Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. I'm Jason
Speaker 1: Kelley and I'm Carol Master. Welcome to the Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week Extra. It's our weekly podcast bringing you an in
Speaker 1: depth interview you will not hear anywhere else. And this
Speaker 1: is someone we both found fascinating plays into the fitness world.
Speaker 1: We're talking about John Burke. His father started the company
Speaker 1: Trek Bicycles, and so we talked about the history of
Speaker 1: the company, where they started and where they've come well,
Speaker 1: and it's a wide ranging conversation. What I liked about
Speaker 1: it is certainly on brand for both of us, as
Speaker 1: you say, we love this company. I think we both
Speaker 1: have Trek Bicycles and we followed the company to some extent.
Speaker 1: But it was an emotional interview and in some ways
Speaker 1: talking about his father, but also talking about how you
Speaker 1: run a company in this day and age, how you
Speaker 1: hold onto your employees, how you treat your employees, and
Speaker 1: even how you treat your customers. Check it out. Started
Speaker 1: by his dad, Dick Burke and a partner some forty
Speaker 1: years ago created their own brand of bikes. They did
Speaker 1: it building them in a barn. The barn is still around,
Speaker 1: so is the brand, so we want to bring in
Speaker 1: um John Burke. He's president of the family owned in
Speaker 1: Wisconsin based Trek Bicycles. UM, so nice to have you here.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me. It's great to
Speaker 1: be here. All right. So take us back to the beginning,
Speaker 1: because this is, as Carol said, this is a family business. Candidly,
Speaker 1: there aren't a lot of those around anymore, certainly that
Speaker 1: have stayed in this way. But it's also employee owned.
Speaker 1: There's something special about this company. Tell us what it is.
Speaker 1: You know for sure, it's a family company. Um, the
Speaker 1: family owns the business. There's an esop, the SAP owns
Speaker 1: percent of it. But I think it's more than the ownership.
Speaker 1: It's the feeling. It's the feeling when you come to
Speaker 1: Trek that it's a family and we make sure we
Speaker 1: take care of everybody in the family and it's just
Speaker 1: an amazing place. But how do you do that, Johnny?
Speaker 1: In a day where I feel like so many companies
Speaker 1: are focused on the bottom line and I know, I'm
Speaker 1: guessing being family owned, it gives you some some leeway
Speaker 1: to do that. You got to be profitable. I think
Speaker 1: it starts with values. Um, you know it's my mother
Speaker 1: and my father. Um, we're are My mother is still alive.
Speaker 1: They're amazing people and they really started out with to
Speaker 1: who much has given, much is required, and you know,
Speaker 1: our family has been so fortunate. But you take a
Speaker 1: look at everybody a track, and I always view all
Speaker 1: those people as they're part of the family, and being
Speaker 1: part of the family their high expectations. But it also
Speaker 1: means that we're there to support everybody, that everybody gets
Speaker 1: taken care of, and that we try and do some
Speaker 1: amazing things together. And luckily, over forty forty plus years
Speaker 1: we've done some pretty incredible things. And you've been there
Speaker 1: for thirty plus years. He joined the nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 1: Was that a foregone conclusion that you were going to
Speaker 1: go into the business or were you one of those
Speaker 1: kids like, I'm not sure I'm gonna go work for
Speaker 1: the old man. You know, I wasn't sure I was
Speaker 1: going to do that. And then I worked a summer.
Speaker 1: I was working in the warehouse, and when I got
Speaker 1: done working in the warehouse, when I got all the
Speaker 1: packages out, when the ups I came. It was Frank,
Speaker 1: the UPS guy. He came at three thirty UM after
Speaker 1: I got all the box, I'd run into the sales office.
Speaker 1: I can get on the phone and I'd sell. And
Speaker 1: I was pretty good at selling. And that summer the
Speaker 1: bug bit me and I knew i'd go into the business.
Speaker 1: There were no conversations Mom, Dad, I think I want
Speaker 1: to go paint or be a lawyer or something like that.
Speaker 1: You know, my father, My father had one simple really,
Speaker 1: so your your last name will get you in the
Speaker 1: door and the rest is up to you. And my
Speaker 1: last name got me in the door. And um, I
Speaker 1: did pretty well. But it was also at a time.
Speaker 1: You know, I started Trek in Ur and Trek was
Speaker 1: doing great seventies six to eighty four, and almost the
Speaker 1: minute I start, it just crashed. What happened? Oh, you know,
Speaker 1: my father owned the company, but he didn't run the company,
Speaker 1: and and the customers didn't really like the company, and
Speaker 1: the company didn't really like the customers. And so I
Speaker 1: was a sales rep. I was. I had like twelve
Speaker 1: states and I drive around in my little Chevrolet Cavalier
Speaker 1: and uh, it was the greatest education you could ever have.
Speaker 1: And you know, I saw every all the wrong things
Speaker 1: that we were doing. And I said, you know, if
Speaker 1: I ever got in a position of power, I'd be
Speaker 1: able to change those things. And you know, because the
Speaker 1: company was small at that time, my father ended up
Speaker 1: coming out. He replaced the management and I was twenty
Speaker 1: four and all of sudden I was in charge of
Speaker 1: sales and customer service and we can make changes and
Speaker 1: we did really, really fast. My father loved customers. We
Speaker 1: changed the culture of the company, and uh, it was
Speaker 1: a good thing. What's the dynamic I always think about
Speaker 1: with the family owned business and you bring in, you know,
Speaker 1: the kids into the business, how are they perceive, especially
Speaker 1: when you're younger and even though you grew up in it,
Speaker 1: and you've got employees who've been at the company for
Speaker 1: a long time, what's that interaction like? Well, you know,
Speaker 1: my one of one of my nicknames, and I have
Speaker 1: a number of them, was kid Burke, and uh, you
Speaker 1: know I was. I was always just so proud of
Speaker 1: my father, so really it never bothered me. I didn't
Speaker 1: see the expectation as even though I'm sure they were
Speaker 1: there there there was work to be done, and uh,
Speaker 1: I always looked at it as as an honor that
Speaker 1: I was, that I was his son. I never looked
Speaker 1: at it as a burden. Did you feel like you
Speaker 1: had to work harder though, Yeah, because you were his son. No, Well,
Speaker 1: because I was his son and because the family owned
Speaker 1: the business, I had to you know, you had to
Speaker 1: lead from the front. You had you had to get
Speaker 1: the job done. And tell us about your relationship with
Speaker 1: your father, because you wrote a book about it. I mean,
Speaker 1: this was I mean it's something I actually looked at
Speaker 1: the book a little bit. I'm definitely buying it. Sorry, dad,
Speaker 1: I'm giving you the like a preview of your Christmas rest,
Speaker 1: like I'm gonna buy this book from my dad. Uh,
Speaker 1: tell us about why you wrote the book, what it
Speaker 1: was that inspired this relationship. You know, he was he
Speaker 1: was an amazing person and uh, you know I spent
Speaker 1: my you know, I spent my life with him. But
Speaker 1: you know, he and I also built trek and it
Speaker 1: was you know, he and I were really close and
Speaker 1: uh we were the last two people in the room,
Speaker 1: and you know it was, you know, a great highlight
Speaker 1: of my life. But he was super fit. You know,
Speaker 1: he ran five New York City marathons. He and I
Speaker 1: ran Boston together three times. Um, he was super fit.
Speaker 1: And when he was seventy three, he had a problem
Speaker 1: with valven his heart, and he went in to get
Speaker 1: it fixed, and he was one out of the hundred
Speaker 1: who didn't come out. But at his seventieth birthday party,
Speaker 1: he said, pulled out out of his suit, Jack, I'll
Speaker 1: never forget. He pulls out these yellow legal pat He
Speaker 1: had six pages. He wanted to give a speech to
Speaker 1: his birthday party. Only the family was there, and you know,
Speaker 1: he talked, and the one thing I always remember, he says,
Speaker 1: I have one last great thing to do. He goes,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure what it is, but I got one
Speaker 1: last great thing in me. And he had done a
Speaker 1: number in his life, but in the end, the last
Speaker 1: great thing was the way he died. He was in
Speaker 1: the hospital for eighty eight days. He taught amazing life
Speaker 1: lessons throughout his life, but those last eighty eight days
Speaker 1: were his best days. And so after he passed, I thought,
Speaker 1: I'm just going to write a book for my two
Speaker 1: kids because I really want them to understand their grandfather.
Speaker 1: And I got it finished at and a couple of
Speaker 1: people read the read the proof, and they say, you
Speaker 1: should turn this into a book. So I did. What
Speaker 1: what did your kids say? About that book. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because I had both of them after I
Speaker 1: decided to make it a book. I had both of them,
Speaker 1: you know, proof the book, and they came back with
Speaker 1: a couple of suggestions. But I think they're as proud
Speaker 1: of him as I am. And so how does his
Speaker 1: sort of legacy pervade the company at this point? Because
Speaker 1: obviously he was larger than life for you and and
Speaker 1: obviously for the for the company. There aren't that many. Again,
Speaker 1: as we've been talking about family owned companies, especially where
Speaker 1: it's imprinted. You know, someone said to me recently, there
Speaker 1: are a lot of family companies out there, but there
Speaker 1: aren't that many like Sam Walton's. I mean this is
Speaker 1: a an example of that in many ways that the
Speaker 1: personality of the place reflects the founder. Yeah, I think. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, somebody told me before they before he died,
Speaker 1: that his body would die, but his spirit would live on.
Speaker 1: And uh that is so true. And so you know,
Speaker 1: I have a conversation with him a couple of times
Speaker 1: a week, but his legacy at Trek is um do
Speaker 1: the right thing, and for sure his legacies take care
Speaker 1: of the customer. I mean, he was just he was
Speaker 1: all about the customer. If you do the right thing
Speaker 1: for the customer, if you run a really good business,
Speaker 1: the rest will take care of itself. And he was
Speaker 1: really strong on that. Is the next generation of your
Speaker 1: family involved or how involved are they? Well? My daughter, Um,
Speaker 1: she works at Track, she works in the marketing department.
Speaker 1: She's in charge of the women's advocates program right now.
Speaker 1: Spent a year working at retail, so she's involved in
Speaker 1: the business. Um, My mother is on the board at Trek,
Speaker 1: and my son he runs a marketing company in Milwaukee.
Speaker 1: All right, So let's talk about the scope of the
Speaker 1: company a little bit, because you know, from four to now,
Speaker 1: a lot of things have changed in the broader market clearly. Um,
Speaker 1: when it comes to the broader fitness movement, you know
Speaker 1: you were involved, I believe with Bush forty three to
Speaker 1: President George W. Bush and in physical fitness. What have
Speaker 1: you seen in the sort of mega trends that are
Speaker 1: underneath all this that have helped propel Track forward. I
Speaker 1: think there's I think there's a couple. If you just
Speaker 1: take a look at cycling in general. Um, you've got
Speaker 1: health issue, especially in this country. You've got an incredibly
Speaker 1: high obesity rate, people not moving, you know, people looking
Speaker 1: at screens. And that's one mega trend. The other mega
Speaker 1: trend you have is congestion. And here we are in
Speaker 1: New York and you know there's a lot of congestion
Speaker 1: here in New York, but there's cities all around the
Speaker 1: world who face this big issue of congestion. And the
Speaker 1: third thing, which is going to end up being, you know,
Speaker 1: the issue of the century here is just climate change.
Speaker 1: And if you put all those three together, there there's one,
Speaker 1: uh simple solution that doesn't solve all those things, but
Speaker 1: there's a simple, cheap, partial solution all those issues, and
Speaker 1: it's the bicycle. And you know the bicycle. You know,
Speaker 1: if you go to a place like Copenhagen, UM, if
Speaker 1: you measure a trip by going to work, going to school, um,
Speaker 1: going to a friend's house, of trips are taken by bike.
Speaker 1: In the United States, it's one point three. If you
Speaker 1: go take a look at the health of those people,
Speaker 1: it's significantly better than ours. So I think, you know,
Speaker 1: those three trends make the future of the bicycle look
Speaker 1: really good. Talk to us little about working with cities
Speaker 1: and municipalities to make it much more bike friendly, because
Speaker 1: I think that's a big problem. It's a big problem,
Speaker 1: and it's also a big opportunity because you know, if
Speaker 1: you take a look at New York today, new York's
Speaker 1: got a long ways to go. But if you took
Speaker 1: a look at New York twenty years ago, it didn't exist. Um,
Speaker 1: New York has made a lot of progress. Um, there's
Speaker 1: a long way to go. Every single city you go
Speaker 1: to today, as opposed twenty years ago, most cities hadn't
Speaker 1: done anything. If you take a look at them today,
Speaker 1: a lot of cities have a decent foundation. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of people who are looking to answers for congestion,
Speaker 1: for climate change, for health issues. So more and more
Speaker 1: cities are getting interested and we're seeing I think if
Speaker 1: you take a look at the last twenty years, there's
Speaker 1: over thirty thousand bicycle projects that have been completed around
Speaker 1: the United States. It's a it's a lot. There's a
Speaker 1: lot more to be done, but we're moving in the
Speaker 1: right direction and the foundation has been laid. How much
Speaker 1: electrification of bicycles is going to really help in that Momentum, Okay,
Speaker 1: great question. Um. We own a bike sharing business and
Speaker 1: one of the places that we have a bike sharing
Speaker 1: installation is one of our hometowns, Madison, Wisconsin. So Madison,
Speaker 1: Wisconsin has three fifty b cycles UM in play. We
Speaker 1: just switched the entire system on June fifteenth from regular
Speaker 1: bikes over to electric bikes. Ridership is up four x
Speaker 1: four times if you ever go out to test ride
Speaker 1: an electric bike, if you're at a bike shop and
Speaker 1: you go in and you want to test ride an
Speaker 1: electric bike, you will come back and out of a
Speaker 1: hundred people, you will see a hundred smiles. I have
Speaker 1: to tell you I've tried it and loved it on
Speaker 1: the West Coast. It was so much fun. I was thinking,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna like this. It's amazing and it allows
Speaker 1: ordinary people to do extraordinary things. You can ride in
Speaker 1: e bike wherever you want. We were in the French
Speaker 1: Alps this summer at Tour de France, and we were
Speaker 1: with a couple of friends, um and you know, we
Speaker 1: had one person wasn't a strong cyclist, and she rode
Speaker 1: with us every day. She went up Alp Duez, she
Speaker 1: went up the biggest climbs and she absolutely loved it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's amazing. So let's talk about one of the other
Speaker 1: mega trends. And Carol and I have spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time on our shows and in our respective journalism
Speaker 1: thinking about this, which is the wellness and the health
Speaker 1: piece there that you talked about. We seem to amid
Speaker 1: all of the talk of the OBC right and things
Speaker 1: like that, there at least is a part of society,
Speaker 1: a part of the culture that is really embracing this
Speaker 1: idea of a much more holistically healthy lifestyle. How do
Speaker 1: you take advantage of that as a company and be
Speaker 1: a part of it? Okay, Well, I think we're not
Speaker 1: only a part of it, I think we're a leader
Speaker 1: in it. And it all happened at trek I think
Speaker 1: it was maybe twelve years ago, and three things happened
Speaker 1: in the space of two months. We had a truck
Speaker 1: driver have a massive heart attack um driving across Iowa
Speaker 1: and it ended his career. He survived, but it was
Speaker 1: a huge bill and it ended his career, and he
Speaker 1: loved working at trek Um. We had a woman in
Speaker 1: our international department who had we had come out with
Speaker 1: a health program. She lost twenty pounds, great shape. Her
Speaker 1: husband not so much worked at a different company in
Speaker 1: his late forties, he had a stroke totally shook up
Speaker 1: her entire life. And then we had a warehouse manager,
Speaker 1: Craig Omlin, one of our best UH workers. He managed
Speaker 1: one of the warehouses. UM. He was a big guy.
Speaker 1: He was really tall and really wide and UH. He
Speaker 1: died in his forties and the death certificate was on
Speaker 1: my desk and cause of death was obesity. I had
Speaker 1: the HR guy come into my office and I said,
Speaker 1: I've had it. We're done. I go, I want a
Speaker 1: new health program. We're gonna put this thing together and
Speaker 1: we're gonna introduce it in less than a month. And
Speaker 1: in less than a month, I stood in the Ahri
Speaker 1: m at Trek and I said to everybody, we're changing
Speaker 1: the way we look at health. These are the four
Speaker 1: things we're doing, and we're gonna make sure that you're healthy.
Speaker 1: And that was it. Chang ange um It said everybody
Speaker 1: at Trek has to get a health risk assessment every year.
Speaker 1: We used to make it optional and we get the
Speaker 1: people zero percent Body Fat Club at Trek would all
Speaker 1: rush in there and get there get their health risk
Speaker 1: assessment done. We said everybody has to do it, and
Speaker 1: not only you, but your family because if you're on
Speaker 1: our health insurance, your families on the insurance program. Um,
Speaker 1: we did that. We turned the cafe into a healthy
Speaker 1: cafe for people who were not healthy. We got them
Speaker 1: UH coaches for a year. We said we're gonna help
Speaker 1: you get healthy. Um. We eliminated smoking from anywhere near Trek.
Speaker 1: We did everything we could and the impact of it unbelievable. So, well,
Speaker 1: you're taking a look at health healthcare costs tracks. Healthcare
Speaker 1: costs over the last five years have gone down. Wow, okay,
Speaker 1: so okay, we keep we have a score for our
Speaker 1: health because we have all the health risk assessments are
Speaker 1: scores on up. Every year. Trek has become a healthier
Speaker 1: workplace every single year. You take a look at this country.
Speaker 1: We pay almost of g d P as health and
Speaker 1: we have the worst results in the industrialized world. The
Speaker 1: most unhealthy people are in America. And we have a
Speaker 1: government that spends all of its time talking about how
Speaker 1: we can spend more money on health, and we never
Speaker 1: talk about how our citizens can become more healthy. Well,
Speaker 1: I think about how often we have that conversation. I mean, Jason,
Speaker 1: I both embrace this world big time. You know, what
Speaker 1: is it going to take to change kind of our
Speaker 1: approach when it comes to taking care of ourself, this
Speaker 1: whole idea of wellness and taking care of yourself so
Speaker 1: that it doesn't become a problem. And I do wonder
Speaker 1: incentives usually get people to where you need them to be. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I think you know if you just one is we
Speaker 1: have a twenty two trillion dollar death set um. Number
Speaker 1: two is we're spending twice as much money as any
Speaker 1: other country on health and something has to change in
Speaker 1: that equation. To me, it needs to be leadership from
Speaker 1: the government because this can't keep going on. But John,
Speaker 1: do you penalize employees if they don't do well or
Speaker 1: they don't sign up for How does it work? The
Speaker 1: way it works is that we have a program and
Speaker 1: based on your health risk assessment, if you score really
Speaker 1: well on your health risk assessment, you pay less for
Speaker 1: your health insurance. Okay, So that's what I wondered, because
Speaker 1: you really need to incent but we also take a
Speaker 1: leadership role and we say we're going to help you
Speaker 1: get healthy. We don't leave people out on on an island.
Speaker 1: We come a big hug and we say here we go,
Speaker 1: and it's it's part of the culture at track and
Speaker 1: people go, well, you're just a bunch of people who
Speaker 1: ride bikes. Carrot and stick. We have a carrot and
Speaker 1: a stick, but there's also a culture. And I think
Speaker 1: that's what we need in this country, is we need
Speaker 1: a culture of health. Well, speaking of cultures, and we
Speaker 1: talk about this a lot too, about the importance of
Speaker 1: diversity and equality and you are in town, you're getting
Speaker 1: the inaugural Champion for Equality Award at this year's Women
Speaker 1: Sports Foundation gala. Talked about equality at Trek. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think, UM, you know, equalities uh an important issue
Speaker 1: at Trek and when you take a look at it,
Speaker 1: we're involved in a sport UM. We're also just involved
Speaker 1: in running a business, and we want to make sure
Speaker 1: that we provide opportunities for everyone, regardless of color, regardless
Speaker 1: of gender. We want to put the best team on
Speaker 1: the field and we're really serious about that. When you
Speaker 1: take a look at sport UM. We're sponsoring a women's
Speaker 1: cycling team sponsor UM and somebody came back from one
Speaker 1: of the races and they walk into my office and
Speaker 1: we're having an executive meeting and they're like, do you
Speaker 1: know what's going on with the women's team we're sponsoring.
Speaker 1: And I'm like no, and he's like, well, they don't
Speaker 1: get paid very much. They show up for the race
Speaker 1: the day before because the team can't afford to get
Speaker 1: him there earlier. They're only given one bike. They stay
Speaker 1: in allows your place, and I'm just like, I was embarrassed.
Speaker 1: I just sat in there and I was embarrassed. So
Speaker 1: we took a different approach to men's cycling where we
Speaker 1: actually bought a team, and I just said, we're gonna
Speaker 1: buy a team, and so we went out there and
Speaker 1: we you know, we totally changed the paradigm in that sport,
Speaker 1: and we said we're going to buy a team, and
Speaker 1: we're going to treat the men and the women the
Speaker 1: same way. And so more broadly in sport, we spent
Speaker 1: a lot of time Caroline I did over the summer,
Speaker 1: obviously rooting for talking about the US women's national team
Speaker 1: in soccer. It felt like a moment. Then there have
Speaker 1: been a few sports that have started to figure out,
Speaker 1: tennis being one. Are we at a moment where this
Speaker 1: is starting to change or is this something where there's
Speaker 1: a danger of sort of falling back when it comes
Speaker 1: to equal compensation. You know, just the very basic sort
Speaker 1: of equal pay and equal opportunity across sport, you know,
Speaker 1: and I can only talk for the sport that that
Speaker 1: we're in, and you know, the sport of cycling is
Speaker 1: really an old man's sport. It's controlled that way, and
Speaker 1: so um. You know, when you take a look at
Speaker 1: the prize money men's compared to women's, when you take
Speaker 1: a look at TV, men's compared to women, it's not
Speaker 1: it's it's embarrassing. It still is embarrassing. We're taking our
Speaker 1: the portion that we control and we're saying, hey, we're
Speaker 1: going to make sure they're on an equal level here
Speaker 1: and we're going to be an example for everybody else.
Speaker 1: We host a World Cup in Waterloo, a World Club
Speaker 1: Cup cycle cross race, and it's it's equal price money.
Speaker 1: First cycling event ever to have equal price money. We
Speaker 1: make a big deal out of it, and all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, other races are changing. People are seeing what
Speaker 1: we're doing in professional and people are making changes. Well,
Speaker 1: I have to think this is got to be at
Speaker 1: least partially an element of enlightened self interest, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: because you want to sell bikes to women and say
Speaker 1: like this is great that you're doing your job, but
Speaker 1: you've got to be thinking about, like, what's your demographics
Speaker 1: in terms of where your seal is it mostly men's,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a lot, it's a lot of men um,
Speaker 1: but there's a huge potential market with women. And you know,
Speaker 1: women who are in the sport absolutely love being in
Speaker 1: the sport um and there's there are more and more
Speaker 1: women who should ride bikes and trek can there is
Speaker 1: there's definitely some self interest too well, and especially when
Speaker 1: guilty right well, I mean when you okay, but when
Speaker 1: you start to synthesize this a little bit with again,
Speaker 1: so sort of going back to the mega trends around fitness,
Speaker 1: you think about boutique fitness, You think about everything that
Speaker 1: we've seen the success of even like a Lulu Lemon.
Speaker 1: You know, this is women driven in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: The market is massive. So I have to think and
Speaker 1: I'm not this isn't a criticism. This is just smart business.
Speaker 1: A lot of ways it is. And you know, one
Speaker 1: of my favorite charts is the running business. And if
Speaker 1: you if you take a look at running and you
Speaker 1: go back to nineteen it was something like a marathon
Speaker 1: ors it was something like men, five percent women, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden you take a look at the
Speaker 1: running business just explode over the last twenty five years.
Speaker 1: It's all women today. There are more women who finished
Speaker 1: marathons and men. It went from five percent to fifty
Speaker 1: And I really believe that that could happen in cycling.
Speaker 1: And so there's there's a moral issue here. There is
Speaker 1: also a business opportunity well, and in keeping with that,
Speaker 1: were Bloomberg, we'd like to hear about opportunity. Where where
Speaker 1: is your biggest growth market. I'm just curious because you
Speaker 1: do sell around the world. You sell around the world,
Speaker 1: you know. One of the things is, you know, I've
Speaker 1: worked the Trek for over thirty five years. I've never
Speaker 1: seen the amount of opportunities that Trek has today everywhere,
Speaker 1: almost everywhere. I mean, we have so many great things
Speaker 1: going on as a business. If you go to Europe,
Speaker 1: the European business is almost three times bigger than the
Speaker 1: US business. Our market share in the US for premium
Speaker 1: bikes is is, you know, in the high twenties. Our
Speaker 1: market share in in Europe is around six Our business
Speaker 1: in Europe is growing like a weed. We have a
Speaker 1: lot of opportunities in Europe. If you go to Asia, UM,
Speaker 1: massive opportunities in Asia. If you take a look at
Speaker 1: electric bikes, UM, that's booming all over the world. What
Speaker 1: about you the trade ward that we're seeing because that
Speaker 1: you do also manufacture around the world, right, So tell
Speaker 1: me is that impacting you? You know we uh, we
Speaker 1: manufacture really high on bikes in the US. We have
Speaker 1: a large UM manufacturing facility in Germany which supplies uh
Speaker 1: the European market, but we produce a bunch of bikes
Speaker 1: in China, both for all over the world and also
Speaker 1: the U S. We're a global company that has a
Speaker 1: global supply chain chain. So yeah, the the tariff has
Speaker 1: had a huge impact on Trek. The one thing I
Speaker 1: want to ask you, because I think about your world
Speaker 1: private equity, I mean they I do wonder family owned
Speaker 1: for a long time. I know you want to keep
Speaker 1: it that way, but I do. I'm curious if you've
Speaker 1: got people who are knocking on your door looking at
Speaker 1: this business, especially as we see the growth in fitness.
Speaker 1: You know, my father, UH, people would ask him about
Speaker 1: going public and he'd also have the same answer, and
Speaker 1: the answer is I don't need them, and I don't
Speaker 1: need the headaches, and I've inherited that few. What's your biggest,
Speaker 1: single strategic initiative that you as the president set out
Speaker 1: for this company today. You know, one thing that's become
Speaker 1: really obvious to me over the last three months is
Speaker 1: just sustainability. UM. One of the things we have UM
Speaker 1: different objectives inside the company and I have my list
Speaker 1: of ten and we changed those two months ago. We
Speaker 1: added becoming a leading sustainability company fast and right now
Speaker 1: we're moving. Trek is moving fast in a lot of
Speaker 1: different areas, but the area we're moving fastest in and
Speaker 1: sustainability because because I know it's the right thing now,
Speaker 1: the earth needs it. I mean, if you there's a
Speaker 1: great move the great documentary Above and Beyond, UM, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: And I saw that documentary and I just that was
Speaker 1: a moment for me. I had the you know, the
Speaker 1: top hundred thirty leaders a Trek watch that. UM. We
Speaker 1: had Sir Robert Swann, who's walked to both poles and
Speaker 1: he's a big environmentalist. He was at Trek two weeks ago. UM.
Speaker 1: We've put together a plan and I think there's about
Speaker 1: I went through each item. I think there's about a
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty seven ideas, and I think we narrowed
Speaker 1: it down to about fifty. But we're going to make
Speaker 1: a difference and we're gonna do it fast. So that
Speaker 1: was John Burke. He's president of the family owned Wisconsin
Speaker 1: based Trek Bicycle again, a company that was co founded
Speaker 1: by his dad. And I just love it because he's
Speaker 1: really thinking about first of all, his future consumer uh
Speaker 1: and certainly thinking about diversity at the firm and the
Speaker 1: company h and thinking about where this market is going.
Speaker 1: We talked about diversity, we talked about electrification, we talked
Speaker 1: about so much. Right, it's hard to run a company
Speaker 1: these days. Twenty nine team keeps you on your toes,
Speaker 1: but a good conversation with them, we really enjoyed it.
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Speaker 1: Carol Masser, and I'm Jason Kelly. This is Bloomberg