We are always pleased when Cycle Chic inspires. This is not, however, what we had in mind. The car industry, in this age of demotorisation, are bumping things up a notch. I am in Montreal and Ottawa this week, presenting one of my talks, and discussing how the car industry has spent a century perfecting the art of selling their products. A lot of bicycle advocacy, on the other hand, is small groups of sub cultural enthusiasts trying to get the larger population to be just like them, instead of employing basic marketing techniques to encourage people to ride. The growth of Cycle Chic mirrors the marketing techniques employed between 1880s-1950s and it interesting to see how it has gone from a blog with nice photos to becoming Bicycle Advocacy 2.0.
The city of Murcia, in Spain, has a cycle chic blog and Cycle Chic Belgium is run by an environmental NGO. Several other cities have contacted us about starting cycle chic blogs and today Montreal Cycle Chic will launch here in... Montreal. I am heading down to the bar shortly.
Montreal Cycle Chic is an intiative of Velo Quebec, Canadas largest cycling NGO. They recognize the value of the concept and its ability to encourage people to ride bicycles.
From babes and dapper chaps on bicycles to mainstreaming bicycle advocacy. Nice.
