Nando Caban-Mendez is just an ordinary cyclist, with an ordinary day job as an environmental designer. “I’m not a racer,” he said. “I just love to ride bikes.” And he has designed cycling jerseys and technical t-shirts that fit that same love for bikes. He started Chronic Cycling about a year ago, and has collected feedback from friends and potential customers, and now is just about ready to sell his first shirts. Preliminary designs for several shirts are on his site, ChronicCycling.com.They should be available by mid-March, if everything goes right.
From the start, Nando has planned on making both technical t-shirts and cycling jerseys, both “stock” designs and custom designs, and fits for both women and men. This has been quite a challenge. Getting started took a lot of research. It was hard to find the right manufacturer for his shirts, because his orders are very small (once things get up and running, an average order might be 150 shirts at a time). Not only that, but he wanted just the right fit. It was difficult to find a manufacturer that would produce jerseys and shirts to his specifications and allow him to order such small quantities. Nando said he researched over twenty potential vendors before settling on one.
Chronic did not take pre-orders, Nando said, because he wanted to make absolutely sure that quality and fit were up to his expectations. His goal is to make products that he himself would love, and by extension his customers will love. Most of his business is expected to come from word-of-mouth referrals and he wants as much input as possible – and to keep on improving his shirts.
Nando moved to Austin about seven years ago and says they have met lots of friends in the local cycling scene, and they love it here. When I asked him about bicycle infrastructure here in Austin, he was relatively happy “In Puerto Rico we had no bike lanes at all,” but would still love to see more attention put into closing the gaps. On his own commute, he points out that crossing Walnut Creek at Metric boulevard is really dangerous because there are no bike lanes at that point and it’s fairly narrow – “you have to either keep up with very fast moving traffic, or hit the sidewalk.” He loves events like the Tour De Fat, and wishes we had more like it. “It would be great to have something like that every month, that brings all types of cyclists together.”
On Christmas Day, Nando had a crash where he went over the bars at the greenbelt and suffered a couple of hairline fractures in his right arm so he’s been sidelined from riding to work for a few months – “I can’t wait to get back on the bike.” right now, hIs work commute is about fifteen miles each way, and there are no showers so he wears cycling clothes and changes at the office. Inventive, Nando has also put in a hidden hook where he can hang up his clothes under his desk at work.
Will you be seeing Chronic products in your local shop soon? Well, maybe. “It would be pretty awesome” to have them carried by local Austin bike shops, but the launch needs to go right, first. He hopes his shirts will also help grow the local cycling community.
Look for more on Chronic Cycling’s t-shirts and jerseys when they have products officially for sale. For now, you can learn more at Nando’s site, ChronicCycling.com.
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on Feb 17th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
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