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Andrew: The name just flowed. It was just Vintage Electric. That was before even I thought
it was going to be a business. It was like, "I want to build a vintage electric bike."
Then, bringing it around and getting people's interest, and thinking I could actually build
them for customers, deliver, and make them as happy as I was when I first rode mine.
It was easy, just Vintage Electric. Shea: At first impression, it's almost like
owning a witch's broom. It's like flying. It's just free power. It's crazy. Wind in
your face, you get up to speed real fast, and it puts a big smile on your face.
Andrew: The approach we've taken with Vintage Electric is to create an item that gets people
out of their cars, and allows them to feel the freedom of their first bicycle, leaving
your parents' house and riding around the block, but it brings it to an older generation
where people can hop on a bike, go down to the coffeeshop, meet up with their friends
and ride 30, 35 miles per charge. It's really a great commuter. You can ride to work. It
only takes an hour and a half to recharge when you get there, and then ride right back
home. Shea: I think we just need it to be a lot
more bicycle-aware, which is cool. I think we're going to be a big advocate for that
in the future, and get people on the streets in a safe manner, and make it more feasible
for people to really enjoy electric bicycles. Andrew: We built the prototype in my parents'
garage. I was determined to beat my buddy with his 125 gas motor with this electric
bike. Shea really helped out. He was helping out with a lot of the welding and manufacturing
the forks and the front end stuff. It was all really happening right in the garage.
Shea: Me and Andrew teamed up. I ended up moving all my tools, all my motorcycle stuff,
all my fabrication stuff into this spot with him. He was going to do the design side. Then,
the bike thing took off, so now it's all melded into one little piece. We use my shop, and
the design studio and everything to make a good team, where we can all be creative, let
ideas flow, and we can build cool stuff. Andrew: I started this thing off wanting to
design bikes. That's really what I feel that I'm good at. This team has gathered around
me to pick up all the pieces that I leave in the wake behind me all day long, shipping
and handling, making sure that new models can be engineered to perfection and actually
work. It's one thing to draw it on a piece of paper and say, "This is what I want it
to look like", but people from our team step up and they make that a reality.
Shea: It's cool to see something being up on the wall that I've just welded, two days
later being back in a rolling chassis with a crazy color combo or some sort of weird
anodizing going on. Things are really rolling over here. It's cool to come in every other
day and see how much change has happened. To put your time and energy into something
that has a lot of emotion involved in it and to see it given back with the success of being
in Wired magazine, and BBC website. It's cool to see all that pan out from this little idea
that has risen. I think the team we have here, we're all on board to really see our goals
and our dreams achieved. The main thing here is we want to bring back
that technology and that innovation that's happening in the electric industry, and throw
it back into the bicycle. We came up with this heat-sink aluminum box that went in there.
Everything else from there was fit and finish. We spent a lot of time looming each wire so
that it had a nice little finished piece to it. I think just building longevity into the
product and showing that the fine details are the most important part to us, the leather
and all the ties, all the wire routing's all been thought out. I think that's the most
important part of doing all this. I went through a couple of different designs. I think we've
really fine-tuned the way it is now. Andrew: We really create these bikes and build
them from the ground up. First step in that process would be doing all the metalwork,
so manufacturing the frames, manufacturing the forks, milling out all the crowns. As
soon as that's done, everything gets shipped off to powdercoat. Once it's powdercoated,
everything comes back. Final assembly, gets put together, tested, gone through a whole
series of tests, make sure every one is perfect for the customer. Then, out the door it goes.
I think the coolest feeling of doing this whole Vintage Electric is dropping a bike
off. When you hand it off, it's your baby. It's been in the shop. You've seen it, "Oh,
this color is so great." When you give it to the customer, they're happy. That email
you get one month or two months later of how happy they are, and the way it's worked, and
the way it's changed their lives, allowed them to go out and do more things.
Shea: What we want to drawn on is we want to have a quality product that lasts, that
is a strong piece that can fall off the back of your truck, and you can get it fixed. You're
not just going to break all the plastic apart and be like, "That's a piece of junk." We
want it to be reliable. We want it to be strong. We want it to be something that you're going
to cherish for a long period of time. Andrew: The idea of going back to building
and creating products that are meant to last, something you can pass down to the next generation.
You look even at a toaster that my grandma's had for the last 60 years. It was designed
so well. It looks great, and it still works. I think the whole idea of planned obsolescence
is total ***. It shouldn't happen. It shouldn't be around. Every product we build
should be built to last, and built to upgrade. That's what really inspires me is always the
vintage stuff that has such quality built into it. That's why bringing quality back
with the vintage design is important to me. Being 22 and trying to convince people to
fund you, to really believe in you, you have to work twice as hard to make people believe
that this is a real company, it's the real deal, and we ship these bikes out to everybody.