If you went back in time to give college-aged Brian Riley a glimpse into his life now, he wouldn’t be surprised to find out that he’s an entrepreneur. But he might be surprised to discover that he became the co-founder of Guardian Bikes, a bike company that makes and distributes safer children’s bikes.
“I never intended to start a bike company,” laughs Riley, who started his entrepreneurial journey while he was still in college. Invigorated by the entrepreneurial environment on campus, Riley was inspired to solve a problem that had been bothering him for years: how to make bicycles safer.
When Riley was young he witnessed his grandfather’s difficult recovery after he suffered a very serious over-the-handlebars biking accident, which happens when the rider overapplies their front brake. His grandfather underwent surgery and suffered severe neck injuries. Riley wanted to create a product that would prevent this kind of accident and injury from happening to anyone ever again, and with this goal in mind he created SureStop technology.
SureStop braking technology makes bikes safer, especially for casual or recreational bikers who are less attuned to the nuances of braking systems. The product worked great, and Riley took SureStop out to the large incumbent players in the bike industry such as Schwinn and Huffy. They thought that these brands would be thrilled to outfit their product with SureStop so they’d be able to market a safer, better bike. But instead they were shocked to meet a good amount of resistance.
Marketing teams loved SureStop, but legal teams brought that enthusiasm to a screeching halt: if major bike brands marketed SureStop-equipped bikes as safer, even though that was true, it would undermine their existing bikes that didn’t have SureStop, introducing a slew of liability issues for bikes they sold or would sell hat didn’t have SureStop. So, the big bike companies offered to put SureStop on some of their bikes, but they weren’t allowed to market the safety features properly. This obviously put a damper on the exposure that Riley’s technology deserved.
Another issue that Riley noticed in this arrangement was that these big bike names sold their products in impersonal retail spaces such as Walmart and Target, or smaller privately-owned bike shops, but in both settings the SureStop technology relied on a customer service representative that was unaffiliated with SureStop to properly explain how to use the technology.
This meant that in the best-case-scenario, SureStop had to rely on a random person to explain the product, and in the worst-case scenario, SureStop technology was explained by a hang-tag on the bike that the consumer would have to read of their own volition. This distribution model didn’t give them a way to manage the consumer’s experience of purchasing SureStop, and also meant they had no way of ensuring that buyers were being properly educated about the product.
Riley went into the bicycle industry with technology that worked, that was needed, and that he was passionate about – but because he was unfamiliar with the industry, he had to learn the dynamics of the market the hard way.
“We finally realized that the path that we were taking to try to get this technology to people was just fraught with too many challenges,” Riley explains, emphasizing that all of the roadblocks he faced as a SureStop component supplier to big name bike companies helped him get acquainted with the industry. These experiences enabled him to determine a more efficient path forward that aligned with SureStop’s core vision: a safer bike riding experience.
Riley realized that they needed to create the entire bike and sell it directly to the consumers.
Riley realized that he needed control not only of the technology, but also of the marketing and distribution of his product so that the consumers were able to understand what value his product holds and how to properly use it as well. By cutting out all other parties and taking full control of his technology, from the conception to the moment it’s finally in the consumer’s hands, they solved all of the issues they’d faced as a component supplier.
“It was a big decision and a big risk, [but] we wanted to control our own destiny from a marketing standpoint, from a revenue standpoint, and in terms of that final product and the overall experience that the customer has,” Riley explains, describing that critical moment in his journey when he and his co-founder Kyle Jansen pivoted from being a component supplier to their own bike company.
Photo courtesy of Guardian Bikes
Riley started placing SureStop on bikes in 2013 and pivoted his entire business to Guardian Bikes in late 2015. Guardian Bikes is a direct to consumer company and the only children’s bike company that has differentiated technology to make a safer bike. In addition to being equipped with SureStop safer braking technology, Guardian Bikes have spruced up other safety features of the bike, too. Because they sell everything directly to their customers, they control every aspect of the customer’s experience, from educating them about the product to fulfilling the orders to letting them know when their bike has shipped.
While the move from selling braking technology to manufacturing and selling entire bikes is admittedly a huge one, Riley points out that the company’s core mission has stayed the same, and solving the issues in marketing, customer education, and distribution were just as important as solving the safety issues on bikes. “From the beginning the company revolved around solving the problem [of bike safety]. At the beginning it was about how to create a technology that solves that problem, and then the business side of it is just a tool to get the safety solutions out to as many people as possible.”
Riley also maintains careful control over Guardian Bike’s public image. While the company was still only selling components to other bike manufacturers as SureStop, they were approached by a producer from ABC’s hit show Shark Tank. He turned them away initially because he wasn’t sure the show would have much value at the time, and he could sense that SureStop wasn’t ready for the exposure. But when they transitioned to manufacturing and selling kids’ bikes as Guardian Bikes, he reached out to Shark Tank’s producer and let him know that he’d be ready to go on the show if they’d still have him.
Riley and Jansen filled out the application and appeared on Shark Tank in 2016, where they received a deal from Mark Cuban. They started selling Guardian Bikes in 2015 and earned a couple thousand dollars in revenue, but the Shark Tank deal sky-rocketed these sales in 2016 and the years that followed, and in 2020 they earned just under $10 million in revenue. Riley admits that Shark Tank got the name out there, and that it’s “a gift that keeps on giving,” driving more traffic to the site whenever there is a rerun of his episode. But ultimately Riley explains that even with Shark Tank, you have to “really nail the product and really nail the customer experience, because as a direct to consumer business you live and die by reviews and general word of mouth.”
He explains that your product has to deliver on its initial promise and by doing so you’ll earn champions of your innovation that will leave reviews reflecting their great experience and convert any new traffic or attention that you get in the future.
Sometimes, however, there are things that disrupt your customer’s experience that you can’t control. During COVID Guardian Bikes actually saw an increase in business, due to the fact that people were stuck at home and looking for ways that they could still exercise and have fun while being safe. The fact that people did not want to go into retail stores also benefited Guardian Bikes, who had had an online storefront since 2015, because it drove more people than usual to look for bikes online.
Riley explains that Guardian was well-positioned for this increase in demand since they manufactured their own bikes and sold them directly to the consumer. Most retailers would sell out of their bikes and were unable to do anything about it because they didn’t have direct control of their supply chain, but because Guardian Bikes manufactures their product as well as distributes it, they were able to be flexible in that regard. The supply chain was severely disrupted, however, and they still had to pivot and explore creative ways to adjust the logistics of their operation as shipping container imbalances and price surges occurred.
Ultimately Riley explains that they revamped the website to accommodate the increased demand and also increased communication with customers who had ordered bikes so that they knew exactly what was going on during the supply chain disruptions that slowed down production and shipping. This transparency and emphasis on the customer’s experience meant that despite these challenges during COVID, Guardian Bikes still experienced growth.
Overall, it’s this ability to pivot and adapt – to switch gears, and change lanes when needed – that has earned Riley and Guardian Bikes so much success. He emphasizes how important it is for entrepreneurs to look at their product holistically in the context of the industry they are entering, saying, “Matching the business model, marketing model, and distribution model is just as important as the innovation itself.”
Photo courtesy of Guardian Bikes
He also encourages founders to find a balance between persistence and flexibility. While entrepreneurs should persevere through challenges, they should also maintain a willingness to evolve and pivot as they find the right path for their innovation to really flourish.
That balance hinges on RIley’s number one piece of advice for founders, which is that they have to truly be passionate about their product, passionate about the problem they are solving, and passionate about their customer base. Because while Riley was able to adapt to the challenges that were thrown his way, it still required a lot of perseverance, and he is honest about the tough periods and rough patches that entrepreneurs go through.
“If you’re not really excited about the product or service that you’re bringing into the world and bringing to customers and really passionate about it, you probably won’t make it through those challenges and tough periods,” Riley cautions. “You should start a company because you want to bring something of value to a customer set that you really care about and you want to see that thing exist in the world.”
Guardian Bikes proves that an entrepreneur’s path is full of bumps and sharp turns but with the right mindset and determination you can make the journey safely – and with $10 million in revenue, too. Learn more about Guardian Bikes here.
Written by Catherine Casem
Find Guardian Bikes on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
