New Product Launch - Men's Bib Shorts
One of the benefits of being a direct to customer brand is that we get lots of good quality feedback. One piece of feedback we have received a number of times is that some of you want to have the option of a matching Jersey and Bib Shorts. We also wanted to apply some of our thoughts and learnings from riding with other brands Bib Shorts over many years, taking both things we liked and disliked (more on this below). These have actually been worked on since late 2017 and tested over thousands of varied real world kilometres all over the UK and Europe, identifying incremental refinements along the way.
We have cut no corners and instead have selected what we consider the finest materials, from the leading suppliers. We fully appreciate that our Bib Shorts are not cheap but we think compared to the offering of top brands which price anything up to 2-2.5x higher they still offer great value. To further improve the value we also offer Bundles for purchases of Bib Shorts plus any Mens or Womens Jersey or Gilet.
Path to final design
We opted for elastic straps rather than fabric panels or fabric straps, for us this was a simple decision driven by comfort and getting the right degree of compression on the shoulder straps. We also prefer not to include additional fabric going up the back – if the weather is cold you can choose to wear a base layer but if the fabric is built into the shorts then you can’t remove it on warmer days. On a similar note we have cut the bib-shorts to finish just high enough to provide support and comfort but without it rising up unnecessarily high which again can produce areas of overheating.
On the aesthetics of the shorts, we think that less is more, so our logo features only subtly on the leg gripper elastic. This also avoids using transfer logos which almost inevitably peel off over time.
As a final touch, we have never understood how brands make a big deal about comfort and then have a large care label that rubs against the skin or has to be cut out and then rubs even more! We think it’s a no brainer to have a small label that points out away from skin where it can remain in place, without causing any irritation.
A quick note on selling only a Men’s Bib Short - while we have been extremely happy with the customer reaction since launch, from both Men and Women we have received greater interest for Shorts from Men. As a small start-up we had to make a choice to first launch one so we are starting with the Men's and as we continue to grow we would love to launch Women’s shorts as soon as it is possible.
Ultimately all we do is about you, the riders, so we hope that many of you will enjoy a lot of comfortable and enjoyable miles wearing our Bib Shorts.