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“Every day, I was going into work like, ‘This is so fucked,’” Aaron Stinner said, reminiscing on his former job. He was 24, managing Bicycle Bob’s bike shop in Santa Barbara, and observing from up close what he calls a “broken” business. “I noticed how screwed up the whole supply chain was. The bike industry in general is like a dinosaur.”
This was Stinner’s experience: On any given November, a cycling giant like Specialized would come to his shop and ask for a $250,000 commitment. Specialized would flip that order to its plant in China, hopefully earning a discount for the massive batch, and then deliver it to the shop four months later. Specialized took on little risk, while the shop owners were saddled with the financial burden and inventory.
“Specialized lives on bike shop credit, essentially,” Stinner said. “It’s up to brick-and-mortar shops to sell [their bikes] with very little support from the brand. What you thought was going to be hot in November could very much be not hot in March. Now, you have the season to unload all this inventory you basically had sitting on credit, hoping that it’s not obsolete. Come August, you have to blow it all out, because you have to decide what you’re going to sell again next year.” This, in essence, is everything Stinner Frameworks exists to destroy. They make American-manufactured bikes, built one at a time, sold direct-to-consumer, with a focus on limiting their environmental footprint.
Stinner set off making bikes for friends in 2010, drawing on a childhood spent wrenching bikes and frame-building experience he learned from Oregon’s respected United Bicycle Institute. He estimates he crafted between 10 and 20 frames before orders started coming in from strangers. Soon, he was earning more money from fabricating bikes in his garage than he was managing Bicycle Bob’s. Committing to starting his own business was an obvious progression.
In August 2014, Stinner upgraded from his Santa Barbara garage to a 1,000-square-foot workshop in nearby Goleta. He got into business at an opportune time. The hand-built bike sector is thriving, even in the wake of an overall stagnant bike industry. The North American Handmade Bicycle Show, where Stinner Frameworks once earned “Rookie of the Year,” started in 2005 with 23 exhibitors and 700 attendees. By 2016, the numbers for the annual summit had ballooned to 179 and 3,500 respectively. Before NAHBS Chief Judge Patrick Brady stepped on stage to present the awards in 2014, he told a reporter from The Atlantic, “Right now is the golden age in custom frame building. There have never been more builders producing, and the quality has never been higher.”
