Behold the essence of PINK MADNESS! This is the English Arrow, circa 1980, restored to it’s full & proper glory-due in no small part to your Green Grips Heavyweight handlebar tape in Petal Pink & Natural and your Wooden Cork Bar Plugs! We are looking good! The Heavyweight tape looks & feels great! I had forgotten how nice “real” bar tape feels. The Bar Plugs are that perfect vintage finishing detail. All is once again right & in balance & as it should be with the world; thanks to you. It has been a pleasure to get to know you folks in the course of this adventure and to work together with people who share a passion for stylish, and responsible, cycling.
This will be my mount for the Eroica-Paso Robles Gran Fondo on 4-12-15. The English Arrow monicker derives partly from the native country of frame builder, Colin Laing, who built bikes & had a bike shop in Tucson, Ariz., Laing Cycles, who made this bike & a matching track bike for me in 1980. These were my first pro-level racing bikes. Many, many, many miles & memories here, a long & continuing story, of which you & your company are now a part of. Great to have you along for the ride. Thanks, again.
“Cloth bar tape has always been different: it lasts longer, looks nicer, feels better and in the case of Green Grips cloth tape, it wraps better.”
Most cloth tapes (all of them, actually, except Green Grips) use a wide, super tacky adhesive on the back of the tape. The Green Grips adhesive is narrow, less tacky, and easier to get a perfect wrap with. The tape is softer and more flexible too, also making wrapping easier.
At Gravel & Grind, we often put gel under the tape to provide a classic look with a bit of cushion. It’s not squishy, and it doesn’t look all bulky, it looks fine and feels great. We then finish the tape with a twine whip. We then either leave the tape raw (the colors are great, and fade nicely, as all natural things do, when exposed to sunlight) or cover it in two coats of shellac. That still leaves a bit of texture while helping protect the tape from dirt and scuffs.
When we first started selling Green Grips, I thought we’d only sell a few colors, but I ordered all of them in. We actually end up selling all of the colors pretty much equally, except yellow, brown, grey and black, which we sell 2:1 over the other colors. Turn over is good, especially for an esoteric product, so that’s always rad.
The yellow tape, for the record, turns a gorgeous gold color with two coats of amber shellac.
-James Johnson, Co-Founder & Owner of Gravel & Grind
Gravel & Grind is a bike shop with an artisan coffee shop located in historic downtown Frederick, MD. Their shop specializes in durable, beautiful bicycles for touring, camping, town riding, commuting, old school mountain biking and whatevering. Their full service shop builds new bikes from scratch, and refurbishes classic steel bikes to make them more usable.
Gravel & Grind carries the full-line of Green Green Eco-Friendly tapes. To learn more visit http://gravelandgrind.com/about/.
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