“The morning rush hour turned into a pure chaos. The terrorist attacts claimed 52 lives and wounded over 700.” so many people on the street. When he got to his office, Bødiker heard about what had happened. He called the Danish Deloitte office to tell them he was alive. Not everyone was as lucky.The terrorist attacks claimed 52 lives and wounded over 700. Bødiker’s Swedish colleague Christian Linde was in Copenhagen on business. He watched the news about how the Underground exploded on his route to work. ”I’m never setting foot on that train again”, Linde thought. He called Bødiker and said: ”We’re going to start selling bicycles.” They had spent many lunch hours talking about how amazing it would be to own their own business. Two weeks later panic struck London yet again. Bombs were found on three Underground trains and one bus, but thankfully they hadn’t gone off. Bødiker, Linde and many other London residents started avoiding buses and Undergrounds. London bike shops sold all their stock. Bødiker made a very Danish and very aesthetically-driven observation: ”Businessmen in pinstripe suits are riding around on racing bikes. It looked really stupid.” Bødiker and Linde had what can only be described as an “aha moment”. They decided they would sell stylish, quality bikes that are nice to ride. Linde says that at first, his family thought he was crazy, but that didn’t deter him at all. Many people think that leaving a job that pays well is a huge risk. Bødiker thought differently. ”I know I can always go back to consulting. No one can take away what’s inside my head.You can lose a business, but then you just have to try again.” ”Denmark is a wealthy country with a high standard of living. So what’s the cost of failing here? It’s very small, especially since I have an advanced degree. The risks are much higher in the
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United States. But here, failure isn’t a major catastrophe”, says this son of the welfare state. When they gave their notice at Deloitte, Linde and Bødiker had a business idea and years of experience in turning business ideas into business strategies. Analysing risks and combing through companies’ books had taught them to understand and analyse business strategies from every angle. ”We thought it would be fun to test out those skills on our own business”, Bødiker says. In addition to their experience as business analysts, the pair had a rare and valuable brand of intellectual capital: before the London terror attacks, they hadn’t given much thought to their upbringing in bike-crazy Scandinavia.When they did, it became the foundation for their brand. ”You don’t realise you’ve lived in a biking culture until you leave”, Bødiker laughs. He says in Britain teaching adults how to ride a bike has evolved into a whole business branch. ”Can you imagine?!”
B
ødiker and Linde started studying bikes and the bike models on the market while they were still in London, but they knew from the beginning that their new business would be based in Copenhagen, the Mecca of biking. They knew how they wanted their bikes to look. They sketched them on paper. But who would actually make them? They had no intention of becoming factory owners. They would have to find a factory, a subcontractor. Around 130 million bicycles are made each year. A little under 100 million of them are made in Chinese factories. Linde picked up the phone and called China. He’d heard about a company that could make the bikes at a great price. The deal fell through because the factory want-
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