SRAM gathers journalists from around the world to try out products in the Soquel Demonstration Forest.
When Chicago-based mountain bike company SRAM was shopping around for a place to show off a new line of products, it came to Santa Cruz. It's “a mountain biking destination and a year-round destination,” says Benny Cruickshank, brand communication manager. “There aren’t many of them, and Santa Cruz is definitely one of them.”
SRAM employees think they’ve hit on a winning approach to showcasing their products. Cruickshank says that while most companies rent a hotel room for a few days and give Power Point presentations to journalists in a conference room, SRAM thought there might be a better way.
“We find that to be dry and kind of stale,” Cruickshank says.
Instead Cruickshank and his coworkers rented out a beach house on East Cliff Drive and invited journalists—three or four at a time—to come check out their new line of products, which this year includes a new shifter and new brakes. This is the company’s second year in Santa Cruz. They’ve done similar product launches in Durango, Moab and Southern Oregon.
James Lalonde, SRAM’s public relations coordinator, says the method pays dividends for the company. Journalists write better articles and take their time, he says—plus it’s pretty fun for the staff too.
The team of about eight SRAM employees takes the journalists mountain biking at Soquel Demonstration Forest, where they try out the products. Afterward, they come back home for a big dinner and usually a few beers. And unlike some of SRAM’s other destinations, Santa Cruz offers an interesting community if the cyclists want to go out for a concert or a taste of some nightlife.The journalists stay about four days. On March 15 they'll wrap up a three-week run here.
“It’s kind of the best of both worlds,” Cruickshank says of Santa Cruz. “It’s the community. It’s the weather. It’s beach, and it’s the mountain biking.”
Cruickshank says SRAM got the product launch idea from Volcom and Quiksilver, both of which own houses on Hawaii’s North Shore that serve as publicity hubs. Lalonde says SRAM has tapped into something unique in the mountain biking world.
“We obviously aren’t invited to our competitors' media launches,” says Lalonde, “but we have a very strong feeling they’re not doing anything like this.”
