

Rob Webbon 36:42

You've really made it if you're on your own Aluminium Smelter.

36:53

But there's people like hydro and Ken stellium. There are renewable aluminium companies in the UK already using generally using hydroelectric power. So they don't yet make bike frames, but they're talking to us.

Will Richardson 37:07

Rob, how easy was it for you to learn and to adapt?

Rob Webbon 37:11

And I'm really inspired by your approach actually, Shelley. So I kind of came actually from a background of doing some LCA work and carbon accounting and kind of consultancy back in the day. So it was something I always wanted us to do. But for the kind of the clothing side of things, we really struggled to find any suitable emissions factors that I felt confident in. And I guess that's because there's so many manufacturers of polyester, there's so many different processes involved, and depending what processes used and you know, for the finishing and dyeing, and all these various things. It was a bloody minefield, if I'm totally honest. And like you say, the options are there to go to a specialist LCA firm in this in the clothing space. And back in the day, that could have been 15 or 20k, to do your LCA for one garment, you know, and of course, I mean, the beauty of a proper LCA is not just emissions, it focuses on resources and water, and eutrophication, all of the wider impacts. But I think climate is a really important place to start right now. So were we able to do LCA in the early days now, since then, there's been some good tools emerging. There's one called the Higg index, which is set up by Patagonia and others, with a view to making that LCA data widely available. And it's got some real flaws, is certainly not perfect. And there's been some rulings recently by competition's marketing authorities who have said you can't use Higg data to market your products. You can't say, our polyester t shirt is 50% Better than one from this shop. Because we've used the Higg data. It's not for that is used as a tool to inform your business decisions. But then increasingly, there's more and more companies on the market. Now, there's a great one we've been working with called Compare Ethics, who they take all the various different range of emissions factors, the database is not just in clothing, but other industries as well. And they will then crunch all the numbers on your behalf for each of your products, and spit out essentially the the emissions data for each of your products is based on the Locate geographic locations, which is something that he doesn't really do well, or the mileage that's involved in transporting how you transport. So they crunch a lot of data to give you essentially for a kind of a monthly subscription to give you an LCA output for all of your gardens. So it's way way cheaper than getting a proper, full in depth LCA and much more accessible. So yeah, I would say the tools and the companies out there doing it are getting better and better. It's still a journey to go through. And it's it's unless you have someone incredible actually doing it for you in house, it can be quite quite a challenge to go through it. Yeah. Okay.

Shelley Lawson 39:41

And I think because the data is still best endeavours and estimates for us. We're not confident in carbon labeling yet, because I would be happy to put a carbon label on each bike, but I know our competitors could come along and put kind of any number they like, because we haven't got one agreed methodology He or 1/3 party authority that would validate what we're all doing. Yeah, that's a shame. We kind of need that. Yeah.

Will Richardson 40:06

Yeah. Yeah, it makes sense. Shelly Frog Bikes made a conscious decision to work with cycling shops and not sell online. Why was that important to you,

Shelley Lawson 40:18

Partly because of the service. So when you buy a bike, you need to be confident that's going to fit your child properly. So the idea that you can take your child to a store, get the measured by somebody who knows about bikes, order the right bike, and then that the bike will be properly built, tested, the brakes will work, everything's screwed up tightly. Even people who think they know bikes, when they get a box of bits, and have to turn them into a bike on Christmas Eve, which has happened, it's not as straightforward as you think it's not as safe. So we made a conscious decision from the point of view of consumer experience to go through bike stores. We also like to support high street bike stores, they are experts in what they do. It's amazing how often you need them as a distress purchase. If something's suddenly gone wrong, you've run out of energy. Once again, the bike stores are a really important and I know it's swimming against the tide in terms of high streets. But look at what happened during COVID, they were allowed to stay open as essential retailers, which is fascinating, thank God, they weren't brilliant for everybody, not only for selling bikes, but for maintaining bikes for getting key workers to work with that and use public transport. It was really quite strong resurgence, quite strong message to bike stores, I think. So we always try to avoid selling bikes online, unless you don't live anywhere near a bike store. Because convenience is a factor. And if we sell if any of our bike stores sell online, we require that the bike is fully built and PDI tested before it's dispatched. But our preference is that customers get to try it out before they buy it.

Will Richardson 41:48

Rob, in contrast you sold entirely online?

Rob Webbon 41:52

Not entirely. We have been in a few smaller independent cycling shops. I think, honestly, the margin was our struggle there. And I totally agree with Shelley bike shops are a critical part of our high street. Most bike shops that we spoke to were saying we don't really make much money from clothes. And we have our two or three standard brands that you know, people know of and want to buy. So thanks, but no thanks. So we really came up against a bit of a brick wall there. But yeah, certainly in the early days, it was the margin that stopped us really taking that route.

Shelley Lawson 42:23

And I guess if somebody buys a garment, it's the wrong size. It's reasonably easy to post it back to you. If they've bought a kid's bike, but it's always going to be the kid's birthday that day, then you've got a bigger problem on your hands.

Will Richardson 42:39

It's quite hard. We bought a bike for the kids online, secondhand on eBay, and then didn't read the small print that they said they weren't going to send it to us. So yeah, we had to get a friend to go and pick it was a logistical nightmare. We were like, oh, man, it's all very well buying secondhand. Now, Prescott offered clothing repair, and frog bikes offers warranties and MOTs for secondhand bikes. Do you think you're almost - alluding to some of the things you've learned on your website Rob - you're shooting yourself in the foot by making your products last so long?

Rob Webbon 43:19

Yeah, look if we wanted to. But if we wanted to build the most highly profitable, biggest margin, we could, then we would have done things very different from the outset. If I'm totally honest, I think Presca is for sure. The type of business that the future needs. And really we can't carry on business as usual. But that kind of messaging around. You don't need to buy this. Well, it worked very well. For Patagonia didn't it? It was their most successful ever marketing. Marketing Tool. But but there is something really important there. I think for us, it was really around, we wanted to work out, can repair actually be a kind of a critical part of the business and two reasons I suppose we did the repair side of things, or we offered it one because we just genuinely felt it was the right thing to do. And secondly, also because it was a way for us to find new customers who wouldn't have found out about Presca, we launched the first chamois pad replacement service in the UK, no other companies doing it. So you bib shorts, your cycling shorts with the pad in them. When they run out. It's quite often the pads The first thing to go, you know, the seams are working the pad or the foam will go funky and just flat as a pancake. So a lot of things get thrown away there. Now, we never actually had to replace a single showing pad in a Presca pair of shorts. But we had every other brand people coming to us to say, Oh, can you just replace a pair because I love these shorts and my favorite ones, but I can't use them anymore. So it was a brilliant way for us because it was kind of industry first and that kind of thing. Really good marketing tool, but it's a brilliant way for us to keep products in use for a lot longer. But then also to find people that wouldn't have found out about this before and because the quality of the repairs was so high. A lot of those people come and lose 60 or 70% or something turned into Presca customers so it wasn't wholly altruistic. I I think that's the only way that repair can be, let's say a profitable part of the business is through actually the impact on the the kind of the longer customer journey with you. Yeah, yeah, I think

Shelley Lawson 45:10

it's probably similar story for us the the fact that our bikes last a long time and are easily repaired and they're made of standard gauge equipment as well as our bikes doors have access to all of our spares. So it makes it very easy to keep them in really good condition in the long term that helps support the original sale price because you know, you can buy cheaper kids bikes for sure, our bikes start at 250 quid. And if a family wants to do that, a they want confidence that it's going to be very long lasting, but also that it that they can get their money back when they've grown out of it. So that's an important kind of initial selling point. But just as Rob said, in terms of customer acquisition as well, supporting our bike stores to sell secondhand, a lot of them offered tradings as the child inevitably grows, they will do a trade in for the next size up. And then they will use their mechanics, and all the spares and touch up paint, to refurbish used bikes and sell them again. And that will bring customers who might not normally walk into a bike store, into the store or onto their website. And particularly at the moment when customers are that much more squeezed for cash. People who are really uncomfortable buying a new bike for a child, again, they don't know if they're going to love cycling in six months time, or if they're going to suddenly have a growth spurt. So the access to a reconditioned secondhand bike is is perfect and makes sense for our stores. And they bring it brings in footfall who people who may not have met before. And while they're in now might just pick up, you know, some lights on my bike on it, just have a look at those adult bikes, and we can turn them into customers as well. So I think it works all around.

Will Richardson 46:40

You're both passionate about cycling, and we know that bikes are really important for our health communities and greener future. What would you like to see done to encourage more people to cycle

Shelley Lawson 46:54

I'm gonna go back to Cardiff Council, I love the approach that a reasonably local authority can have, where they can influence the infrastructure on the roads, the signage, the usage of all the roads, the parking, bays, all of that that's within their gift. And they can work with all the local schools, to get cycling on the curriculum, and to give them all the resources they need, whether it's space or cycle trainers, or even a lock up to put the bikes in, and just encourage everybody from that kind of societal aspect, through to financial incentives to really change behavior. And if your particular school is discouraging, driving, and encouraging, cycling, and has put everything in place to make it easier to do, then that makes really quite profound change, which will benefit the area for years and decades to come. And I love that. And it's, you know, of course, we'd all love our government to do more. And of course, we will look to other countries who we think have done it much better and much faster. And if I had a magic wand, of course, that's what we want to do. But it's it's interesting to see that it is slightly more local level, there are organizations who are wholeheartedly supporting cycling, because as I said earlier, it takes so many boxes in terms of health, the efficiency of cities, and how everybody moves around air quality, which is horrendous in lots of areas. So we'd like to see more of that.

Rob Webbon 48:20

Yeah, I totally agree. For me, it's kind of at the macro level, I think it was it was Holland wasn't it had very high road deaths. And they realized that we need to get people on their cars, they, they put a huge amount of resources into, into the messaging and marketing around very kind of guerilla campaigns around, you know, get out of the car cycling as best to do that in the UK. We're so constrained by the infrastructure. I live in Bristol, which is meant to be kind of, you know, one of the best cycling cities in the UK, some parts of brilliant and the Council have done an awful lot. But there are some areas where they are so constrained by these tiny kind of Victorian streets they've inherited, that actually, it's really, really difficult to do, unless they make some huge sweeping changes to kind of infrastructure and road layout, then it will always be a challenge. I think, at that level, at the kind of the micro community level, it's not much of a surprise is that a lot of cyclists are male, pale and stale. And certainly the kind of those of us getting out and I like her at the weekends. It's very homogenous sport at that level. And I think that's really where community groups organizations, whether that's, you know, women's only cycling groups, there's some of those brilliant ones in Bristol, whether it's groups like black riders Association, who are led by an amazing guy called Timmy who is so positive and so powerful and getting people from from backgrounds who just wouldn't get on bikes normally saying I so right to sit in my car and go cycling at the weekends, and they wouldn't in the past because they wouldn't have seen a face like theirs. They're so you know, it's it. There's so much power in those kind of community groups. Yeah, I think that's probably where change happens quickest. But the greatest change needs to happen at that macro level. And that's a big, big deal.

Shelley Lawson 49:59

something recently about the one of the things that triggered all of those changes in Holland. And it takes a brave government to do this. But there was a law change, which meant if there was any kind of collision between a cyclist and a driver, it was always the drivers fault, no questions asked. And that meant that drivers immediately wanted to be physically separated from cyclists. They didn't want to be within 100 yards of them. So all of the barriers we have, it's we're so tribal, between drivers and cyclists, even though there's a good overlap between them. A big brave law change like that actually enables some huge infrastructure changes, because suddenly, yeah, it's okay to have a street that's only for cyclists, because I don't want to be driving anywhere near there. So maybe it takes some big picture thinking.

Will Richardson 50:44

Yeah, I don't think we're there. Anyway. So finally, what have you learnt, and what has been your biggest learnings along the way, Shelley?

Shelley Lawson 50:59

ah, are so much that the benefits to the business have come quicker than we expected. I think we started looking at sustainability because we wanted to on a really personal level, we wanted to minimize our impact, as our business grew, and didn't expect it would immediately improve the business and immediately improve the quality of the product, the weight of the bikes, the way that we designed the bikes, the way the bikes last, and improve our supply chain as well. And really importantly, improve the motivation of our team. Because when they feel that they're doing something impactful, it's definitely helped us in terms of our existing staff, but also recruiting younger staff. It's a bit of a cliche about millennials, but they do want to work in places that have strong values and where they will have an impact. So we're not only doing it, because it's the right thing to do. And we're, you know, willing to sacrifice things on the way, it's actually already strengthened the business by doing the things we're doing. And we're we are by no means at the end of the journey, and no means perfect, but we are actually seeing improvements. And I'd say across our whole stakeholder base, from suppliers through to the bank, people are pleased that we're doing it. So don't be shy of getting started, even if you haven't got all the answers yet.

Will Richardson 52:17

Yeah. Perfect. And Rob, what about you? Slightly loaded question.

Rob Webbon 52:24

Well, I've had a flood of things coming to me that I mean, I think you're right, surely the most important thing is just start doing it. You know, really, there's so many people coming to us, who said, You guys are way ahead of us, like, you know, it's too much we don't even know where to start, well actually just start doing something, I think understanding your impact at whatever level you can, whether that's a full in depth LCA, or just we've kind of run these numbers. But we now know that aluminium is the biggest issue is such a positive way to start. The team thing I would completely agree with Shelly, I think you can't be having a good team, like, you're not a business without a good team. And we had some amazing people on our team who, let's be honest, could have got a lot more pay elsewhere. But they loved presco. And still do. And I bloody love them as well, you know, O stands for a bit emotional. I think you know that. People do believe if you're doing it from the right place. Even if you're making mistakes, and God knows we made so many people buy into that, whether that's your community or your team. So that is hugely impactful. And I suppose the last thing I've learned how bad the industry is. I'm watching these improve.

Will Richardson 53:45

When you say industry, do you mean fashion or cycling?

Rob Webbon 53:49

Fashion... Sadly, cycling as well. I think it's seen as a green motor transport, it is a green mode of transport. But I think a lot of people who do it are not that way inclined at all. And that's probably going back to the pale male and stale guys and the weekend of which I am one, I've learned how much I don't know, and how much is still a challenge and that we didn't get right. You know, I've been doing this for years as a kind of professional background and then five years full time Presca. Even then I still feel and felt like proper imposter. You know, I don't necessarily have the the ability to tell people like this. And so many people have come out and I'd say you guys were killing it. You're the leading light in clothing in the industry. I can't believe you're gone. Kind of thing. So yeah, I suppose I've learned out you know what, actually, we were doing all right.

Will Richardson 54:37

On that, have you got any plans of what you're going to do next?

Rob Webbon 54:40

Yeah. Well, I've got super, super lucky I've bumped into some guys who actually were in our next door office to us, who are a marine renewables engineering company. And they've asked me to support them two and a half days a week, mostly kind of bizdev they're really interested in getting into offshore wind. And surely you were talking about you know, renewable, or recycled aluminium from hydropower, but also the offshore wind industry is huge. And if we can build out as we need to, then there's going to be so much energy there for things like decarbonizing aluminium, steel, concrete, transport, heating, all these various things. So, so that's great, that keeps the door and I'm really excited by it. And then I've got two and a half days really to work out. Okay, what next, and I have learned quite a lot. And I feel like I can offer quite a lot to businesses who are going through what we tried to go through, or who are just at the start of the journey and feel like where do I even start? So I'm going to be looking at setting up some consultancy work to essentially, yeah, pass on those important lessons that I've learned. And what I'd really like to do is do that in the community as well. So something for business, and then also something for community groups who probably wouldn't necessarily be able to get that support on, you know, climate education, or, you know, all these various different areas. So I'm feel really excited. Actually, I feel, you know, good at this stage of the ending.

Will Richardson 56:07

And Shelley, What about you next with Frog bikes, you've talked about venturing into the US and European markets?

Shelley Lawson 56:15

Yes, exactly. So that's, that's kind of the focus of the crowdfunding at the moment. So it'd be about ramping up our team. So we've got more resource and talking to people in those markets. So that would be exciting, whilst also accelerating everything that we want to do with our supply chain. So that's pretty exciting as well. And on a personal level, I'm also carving out time outside Frog to talk to other businesses that are trying to do the same kind of thing. There's huge appetite there. Everybody's keen to get started. everybody's worried that they don't know what they're doing. And we're all in the same boat. So I think it's there's a, there's a lot to be said for sharing, you know, the highs and lows and all trying to make it happen as quickly as possible. Because there's there is no time to waste here there was last year, we saw the impact of climate change in a way that nobody could anymore ignore. So we will have a huge responsibility to get moving on this quicker. I've even been speaking to school groups. And believe it or not, last week, my mother's WI is the oldest I've ever confronted. And they were amazingly engaged. It was really tough crowd. But wow. It's interesting to see across different generations what people's priorities are, and, and how engaged everybody is.

Will Richardson 57:26

I think that learnings from each other is so important. We're partnering with organizations using them pay footprint in Australia, New Zealand at the moment. And one of the things that I'm trying to get is I want to get to a place where all of us consultancies around the world are learning from each other, because crowdsourcing understanding ideas, and you both alluded to it through this podcast, and just now we can learn from each other. And that will accelerate change that how do we do that? What, you know, what are the platforms that are out there that we can do that with? And what does that partnership look like? I don't know. But I'm forming collaborations and ideas around that. Because I think it's so important. That's because let's say for example, Australian companies will be doing something one way, and we can go, oh, that's a really weird way to do it. But that would work really well, as well, because cultural differences drive change differently in different cultures, and society. Rob, if I may ask you just a few questions about Presca and the thought process around closing it down. And I guess first of all, what did it feel like to close the business?

Rob Webbon 58:44

Or I should say, it's not dead yet. Before? We kind of look at it. Is it? Is there a future?

Will Richardson 58:48

Oh, good.

Rob Webbon 58:49

Yeah. I think in reality that won't include me going forwards, probably realistically, but I would love it if someone with the right intentions would would take it over. Or if you know, one of my co founders could in time do that. There's lots of things to work through to get there. But But essentially, we've put it on ice right now is where we are, how did it feel? pretty devastating in some ways. And that was really around the team. Like I said, we had built a brilliant team. And you're you're responsible for for a lot of people, you know, so that was very, very tough. I had one particular day where I was coming back from a conference. And I think I'd had the real I was on a stage talking about breast care and also wasn't feeling great, which didn't help my head state but I think I had the realization that day of oh, gosh, I think I think this is gonna happen. And I was Yeah, I was literally in floods of tears like, oh, you know, it's really, it's, it has been up and down. I feel very proud now, really, really proud. I'm at a point where now I can take all the positives, whereas before it was, you know, predominantly struggling with some of the negatives and the feeling of failure and all Those kinds of things.

Will Richardson 1:00:01

I guess finally, how did you know when? Or was it just an amalgamation of things? Or

Rob Webbon 1:00:08

do you know the first kind of signal that I, that I thought, Oh, this could be really rocky, within? Who's maybe October, November, October, I think something like that. And I was speaking to a guy who basically said, Look, I don't want to scare you, but the cycling industry is about to be on his knees. And he was speaking from point of knowing. And I talked about the kind of clothing specifically here, but he knew all the big clothing companies, were essentially saying, everyone is sitting on so much stock. Look what's happening with energy crisis coming down the line with the cost of living the consumer confidence. There's a storm coming, there's a storm of rain, and it's going to be really rough. So at that point, I think we realized, okay, and all the feedback from investors was we love what you do genuinely love what you do. But now is not the right time for us. Thanks very much. So I suppose once once we knew the kind of the big investment was off the table, then that gave us a challenge or cashflow challenge. And then coming into Christmas, ourselves, we were locked down, compared to where they should have been. And this year, we were doing a lot more kind of advertising, we had way more stock, we had a bigger range, much better range, the brand was way stronger, the community was double the size. So you know, in normal times, that would have translated to a really brilliant Christmas. But it was actually sales were lower than the year before. We were then at a point in kind of early January going, like, is there a way that we can carry on purely from the kind of cash flow perspective, we'd already laid off the team, which we didn't November, which was brutal. And just all the indicators were going the wrong way? Sadly, you know, I wish it hadn't been the case. But it was pretty clear. And perhaps that day of tears running down my face was was because I had that realization like, we don't this is it. So yeah, that's it wasn't necessarily one specific thing. It was all the facts together, and then a realization. Okay, we can't, we can't make it out of this.

Will Richardson 1:02:08

Thank you, Rob. And thank you for being so candid. And I think I've got huge respect for the way that you seem to be dealing with this and with the way that you've spoken about it as well, with such an open nature. And I think we do know that others are going through the same kind of things at the moment in many different industries as well. So hopefully, your story has helped others. Thank you both so much for being such a positive influence on us in the cycling industry. And thanks for being on the show.

Will Richardson 1:02:42

Thank you. Will. Thanks, Shelly.

Shelley Lawson 1:02:44

Thank you