About
The bicycle has saved my life... twice. I grew up in northern California, riding my mountain bike as a young 12 year old boy over the hills and along the backroads of the east bay area. Oh mother and father, if only you had known specifics about the bicycle hitch-hiking, tresspassing, attempted kidnapping, train track riding, and cross-bay adventures. I wonder why you never inquired as to the whereabouts of your twelve year old boy and his bicycle who disappeared at dawn and returned long after dusk. I consider myself to have lived a charmed life... chased by mountain lions and wolves, blown off the highway by logging trucks and tornadoes, and hopping over barbed wire fences and mounds of beautifully sculpted dirt. Throughout the years bicycles have changed hands, distances have grown, and my home has moved, but the 12 year old boy is still riding.
-Jordan Crider
Returning from Iraq in time for Christmas of '05, I found myself now fatherless, 3 hours shy a bachelors degree that could never be used as intended, divorced from a good woman, and with plenty enough time & money to either figure out my next steps, or fuck it up completely. The main shining beacon in a life now consumed with shadows, was the light brought to bear by the initial freedom that riding bicycles had afforded me since I was a child. So I started at the bottom, and pestered my local once great bicycle shop for a job. The summer season was ending, but my career in the bicycle industry was just beginning. Working on kids bikes, cruiser bikes, comfort bikes, road bikes, and the ultimate holiest of holy grails, the full suspension mountain bike. Wrenching turned to purchasing for the shop, assembly turned to managing operations. The next shop humbled me when my wheel building skills were not up to snuff, so the next next shop I chose because the owner demanded utmost perfection. More wrenching, learning, perfecting wheelbuilding, taking apart and repairing every little damn component. The next next next shop would set my eyes on something even bigger. I turned down job offers to land a spot at one of the largest online bicycle parts retailers in the nation. Again starting at an entry level retail position, I showed up early, stayed late after closing. Learned the merchandise, learned to train others, honed my customer service skills, learned how to figure out what an owner wants. Eventually became Retail Assistant Manager, lead a team, grew an outfit. When company expansion necessitated huge growth spurts, management called on me to lead a remote location. When massive projects had to be completed, again, my employer knew I could get the job done. When changes came, I adapted and lead the way out. During a pandemic, when chaos ensued and the team fractured, I planted the flag and showed each individual what to do. I pulled us kicking and screaming and exhausted and weary and broken through the storm toward the light. The general management wavered, but not I. Those were my co-workers, this was my investment, these are our customers, my work represents my values, this is what I know how to do.
Can I effectively sell product? Sure, every third person can do that. Can I manage huge overwhelming stocks of inventory? Yes. Shipping/Receiving? Yup. Merchandising? mmhmm. Web content? Uhuh. Purchasing and customer service? You bet! Wrenching and repair? Of course... But what I really bring to the table - what businesses desperately need beyond the nuts and bolts of daily labor and productivity - I can do all of that, is vision. Leadership. Courage. Mentorship of good promising dedicated employees. Communication and organization on large levels. From mission statement to execution of operations, I'm your guy. I'll right the ship, or no one can. I'll give it to you straight, so we can actually get somewhere. I'll bring everyone with me, because it takes an entire tribe. I've done it before, I'll keep doing it, and do it again, because it's who I am. It's who my father was, what he modeled to me. What my beloved older brother and amazing little sister and I grew up to be. I don't want any ol' job, those are everywhere all the time. I want to make a dent, I want to make a difference in peoples lives. I want the hard, dirty, messy, confusing, chaotic, unsailable ship to grab the stern and get us through to the next port, and then the next storm to the next safe harbor, again and again. I want to build something with you, from soup to nuts I want to make this thing from nothing to something great! Let's go.
*please email me at nrdbomber@gmail.com for password
