I had two bikes stolen in the past 5 months, both overnight, right in front of my apartment. This is NYC, that stuff happens, I get it.

But here is where my story is different: that first bike that got stolen? It’s locked and parked outside my apartment right now.

On January 17, 2013, I locked my bike outside my East Village apartment. The next day I went out to go for a ride and ended up walking up and down my street several times before accepting the fact that my bike was gone without a goodbye or a trace. I immediately started tweeting about it, made a Facebook post (even sponsored it hoping to get more reach) but I also went the old school route and put a sign (pictured above) right at the spot where it was taken. Maybe it was the fact that my handwriting is easily mistaken for a 5th grader, but somehow it managed to stay up much longer than I thought. The following week I left New York for a month-long trip. When I returned, I accepted the fact I’d never see that bike again and picked up some new wheels from Recycle-A-Bicycle. My new bike got stolen, again, within a week of when I purchased it. Unable to be in the city without a bicycle, I went out and got a new ride and reluctantly decided I should try parking it inside.

Two days later, I was about to sit down to dinner with two friends at my apartment when my doorbell rang. My friend Eva answered the door. She called me over saying a person wants to tell me something about a bike. When I walked out to the hallway he asked to walk outside, because he ‘has a bike.’ When I stepped outside, to my right was my original bike, in excellent condition, resting against the a gate. I was speechless. It was like someone had come back from the dead. The fenders, back rack, even the bell - exactly as it was on January 17. After a minute of just staring at it, I turned to him and he began with broken English: “I am sure you will not believe me, but I have been trying to bring you this bike for months. I come from Brooklyn on the train to ring your bell and you are not home. I kept it inside next to my bike.” I sensed he wasn’t eager to share the details of how he got it, other than he found it down the street, and I was totally okay with that. I could tell he was a person genuinely concerned with doing what he felt was right. The line that struck be most was, “I know someone must have put lots of work into this bike (which was spot on - I’d originally found this bike discarded in pieces and had been bringing it back to life over the past year) and that they must want it back. I know how it feels when you put time into something and how it feels to lose it. So I wanted to make sure you got this back.”

This man deserved a medal of honor in my book, but barely accepted his reward. He left me inspired and pretty damn grateful.

The original post for the reward sign. The original post when my bike was returned.

It’s official: National Bike Month is here! 

The Holstee Team (as shown above) encourages our community for the month of May (and beyond!) to embrace two wheels. Need a reason? Here’s a few:

1. What could be better than biking on a warm, spring day?
2. It’s daily exercise, which we all need. Getting in 20-30 minutes leads to fewer sick days, heightened alertness and more productive employees.
3. Driving a car has been recognized as one of the top, consistent situations people associate with feeling stress.
4. It’s a fume-free ride! And traffic jams: what traffic jams? 
5. You can get a handy basket for transporting groceries, gear for work or cute animals.
6. Think of all the extra ca$h you’ll save: no Metro card necessary!

All of these reasons and more are we’ll will be participating in Bike to Work Day, which for NYC is May 17th! So what about you? To find or organize a day in your area, go here. Or go here to check out other events in your city. 

The Holstee team took a field trip to Swayspace Letterpress in Brooklyn (just a few blocks away from our soon-to-be new office!) and we were super excited to see some of these amazing machines in action. 

Huge thanks to the Swayspace group who made us feel so welcome, gave us tons of information and even sent us home with some awesome coasters and cards. 

Our friends at GOOD are celebrating Neighborday this Saturday, April 27th, and we are, too! 

How will you get to know those in your community? Send us your tweets (@HOLSTEE and @GOOD) on how you celebrate, make new friends and cross that fence!

Be sure to tag #moreofthis.

Congratulations, @2eyes! You’re our newest #holsteemanifesto winner. The response keeps growing and the submissions are getting more and more creative! 

Please be sure to check out our Facebook page to see if your picture made it to our #holsteemanifesto Album. Feel free to tag your pictures and spread the love!

Reminder: there will be a new winner each week! Keep on posting!

Hello! I am stoked to be in NYC but most of all that I am now a family member here at Holstee!

I’ve been here for almost two weeks now and I can’t imagine looking back. Everyone has been so welcoming and I am super pumped to be here; they’ve made it feel like home. There is a ton of new awesome things happening here at Holstee and I’m honored to be a part of it all.   

I first came across the Holstee Manifesto about three years ago while still in college and little did I know that those inspiring words would lead me here. It resonated with me and it was exactly what I needed at the time. It became the push to start living for myself and constantly strive to do the things I love and pursue greater opportunities.

After college, I participated in Project M which proved to me that I was meant to use design and my talents for promoting what Holstee calls ‘mindful living’ and being conscious of all the decisions you make. It all made perfect sense and those two weeks involved with Project M helped shape a very interesting year. After M, I went back home inspired but couldn’t find a ‘job’ that suited me. I needed something more fulfilling so I left my job this past December with no clear vision of what the future would hold. 

About a month later I came across Holstee once again and noticed they were looking for a Graphic Design Intern. I applied and I received and almost immediate response from Dave. He was excited about my work and wanted to bring me in as soon as possible. I had let chances come and go in the past and I knew that some opportunities really do only come once and I was going to do whatever it took to be here. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Thanks a ton in advance for the warm welcome to the Holstee family. I’m looking forward to sharing my passion and love with you all so feel free to get in touch with me or just drop me a line to say hello!

Cheers, 

Andrew

So go out and start creating.

Community member Symon Hayes of Oakland, California shared his Manifesto-inspired artwork with us via Facebook: amazing stuff! 

Huge thanks to Symon!

What do you do at Holstee?

In general, I’m not a huge fan of titles, but it seems to fit that very human desire to put everything into easily digestible boxes, often times at the expense of telling the full story. To the conventional world, at Holstee I play the role of a CMO, but something about the word ‘marketing’ never felt right to me. Since day one I’ve had two concrete goals: to generate awareness and good will for Holstee. This combination more accurately equals brand equity.

‘Marketing’ often turns into desperate attempts to convince, drop prices, and engage in activities that most of the time have great short term prospects, but don’t build respect or integrity for a brand. Brand equity was a focus for us even before we knew how to define it. When Dave asked me what I wanted people to say when asked about Holstee, my immediate response was “I ‘expletive’ love that company.” That’s brand equity. It goes beyond quantitative metrics like traffic and revenue. Yes, it’s harder to measure, but it does things that traditional marketing metrics will never do for you. Brand equity means you have customers that forgive you when you make a mistake. It means people will be eager to tell friends about your new initiative and that it’s easy for folks to get excited to work with you.

I’ve noticed this shift in mindset happening more and more in recent years. I think it reflects a new wave of thinking from ‘marketers’ that were disgusted with the way they’ve been marketed to their entire lives, and looking to change it any way they can.

While we have started to experiment with online ad spend, Im not super interested to make it a focus of our resources.

Some examples of when we chose to put time and energy into initiatives that felt right over traditional marketing campaigns include the Holstee Fellowship, #blockfriday, #moreofthis, #flashofgood, My Life and #agent99.