SANTA FE, NM (BRAIN)—In May of 1993 two bike industry guys got together and decided to start a parts and service company in Ashland, Oregon. Unlike most distributors at the time, BTI chose to focus on one aspect of the market and to do it well—bicycle suspension components.
“We didn’t anticipate being the company we are today, in the beginning we just wanted to be the best distributor of suspension products,” said Andrew Wright, BTI’s president, who co-founded the company with Preston Martin, BTI’s vice president. “But focusing on suspension lead us into new brake systems and dealers got used to coming to us with technical questions and the business just grew,” he added.
BTI's first catalog was a 24 page newsprint flyer with illustrated schematic drawings of every major fork design. That same year, BTI introduced the first Shock Treatment program—a factory-trained service center that bike shops could send shocks to for tuning and repair.
In 1996 the company looked for a more central location from where they could serve dealers on both coasts, and they packed up its inventory and relocated to Santa Fe, New Mexico. It didn't hurt that the new location boasted 300 days of sunshine and abundant riding opportunities. The company is in its second Santa Fe location which it thought had plenty of room to grow. Now that facility is starting to cause growing pains so the company is researching other opportunities.
Wright and Martin are still hard at work every day of the year, even organizing rides and company events in their spare time. And the founders would like to thank BTI's customers and vendors for their support in reaching this milestone.
