New cycling apparel brand Go Faster has cancelled its Kickstarter campaign for kit that’s only available to those who can prove they ride fast enough after learning that the cycling community is apparently not supportive of its approach.
We reported on Wednesday that the British startup launched its campaign for a new model for buying cycling kit that claimed to psychologically help riders go faster, while raising awareness of sustainability issues in the apparel industry.
The concept was that cyclists have to improve their average speed to be able to buy its higher level aero-optimised kit; riding for a distance of 10km or more at 26km/h (16mph) average speed to “unlock” the Level 1 jersey, and 39km/h (24mph) for the Level 2 jersey.
“The idea for Go Faster came from finding that setting yourself a personal challenge and then rewarding yourself with some great kit once you’d achieved it helped us improve, and we wanted to share this idea with other cyclists,” Go Faster founder Oliver MacCarthy tells road.cc.
“The approach was also based on the idea that if you have earned your kit, then you would be proud to wear it for more than one season, in order to tackle the environmental impact of the “premature disposal of unwanted kit”.
With this goal still in mind, Go Faster adds: “The environmental impact of the decision to rethink is very low because we only produced a small number of prototypes, with the last ones being used themselves in the campaign. We will strive to reuse the materials in the prototypes so they don’t go to waste.”
Go Faster said in a message to its followers: “We’ve received many messages over the last 24 hours from the cycling community, both in support of and opposed to our Kickstarter concept. Our idea was to offer performance-minded cyclists the chance to challenge themselves to improve and reward their effort with a standout jersey. But we’ve learned that the wider cycling community does not support our approach. And this is no way to start a new cycling brand.
“We decided the best thing to do was to close the fundraising campaign and rethink our approach.
“We are grateful to our supporters, testers and partners for all their support on our journey.”
25 thoughts on “Kickstarter campaign cancelled for kit available only to those who ride fast enough”
So people who had no
So people who had no intention of buying the kit stopped them from selling the kit…hmmmm will this work with those bloody Marmite jerseys?!?! 😉
Good for them. I think the
Good for them. I think the sustainability aspect is the way to go, really drill down into how to make garments last longer. For example, I had to throw away some otherwise perfectly good bibs because the pads and gel inserts had gone flat. If only the pads could be easily replaced. Think about new materials, recycled materials etc.
I also think the ‘game-ified’ design is quite fun.
Fair play to them. I do think
Fair play to them. I do think there is the kernel of an idea here, though; maybe jerseys for more attainable goals like big climbs or long distances instead of the speed thing, which comes across a bit macho and posey.
Perhaps similar to Xempo who
Perhaps similar to Xempo who have had success in the running market are doing? http://www.xempo.co.uk
I don’t get it, but each to their own …
I think this is a better
I think this is a better option – or “ride X amount in a year” – I think making it about performance, rather than persistence was their mistake. When its about persistance that conceptually anyone can achieve, on any bike if their willing to put in the time wearing the jersey is less lording it over people in an “i’m just better than you” and more a case of “I worked hard for this”.
Conversely, going out and smashing a 10k effort on an expensive bike in a chain gang isn’t really earning anything in the same way as the number of people for whom that is a challenging but achievable goal will be very low and for many its so out of touch and out of reach that it just creates another barrier of snootiness and superiority (and cycling has FAR FAR too many of them).
Your suggestion, which is much more like the way the audax community works emphasises that there is a side to cycling that is about the journey and the adventure, not just staring at someones wheel and chewing the stem (and don’t get me wrong – I love a pacy ride as much as the next guy but there’s more to cycling than that!)
Carior wrote:
I can smash out an hour or so in the evening at a decent pace but don’t have the huge (and it is huge) amount of time needed for these long, slow endurance efforts/challenges…which can also come across as overly ‘macho’ and so on as it’s all about the suffering innit?
So that’s no better and possibly a lot worse in my opinion.
Alternatively people can just chill the hell out and stop being dicks about everything (that’s not about you btw!!)
I think the suggestion is
I think the suggestion is comparable to the marathon/half marathon bumper stickers we see. It represents an accomplishment, and doesn’t seem like a douchey “I can ride faster than you” thing.
Surely a marathon sticker is
Surely a marathon sticker is just a “douchey” ‘I can run further than you’?!
I think the accomplishment idea is a good one but perhaps they should have started with more attainable targets, part of me thinks the reason for the backlash is because most cyclists can’t actually achieve the highest target and have therefore decided it’s a terrible idea!
Socks is probably a better way to do it as well, cheaper and probably bought more regularly than jerseys.
Rich_cb wrote:
I like the idea of socks. As far as a marathon goes, it’s a serious accomplishment. It takes a lot of work and training. I have no issue with someone being proud of such an accomplishment.
SaintClarence27 wrote:
I like the idea of socks. As far as a marathon goes, it’s a serious accomplishment. It takes a lot of work and training. I have no issue with someone being proud of such an accomplishment.— Rich_cb
Oh, and for the socks, you could have mountains for everesting, maybe a calendar for riding every day for a month, things like that.
I was joking if that wasn’t
I was joking if that wasn’t immediately apparent.
I have no issue with people being proud of their accomplishments be they maintaining a high average speed on a bike ride or running a marathon. Both require training and dedication to achieve.
I guess the basic idea is to
I guess the basic idea is to increase the buyer’s investment in the apparel well beyond the purchase price, so that they do not wish to change it every year. Just as we keep objects of sentimental value well past their price expiry.
Quite how you achieve that, not sure. There needs to be some kind of attachment between the gear and something of greater value to the buyer. Maybe organisers of significant events (eg London to Brighton) could issue electronic vouchers redeemable against totemic apparel (“London to Brighton 1984” type stuff, I’m struggling at this point). But whatever it is, it needs to make you want to hang on to that jersey, not bin it for next year’s colour ways.
Maybe they could do something
Maybe they could do something like the recent MAAP off cuts collection.
You earn each piece of the jersey separately and then you order it when you’ve got enough accomplishments to complete something.
To keep you interested each section could also come with a matching accessory (sock/cap/arm warmers etc) that you’d receive immediately on completing the challenge.
I like this idea, anyone fancy bunging me 10k to give it a go?
They might need to change
They might need to change their company name too then….
agree the aims are right but the execution flawed, as ever ideas are cheap, getting them done right is much harder, ( which is why I am not well dispossed to kickstarter)
Go Further or Go Longer, Go Higher…theres a whole range there as well as Last Longer. being sustanable is about getting as many people as possible to change their behaviour otherwise its just green washing.
See what you all did? Another
See what you all did? Another good idea squashed because you can’t be bothered to pedal harder or put more time in on the bike! Nice one!
😉
Anyone heard of greenwashing?
Anyone heard of greenwashing? no, thought not
I did wonder if the
I did wonder if the previously proposed business model breached some sort of disability discrimination laws.
Would a better approach, to tie in with exclusivity and suitainability, not be to offer a subscription, and when a certain number of social media’d miles is past then a new jersey is sent out? A bit like the park run t-shirt thing.
EricP wrote:
I always liked the park run t shirt thing … here is a stylish park run t shirt, but you can only buy one when you have done 50 park runs. Gives you a goal to aim for but, since it is based on how many park runs you have done (and therefore distance – 50 park runs being 250km of course), the goal is achievable by anyone, regardless of whether you complete your park run in 20 minutes or an hour and a half.
Given the popularity of things like the RaceAtYourPace personal challenges, I think shirts you can qualify for based on mileage rather than speed would probably be much more appealing.
…or maybe they realised the
…or maybe they realised the market for cycling jerseys isn’t that huge, and that their sector of that target market was a very small part of it, so perhaps they were doomed to start?
Tbf that hasnt stopped others
Tbf that hasnt stopped others joining that market,though few rarely ask for 10k up front from their customers. But to spend a whole year,claimed, setting this up and to can it after 3 days is a remarkable lack of faith in the vision they were selling/promoting.
Awavey wrote:
More likely it is a sign that they didn’t actually do their research properly during that year long set up. To can it within three days having seen the reaction from cyclist indicates to me that they never bothered taking soundings from cyclists before going fo the kickstarter.
Personally, I don’t care. If someone wants to do this, and can get enough people to support it to make it viable, then more power to them. The main problem for is that I looked at precisely none of their jerseys and thought “That looks good. I would wear that” … especially at the prices they are charging. The £10 jerseys I bought from Aldi to abuse on my commute are more stylish than these.
It didn’t say how long these
It didn’t say how long these 39kph rides had to be? Because I can easily
crop that massive climbsustain that for a bit.10km.
10km.
Whoever came up with the
Whoever came up with the categories needs their head examined – the difference between 16mph and 24mph is just vast!
Crucially going against their
Crucially going against their favour though, was that the jersey designs were just complete horseshit. I’d ride at 39kmh just so no one saw me