GoKawiilKey Takeaways Loveland founded his children’s bike business in 2006 with a focus on the balance bike.
Though some initially rebuked the pedal-less model, Early Rider continued to grow.
Early Rider saw $10 million in annual revenue last year and is on track for $12 million this year.
In 2005, Andy Loveland and his wife were parents to a two-year-old son, Freddy, and expecting their second, Luke. It was an exciting time, Loveland recalls, but even two decades back, the U.K.-based father noticed a troubling trend. Kids were more connected to their screens than to the outdoors. And a lot of people just accepted it.
Image Credit: Early Rider. Andy Loveland.
These days, in an increasingly online world and amid the rise of social media, it’s even more common to see children glued to their screens. By age two, 40% of U.S. kids have their own tablet, and more than half of kids age eight and younger have their own mobile device, such as a tablet or cellphone, per research from Common Sense Media.
Loveland and his wife refused to surrender to a screen-based childhood. “It was just not something that we were prepared to accept for Freddy and Luke,” he says. “We were going to make sure they spent as much time outside as possible.”
Around the same time, Freddy’s godfather, who lived in Germany, came across a pedal-less bicycle developed as a therapy tool to support kids’ physical and cognitive development. He gifted one to Freddy, who was too young for a traditional bike — and it was off to the races.
“ He was just flying around, never to be in his chair again,” Loveland says. “It was absolutely life-changing. The freedom, the mobility, the quality of the time we would spend together. It was transformative.”
Fewer kids ride their bikes amid screen-based childhoods
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