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Screeeech! I overheard someone asking Richard Vallens if he liked the new bedtime reading on the Bike Friday home page. His response must surely be page 3 of the mythical book, "How To Be A Fan Without Really Trying". Read it and see if you agree.
[Richard and Mary Vallens own a New World Tourist each and a Family Tandem - Ed]
Let me answer circumspectly, Lynette. Let me start by filling the perimeter of your desk with rose petals. Then I will follow up by arranging 12 weeks of yearly vacation for you to recharge from the INCREDIBLE amount of effort and energy you are putting out. A limousine to and from work on rainy days (if you insist it be a bicycle, then I'll find an enclosed PediCab). Company paid apartment. Cell Phone. Airfare to anywhere you want to go. Company credit card. Personal massage therapist. [At this point Lynette is seriously considering re-locating to Irvine, CA, on the next available Greyhound bus].
OH MY GOSH ***YES*** I LIKE THE ARTICLES ON THE HOMEPAGE. The Home Page is ASTOUNDING!!!! It is soooooooo incredibly perfect for what Bike Friday is trying to do. The (rotating) lead photos are brilliant. The news stories on the left are fabulous. The Parakeet Speaks column is inspired.
Bike Friday's success is built on relationship marketing and what better way to build that relationship that to make your home page a destination that people come back to, time and again, for interesting news, stories, and photos. I check bikefriday.com every two or three days. It's a periodical to me, just like Bicycling magazine. It fires my enthusiasm for Bike Friday Bikes, and reminds me that Bike Friday riders really ARE doing some interesting things. I have long maintained that it's not bicycles that you're selling. You're marketing magic carpets to the kind of life experiences with which people would hope to fill their lives. And THAT's what your new home page is filled with - images of what you can do with a Magic Carpet. "Buy a bike, buy a magic carpet, and YOU can have these adventures, too." ----- It IS a pity that Roy Wallack wrote about the unstable wheels in his LA Times article. But that is the experience one has for the first 15 minutes on a Family Tandem with an 8 year old on the back. Had he been able to ride for a hour, his impression would have been totally different. Fate took us down, Lynette, when he had that flat. It was just plain bad luck.
BEST regards,
Richard Vallens
So just who is Richard Vallens? Read on:
Your favorite Bike Friday - and why?
The Family Tandem - because we have kids! Hanz and Alan could go to the Hall of Fame based on this bike alone. Part of the joy comes from riding, part from being the best possible situation to communicate with a child. You're close enough to hear each other well, and together long enough to really cover some topics. Yet there are no awkward silences because riding fills in the gaps!
The best thing you've done with it?
A 9 year old girl - who couldn't ride alone joined me on the Family Tandem for 165 miles this year. Her entire 4th grade class went on a series of training rides and a final long ride to the California coast, and she went, too, on the Family Tandem! Ie never had a better time on a bike than those rides.
The weirdest thing you've done with it?
Rode with 23 different kids as stokers during a one hour beach picnic.
Your family?
Married 19 years, , terrific wife, two children
Richard, 53, kid-raiser and for 14 years a self employeed computer consultant, working out of the house. Mary, 45, favorite bride, 5th grade teacher for 23 years in Irvine (our home town) Katina, 14 now (11 when the FT arrived), a ballet-jazz-lyrical dancer And Nik, 11 now (8 when the bike arrived) my pal and ever-eager stoker. ill Ride for Food or Booksis this guy motto.
What you do for a crust?
Crust? Am I too old to understand this question?? What you do for kicks.
I ride. Usually with Nik or alone, and my spirit SINGS! And I photograph children, every one of which is completely amazing to me, and document the essence of their childhoods.
What makes you sad, mad, and glad (in that order)?
Something you've done that you're proud of?
Private Pilot at age 17, entirely self-funded by working at an airport Volunteered (weekly) in both my children classrooms from kindergarten through 6th grade VISTA Volunteer in 1973 (now called AmeriCorp, kind of a domestic Peace Corps) worked in El Barrio de Este Los Angeles (East Los Angeles barrio) teaching literacy
Something you kick yourself for?
Not buying the right camera, and the right bike, the moment I felt the need.
Overall philosophy on life?
Being kind is more important than being right
Quotable quote:
The best bike in the world is the one you have with you when you want to ride.
Your NEXT Bike Friday and why you want it?
A RED New World Tourist because the best bike in the world is the one you have with you when you want to ride. And after that, a SatRDay, because owners keep saying theye never had as much fun in their lives as they have on a recumbent.
[Richard has since bought, and returned, a Sat R Day. Just not his cup of chai, apparently. The fact that he wrote the above letter after that event shows that he is indeed, a die-hard Fan - Ed]