About our new site, and welcome to it

August 17, 2007

The goal of this new site (launched August, 2007) is to make visiting it, reading it, and shopping it easier and more natural for you, and changing it easier for us—so we can keep it up to date and fix typos on the spot. If you see a typo, let us know. Don't think oh, it's a tiny thing, who cares? I don't like typos at all, and it feels cleansing to fix 'em.

The design and engineering part of the site is the work of a company called Zahnd. They're here.

There's a Shop section, where you go to look at our stuff and maybe buy something; and a Read section, where you can't buy anything, but you can read a lot about our gear and our approach to gear and riding and fitting and things of that sort.

In the Shop section:

• if we say it's out of stock, it probably is. Unless we forget to update it, but we'll try to stay on top of things.

• the photos are more helpful and detailed than they were in the old site. More views and more details and fewer distracting backgrounds. Many pictures with tape measures, which are as fun to look at as maps, but more useful in the context here.

• we have a way to highlight Web Specials: one-of-a-kinds, closeouts, and other oddballs & ultra-bargains you can order by phone only.

• you can now check your online order history starting August 2007.

• you can save the contents of your shopping basket, building up an order over time.

• you can use Express checkout 

In the Read section:

• Most of the information is the same as it was in the previous site, because that info was current and there was little and in some cases no need to change it. 

• There are some new articles, and will continue to be more as time passes. Charts with figgers, too—for comparing this thing with that thing, and things like that.

• There's a General Update section, and something that's essentially a blog, but won't be all that bloggish. Unless by that you infer something along the lines of "thoughts and observations that occur to us over time, but actually worthy of serious discussion or speculation." That is what it will be. Trivial. 

All in all, we want it to feel normal and comfortable. I'm not looking for affirmation that it does, but if there's something about it you'd like changed, let me know about it, OK? Email me at grant@rivbike.com. That will be helpful.

 
What about the old Bike Gallery, with lots of pictures of different Rivendell bikes?

It's now on Flickr in the Rivendell Bicycles Group. We've cut out the middle man, and you can now submit photos of your own bike. Here are some tips to make your pictures better:

• shoot in the shade or on an overcast day

•  the drive side of the bike is more interesting.

•  simple backgrounds are good.

•  to minimize wheel distortion on broadside shots, stand back far, then zoom in.

•  when shooting the drive side of the bike, put the pedal btw 2 and 4 o'clock. 

For action photos or whenever you can't control the conditions, don't worry, just get the shot. If it's post-worthy, be happy, and if it's not, try again. Most photos submitted will get posted, so you need to be your own critic and photo-editor. If the site ends up with thousands of riff-raff pictures, we'll set up  another branch of it for "better than average pictures."