Saturday Nov. 2nd, 10:30 AM
Presented by Benjamin Brewer
Ben Brewer, a sociology professor at James Madison University, has been studying bicycle framebuilders in the U.S. for a number of years, looking at how artisan, craft or small batch producers try to make a living within the context of a larger global bike trade, and the particular challenges they face in doing so. To provide a more systematic snapshot of the field, he has also been running a comprehensive online survey of U.S. framebuilders (bit.ly/framebuilders), which will be closed at the end of September. In this seminar, he will present some preliminary results from that survey, focusing on topics of interest to framebuilders themselves as well as fans and consumers of handmade bikes: levels and types of output, demographics of builders, income from framebuilding, common challenges identified by builders, etc. There will be plenty of time for questions and discussion – all of which will provide useful feedback in the ongoing analysis of the survey data.