Bike Hugger 

Bonk! offers some clever aftermarket stickers more in-line with cyclists needs. I’ve seen reflective 3M stuff sold previously, but it’s generally in awkward shapes and sizes. The nice part, is that the color options offered actually allow your reflective coating to blend in to the bike. This picture doesn’t do a good job of capturing the effect, but the fork has a line of black reflective tape on the trailing edge. I want my pretty new rain bike to still look good after adding some reflective material. I’m not big on the yellow and orange triangles.

More photos from the Bikehugger Interbike Mobile Social… Including this one with the beacon in the background emanating from the Luxor Hotel. Riding down the strip in Vegas was a highlight of the trip. Riding with Xtracycles, Dahons, Mundos, and Fossil Fool, made this the most unique group ride at Interbike. We’re already planning our next Mobile Socials at SXSW, and Portland’s Webvision.

Uploaded by Dapper Lad Cycles | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.

With all the exhausting booths, parties, activities, and same old thing every year, it was refreshing to see Hed Cycling invent a Sunscreen Headset Cap and for me it was the “best in show.” And why’s that? Cause here’s a legendary dude that puts wheels under the top cyclists, constantly innovates in the wind tunnel, and he was totally excited about this plastic cup of sunscreen. It was infectious and cool to not hear someone describe in marketing mumbo jumbo how their carbon layup is better than everyone else. Seattle Cyclist are vitamin D defficient, so I rarely use sunscreen and was thinking that I’d put some Nuun tablets in there and use it like a salt lick on long rides.

This year, Bike Hugger brought more bloggers with the mission to go find cool stuff. I focused on our existing partners, the Mobile Social, and the next one — the mother of all Mobile Socials at SXSW 09 in March (more on that later).

I’m thinking that this bike was cargo, before cargo was cool and it’s aero cargo for touring across America.

Uploaded by qcom | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.

I had actually seen Wheeltags online prior to the show, and wasn’t all that interested because the stock patterns they offer don’t really fit my style. When I saw the booth, I got a look at a number of their custom offerings - and some were quite impressive. I had just seen the Velocity ELVS reflective rims so I asked if Wheeltags had something similar. I actually like their options better - they can do various depths, with or without logos. I think a Bikehugger branded reflective wheelset is in my future for my new disc commuter wheels!

(Note - this rim appears black under normal light - with my flash or car headlights - it glows bright white)

Sally Scott, a Japanese fashion brand, features a girl and her bicycle for their 08-09 Autumn & Winter Collection.

In the 3 years that we’ve attended Interbike, the industry has started not only understanding and embracing blogging and Social Media, but also now launching their own communities. Interbike saw

• Greenlight Ride from Civia
• Cateye Commute
• Pedro’s Plus 3 Network

Ok, cool, but do we need yet another bike community and more fragmentation of an already niche audience? At Textura Design (the parent of Bike Hugger) we advise businesses to not start their own social networks or communities, but instead to join one and take part in the conversation about their brand and products. I talked about that with my fellow panelists during the Social Media session at Interbike.

Spend monies for Do Epic Shit shirts here.

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iTMP got a few square feet in the Polar booth this year. I’m not even an iPhone user, but this was a app I wanted. Rather than schlepp your laptop to stage races or training camps, you can upload directly to your iPhone and sync your workouts. I didn’t seen any mention of GPS, but it can’t be far behind.

We rode the Strip from the Sands to Mandalay Bay … Dahons, Novara, Xtracycles, Big Dummies, Mundos, A2B electric, a Bike Blender, and more. Trouble free, fun, and massive. The next day, I qualified it as following the Bike Hugger prescription to “do epic shit.”

Uploaded by LightenUpBikes | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.