The Branding of Karmic Bikes
building a brand versus building bikes
Branding is such a weird word. It’s not something people usually think about, but it’s pervasive and we’re all affected by it to some degree.
The bike industry is weird. Most companies are making the same bikes, in the same factories, using the same parts. The only difference is the paint scheme they’ve come up with for that year, and the brand decals on the downtube. I didn’t start Karmic Bikes to build a brand. I just wanted to make great electric bikes that more people could afford. Apologies to all my marketing friends out there, but our customers aren’t buying a brand.
I’ll explain more below, but allow me to share the story of Robert O. from Santa Cruz.
We first met Robert via email over a year ago. He was an eager and enthusiastic follower of NTS Works, the defunct ebike startup from his hometown. Karmic Bikes had originally agreed to purchase the design of the “Fat Free” (talk about terrible branding). Robert wanted one so badly, he actually wrote us a check for what was essentially a rough, chop-and-weld, hand-made, garage-built prototype. I kinda felt bad, but he was all smiles.
After riding that white bike for a few months, Robert gave us valuable feedback and asked if we could improve the design. And boy did we improve it! I incorporated a lot of what he told us into the next few prototypes that we made. Eventually we ended up with the Koben prototype as seen in our Kickstarter video. We delivered one of the two protos (I kept the blue bike for myself) to Robert since we had to return all the NTS Works junk.
Robert started using the orange bike on a daily basis, going up the steep climb to UCSC. He was pretty happy with his new Karmic Bike. Until the small battery pack started having issues. The range was dropping off, and the power would cut out. We also noticed the charger was getting warm on longer charge cycles. Back to the drawing board. We had to fix these things.
We’ve since found a better battery partner in HiTech Energy, and specified a larger battery to give more usable real world range. It’s pretty silly to build an ebike that can only go 6–10 miles. Even our original target of 25 miles didn’t seem enough. We also worked with HTE to spec a better charger. The new design incorporates an internal fan to keep temperatures in check. The slight whirring sound may be noticeable in a quiet office — it’s similar to a PC’s fan (for those of us old enough to remember). We think the additional safety margin is well worth the trade off. The new charger is much better.
Two weeks ago we delivered Robert his third Karmic Bike. It’s a production sample Koben S, so the frame design and parts specification is near-final. We’re only testing tires and other small parts at this point.
Here’s what Robert had to say about it:
On Nov 18, 2015, at 5:28 PM, Robert Orrizzi <orrizzi@cruzio.com> wrote:
Hi Hong-
All good news! This bike is the best! It is a very fun ride!
Things I really like:
The bike handles well and looks super cool, picks up more power assistance the harder I pedal, “sails” up the hills, battery power is only half used after my daily round trip ride to UCSC, battery gauge on computer seems to be accurate, seat is comfortable, carbon fiber fork is cool AND this bike looks really “sexy”. A couple of people have asked me about it already!
Things I don’t like:
Minor whirring noise of motor, buttons a bit hard to use (especially w/ my arthritic hands), power assistance level # boxes (1 thru 5) difficult for me to see while riding, all the data info on the computer when all I really want is a clock.
Things I need to buy:
Kickstand, back fender
Overall rating:
9.85 out of 10 — This bike is a WINNER!
Thank You, Hong for all of your hard work and good service. I want you to know how much I appreciate your personal attention. Thanks again for making this all happen!
In Gratitude,
Robert
Caring for Customers — All companies exist to take care of their customers. Those who believe they exist to make money are forgetting who’s paying for their product. We fully intend to be a profitable business in the long-term. But that will only happen some day, if we take care of our customers today. Our customers are everything to us. Kickstarter Backers are even more important, since they’ve believed in us so early. We are thankful for them.
Creating Community — Robert is surprised that he gets all this attention while riding his Koben. I’m not. People love the bike and are impressed by how fast it goes down the road. He tells us that he gets stopped by folks who want to know more about his Karmic Bike. These are not minor interactions. This is how you build a community. Riding bikes is good for you, and its good for your neighborhood. We hope Robert inspires more people to ride their bikes. We think he’ll be getting another Koben for his partner soon.
Constantly Changing — We are used to the idea of continuous deployment in software development. While the cycles are slower in hardware, the concept is the same. We will keep working hard to make better bikes for everyone. Even in the few months since our Kickstarter closed, we’ve made significant improvements to the Koben. Not just in things you can see, like the frame design or the production colors, but in the things that you can’t, like the increased power and range of the battery, or the safety and ease of use of the battery charger. Our bikes will be better next year, and in every year after that. The pace of development in technology and improvements in battery science ensures this. We will always strive to make the best bikes. We will always push ourselves, and the bike industry, forward to the future.
I hope this gives you a little more insight into what makes Karmic Bikes different than other bike brands out there. We don’t have their marketing budget, or their hard-earned brand awareness. That’s okay. We do have our Karmic community. I know if we do right by our customers, we will be fine.
We build great bikes for everyone. We hope to be doing it for a long time.
Cheers,
Hong
