Islabikes has been innovating in the children’s
bicycle market for the last decade. With the
introduction of its new Imagine Project, the
firm has plans to entirely redefine not just
bicycle production but the way all industries
approach manufacturing.
Over the last ten years, while it has appeared
that the UK cycling market has grown significantly
— spurred on by the successes of British riders at the
Olympics and Tour de France, and even more by the
government’s Cycle to Work scheme — in truth only
specific areas of the market have flourished. Today, the
domestic cycle industry is seeing a range of difficulties
with an increase in the cost of imported components
and market share reducing among a greater number of
brands.
This is true of the children’s cycle market. Ten
years ago Ludlow-based firm Islabikes, then a fledgling
company, was the only dedicated high-quality children’s
bike brand. Today it faces competition from mass-market
manufacturers who have seen the value in producing
better children’s bikes, as well as a number of new
dedicated children’s cycle brands, many of whom were
originally inspired by Islabikes.
In its quest to innovate, not only has Islabikes
continued to enhance its product line, it has also inspired
its new Imagine Project, a venture where Islabikes seeks
to address questions of resources, manufacturing and
ecological responsibility.
Innovation has been the cornerstone of
the Islabikes story. Started in 2006, Islabikes was the
brainchild of bike industry expert and professional racer
Isla Rowntree. Isla noticed that her family and friends’
children were being given heavy, hard-to-control bicycles.
She knew that little riders would find far more cycling
success and enjoyment if their bikes were lightweight
and proportionally-sized — not just in terms of frame
dimensions and wheel diameter but also in terms of
component sizes — so set about designing her
own range of children’s bicycles.
From humble beginnings in a rented
office in converted farm buildings, within
two years Islabikes had paid for the tooling
to create its own design of proportionally sized
brake levers. Today, Islabikes fits its bikes
with its own exclusive size-specific saddles, pedals,
cranks, handlebars, grips, stems, seatposts, wheelsets
and tyres. In the last year it has even diversified into
high-performance children’s racing bikes, all in the name
of its founding ethos: to provide children with a better
experience of cycling through lightweight products and
intelligent, holistic design.
Currently almost all commercial products are
supplied on a ‘take, make and dispose’ model, also known
as a linear supply chain. Raw materials are taken from the
ground, processed and then manufactured into a product;
the product is then typically thrown away when the end
user has finished with it. Linear supply chains are wasteful
and ultimately, with diminishing reserves of natural
resources, unsustainable.
Although bicycles tend to have longer useful lives
than many products, their manufacturing model is still not
without waste. At the end of a bike’s working life there
is no established mechanism to recover and reuse all the
materials that were utilised in its manufacture.
With the Imagine Project, Islabikes wants to
change this. By using a unique ‘closed-loop’ or ‘circular’
supply chain, it promises to redefine the relationship
between a bicycle, its rider and the manufacturing process.
To call the Imagine Project just a cycle rental
scheme for children’s bikes is to do it a disservice. More
accurately, it is the servitised supply of a bicycle where the
customer not only pays for the use of the bike but also
other benefits such as customer support. The Imagine
Project subscriber will receive a special utility bike, which
will require no maintenance and can be exchanged for
a bigger model when needed; the anticipated rental
period for each bike size is expected to be 18 months. The
bicycles themselves are owned by Islabikes, incentivising
the company to design for the longest possible working
life, thereby gaining maximum value from the materials.
Imagine Project bikes aren’t off-the-shelf
standard Islabikes but unique models, with frames built
by Islabikes in the UK. Designed and manufactured from
the outset for separability, Islabikes aim is for 100% of
the materials used in the bicycles’ manufacture to come
from reused sources. The stainless steel being tested for
the frame comes from Sheffield and currently consists
of around 70% recycled material. Once it reaches the
end of its useful life (which Islabikes hopes ultimately
to extend to 50 years) those materials which cannot be
reused to make into new bikes will be sent for use by other
industries, thus retaining their original precious properties.
No waste will be sent to landfill. Imagine Project bikes will
originate close to the place of manufacture, minimising
the environmental impact of transportation.
Islabikes wants to ensure that families can
continue to access the benefits of cycling in the future
by offering affordable access to a quality bicycle. It
also wants to pre-empt commercial pressures that will
become more prominent in the coming decade: increased
cost of transportation of goods across the world, rising
wages in South-East Asia — the hub of global bicycle
manufacturing — and and the rising cost of resources.
Islabikes is keen to extol the virtues of this
closed-loop approach to other companies in its supply
chain. Inspired by the principles of a circular economy, as
championed by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, it wants
the Imagine Project to be just one part in a manufacturing
eco-system where the waste from one industry provides
raw input for the next, forming a continuous, cyclic flow
and alleviating reliance on finite raw materials.
With a promise to open-source what it learns
during the creation of the Imagine Project, Islabikes
wants to encourage other companies to explore a similar
path and it hopes that more businesses will follow. More
than just revolutionising children’s experience of cycling,
Islabikes’ Imagine Project may help revolutionise the
manufacturing experience for everyone.
To find out more, visit the Islabikes website or email The Imagine Project at imagineproject@islabikes.co.uk.
Published: 16 May 2017
Focus on Manufacturing - Edition 5
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