welcome everybody to Seattle by club TV

I'm your editor topic Laura and I am

with Martina Brimmer of swift industries

hello thanks for coming on the show yeah

thanks for having me on Tom it's good to

see you yeah good good to see you good

to see you that you're healthy

[Laughter]

so yeah the reason I want to talk today

is about the social distancing bike club

some what it's called

bicycle club we're calling it this with

social distance cycling cycling

clubhouse close yeah and you know this

really jumped out to me because I was

trying to come up with a post about you

know what does biking responsibly look

like right now you know public health

officials say it's it is good to get

exercise and it's good to get fresh air

but you have to have social distance

from others when you do it and you know

biking is kind of perfect for that but

only if you're doing it alone or with

people that you already live with

otherwise obviously you're not socially

distancing so when I saw this club it's

like yes yes this is brilliant this is

exactly what we need so maybe you can

tell us a little bit about it yeah so

the swift social distance cycling club

is intended to be a digital community to

basically temporarily take the stead of

all of the social writing that we do at

Swift industries and personally

individually Swift industries is like an

insanely social company by its nature we

are really social folks we love our

community we do so many outward-facing

events I don't know any bad companies

that do this much event coordination

me neither yeah

because we love it because it's like

where we get our best ideas about

product it's how we stake like connected

to our community is like so many layers

of goodness so we have been cancelling

workshops that we do on-site seasonally

so Swift oast a presentation series

called Stokes poke at local at a bar and

people show up in here presentations

from people about their different

bicycle adventures obviously that's on

pause what are your plans with that yeah

so we have yet to figure out how we're

gonna pivot um with stoked spoke

Adventure Club or Stone spoke adventure

series but you know maybe it'll take

some sort of digital platform and once

we've kind of come maybe out of this

crazy unknown phase of the last week and

Swift has also been hosting a series of

social rides which have been popular but

those are obviously cancelled for the

meantime also so what do you what are

you doing to you know keep that lively

yeah we're just taking exactly the same

energy and putting it online so we moved

our community online through Strava

Strava at its most basic account level

is free um you just have to create an

account and then unlike other mapping

platforms

it really is set up to be a social

network so that's why we chose Java and

it has like really awesome messaging

features you can set up events and clubs

such challenges track them so um it was

kind of just a little bit like at Swift

on Thursday or on Friday we were just

like I was like what about the Swift

social distance

cycling club and everybody just started

like cracking up and I was like oh just

you wait I'm gonna do it home on Friday

and I was like this is actually a super

fun idea like what could we do with this

so jumped on Strava just kind of got

myself familiar with how to set up a

club so easy and then went for it and

for me every club needs an insignia

that's looking at the starting place and

I loved this idea I've been watching a

lot of Marvel right now and I love the

idea of kind of like a little bit of an

insignia on the collar a little nod like

this the secret society challenge that I

put out was for folks who wanted to to

take 24 hours to design us logo and and

I see oh I count I think about 14 logos

were submitted and they're awesome

they're so good I couldn't have even

dreamed that people would take this time

to make these logos they came in from

all over in that same time frame

basically like we just saw membership

increasing like really fast mm-hmm and

so within 24 hours we had a logo which

is not yet disclosed which one we've

chosen so we're waiting for the right

time to let us know if people still see

the other ones yes they're all visible

you see you can give them thumbs ups you

can give props to the artist everybody

did such a rad job yeah

so then um you know I think a lot about

like unified experiences how we close

social distances and how to create

shared experiences so here we are we've

started with a platform to connect then

we've got a unifying image or logo that

like comes and brings us together and

then

um just thinking about like art

installations and gallery exhibits and

where it becomes like really sensory so

then this idea of a shared playlist came

to mind so we knew that we wanted to

challenge votes or invite folks to do a

social ride on the 4th of April which is

when we would have typically had our

face-to-face in real life social ride

our social rides usually bring about you

know between 25 and 40 people out to

ride with us

depending on the season um and we're

really gonna miss we're really gonna

miss that event so I knew that we wanted

to just set a challenge encourage folks

to go out on Strava you can be like

really tracking and sharing routes and

singing that people are out and about

but then I thought that it would be

really fun to kind of gamma phi it

mm-hmm so we created a challenge there

is like a photo challenge that you have

to submit

so in Strava you can upload afterwards

you can upload images that you've taken

on route and you get like a gallery and

there's some like kind of fun goofy

things that you gotta figure out how to

take photos of and then we create a

Spotify playlist to go with that ride

so that was crowd-sourced and we jumped

on Spotify started a playlist and set it

into collaboration mode and then shared

the link out and asked folks to put in

like a beat high tempo songs that they

loved that they would throw into a dance

mix like we just want like there's just

so much power in staying positive and

music and culture does that for us as a

community and um you know and dependent

artists are like really really gonna

take a hit if they haven't already I

mean

events are being closed left and right

thinking about performing our

who really have been working so hard to

get to events like South by Southwest -

like really bring their craft and their

magic to the public and that opportunity

now being set aside for the time being

so also wanting to like set out

challenges and or assignments that also

broaden our scope of awareness maybe Tao

all of this is impacting all different

walks of life mm-hmm so the next

challenge the one that we issued today

is actually a local one for Seattle

specifically we now have 460 people in

the straw book club and we want to see

it like balloon we want to see it get

huge but today's challenge is really for

the Seattle community because governor

Inslee like many other places in the US

has restricted restaurants yeah pays to

take out only and we are like dear

friends with the folks from peloton Cafe

here in Seattle that's where we start

our social ride typically one of the

most awesome ways that they've adapted

to these new and strange and unknown

circumstances is that they're making

their famous delicious burritos mm-hmm

five packs and ready to be frozen and

selling them for like $20 I don't know

you get a $5 amazing burrito in Seattle

and so the challenge right now is for

the next 24 hours however long to go out

and do a ride out get motivated get out

of the house head over to peloton cafe

and snag yourself and maybe some friends

some burritos drop them off for folks

who are also home down working from home

maybe have kids and can't get out as

flexibly so we're just like we weren't

supposed to be riding we want folks to

be riding

alone or in like very intimate small

groups I'm gonna be writing with Jason

you know you live together already we

got shared you're right it's probably

okay to bike with your roommates yeah

loving the idea that maybe there's like

10 or 15 of us out and about like really

supporting peloton Cafe today in the

Seattle and this could go for like I

mean like the sky is the limit kind of

this could be um whatever our

imaginations go for like I would love

for somebody to initiate ride for

drop-off at food banks I would love to

see folks doing an initiative that is

some sort of challenge around gift cards

for restaurants so join Swift social

distance cycling club and whether you're

in Seattle or not there's like really

amazing ways to activate around our

community and support and make it about

more than writings but my dog's going

crazy

I gotta say it's a place for community

and and I want to acknowledge like we're

trying to keep a beat and positive and

honestly like yesterday was so hard I

felt like I was in free for all these as

a small business owner and so like also

taking time to acknowledge that this is

real heart this is a really hard time

and so even just coming onto an online

forum that is cycling based that like we

have opportunities to give each other

kudos and be checking in whether it's

right believe it or not it feels like

it's pretty

it's a weird crazy time and we're all

trying to navigate it yeah together but

not yes I know that's the hardest part

you just want to give people hugs

it's like specifically what you're not

supposed to do yeah yeah just gesture

yeah yeah well it says so swifter kind

of already has experience with this kind

of organizing because it's wit campout

you know that's a that's a virtual well

maybe you should tell people a little

bit like what is swim campout is an

annual overnight bike ride so please can

you all hear me over my crazy dog it's

great ambience okay it's real listen

this is real oh yeah he's doing like

really messing up his toy and he's

really proud of it you got a rash in

that toy he's like a little Napoleon he

had like really proud yeah so Swift camp

at is an annual call global call for

folks to go by camping on the June

solstice we have a global community at

this point so we can't say summer or

winter it is summer and winter solstice

for the participants and it's been

amazing it's I think we're doing our

sixth year we have thousands and

thousands of participants who go out

we're working on our planning for this

year

so if campout is this year on June 20th

and 21st and it happens all over the

world we want everybody to sign in and

register their rides on Swift campout

calm because it's so cool to see like

thousands of rides happening through the

weekend mm-hmm

and it's cool too because there's like

timezone lapses so you see like Japan

goes first and then you're like already

kind of getting on their Stoke and then

the West Coast hits and then East Coast

hits and then we're off to Europe and

it's like it is so fun it's so fun to

see so what you know we're all kind of

waiting with bated breath but um

typically we do a big Seattle Swift

campout there's usually between sixty

and a hundred folks who come out and

camp all together who knows what that's

gonna look like but such an awesome

opportunity to go adventuring with your

family which are very immediate friends

or closest friends keeping it small and

also like cool opportunities to do some

solo writing if that's something that

you feel stoked about so we're really

excited um and have really really cool

partnerships lined up with bike packing

calm until the designs this year and so

it's it's so motivating and it's kind of

like Christmas is where softly I

definitely our biggest holiday like it

feels like the company holiday for sure

yeah hey here's cross that we can do the

group rides again but you know if not

it's kind of still works totally does

and we'll keep our fingers crossed

because that means that hopefully we'll

have come to the other side of this

mm-hmm

and it's not like we're resilient and

we'll just keep connecting and

organizing and checking in with each

other this way so yeah and at this point

most of Swift's orders are online I

assume is that correct

totally yeah yeah so we're really lucky

in that way but we do have a showroom

we're working right now to figure out

showroom closures stay tuned for some

announcements there our showroom is only

open Thursdays Fridays Saturdays and

Sundays

and you know we want to stay accessible

we're talking about kind of like

convincing those hours what the

different options are if we're only open

for pickup for example but for folks who

are like riding and wanting to support a

small business please our online stores

open and we like need you right now

we totally need you it's it's so amazing

as a small business to understand the

trickle-down of our economic impact we

have incredible relationships with our

suppliers we need to make sure that they

can do this and get through our

employees ourselves

it's big and and start to understand the

impact that you that like a company like

swift industries really has on many many

different companies - because we work so

closely with so many different kinds of

suppliers yeah and all bags are made in

Washington State

so um you know we work with two

wonderful small factories one in Seattle

one in Washington like these dollars

recirculate right here within 300 miles

so it's a big deal yeah it is well

thanks for talking to me and thanks for

organizing the social distancing Cycling

Club yeah I hope that everybody jumps on

it would be so so motivating and so

heartwarming to see that membership grow

yeah yeah it's a really good idea and uh

yeah it's one of those things you see

everyone else's route to like you know

what I'm just gonna go for bike right

now I need to stop reading the news yeah

here it is

it really reframed reframes things and I

think it's like really critical of

course for our physical health but I can

only speak to for myself like being on

that bike is so huge for my emotional

well-being

and it's a tool that's here and a

community that's like so engaged so

let's lift each other up with it yep and

you're not alone yeah totally

great well thank you so much for talking

to me and uh yeah good luck yeah thanks

Tom all right be safe