Puma Bikes website live

Do you remember those colorful bikes with “colours inspired by island culture in the Atlantic” that Biomega created for Puma? You can now buy them online or at Puma stores.

Puma Bikes website

The design of Puma’s aluminum bikes “balances Puma’s European heritage with American popular culture.” Some people love Puma’s vibrant colors, many others responded ‘meh’ on the colors when the bikes were shown last fall at Interbike. If you don’t like the Miami Vice colors (with a choice between mid 80s and late 80s palette), the bikes are also available in white or black. Puma sticks with Old World heritage by calling their step through frame a “Lady’s” bike.

Puma seems to highlight their Slingshot inspired “Urban Mobility” folding bike that’s been around since 2005, ditching the hub gearing for a dérailleur and replacing disc brakes for V brakes on the renamed Puma Disko. What do you think of the Disko folder with 24″ wheels that sells for under $1000?

2010 Puma Disko folding bicycle

I mostly like the designs of the Pico (a 20″ tire bike with a monster front basket and a folding option) and Nevis bikes (basic urban utility bikes but where are the fenders?).

If you buy the bike online, the bike arrives in a box “92% assembled,” according to Puma. Assembly basically involves installing front wheel (w/ 15 mm wrench — no quick release), front brake, pedals, saddle and handlebar.

I really like that Puma will sell these Biomega bikes in the vast “Blue Ocean” of non bike enthusiasts through their own stores. When Josh Kadis interviewed Puma’s marketing chief Antonio Bertone in 2008, he was told, “I think the bike industry doesn’t really work very well. It’s too performance oriented, too exclusive.”

5 Comments

  1. The colours don't strike me as nice. It is an interesting take on a rather bland bike industry with simple colours. Not much in fluro colours out there. I wouldn't buy one, i just wouldn't want to be see on it.

  2. I don't know about the colors. I could get used to them, but it may be a bit much. But what I'm really seeing that I'm not sure about:
    vertical dropouts. I just think folding bikes and hub gears are a natural pairing, and without horizontal dropouts, you lose one of the big advantages of that pairing — less stuff sticking off the bike when you fold and stash it.
    The basket — looks awesome, but it appears to be entirely handlebar mounted. It's been a while since I carried any amount of weight on the handlebars, but it seems like that would affect handling much more than something mounted lower down, so, while I love the capacity, I'm afraid that it might not be a practical mounting solution for that much cargo space.
    Chunky. That's aluminum, I guess, and is probably not a turn off for a lot of people.
    Other attachments? As you said, fenders would be nice. Are there mounting points for them or for racks? The existence of the basket and the front rack of the Nevis (also handlebar mounted?) make me feel there's an attempt to make these functional/practical bikes rather than pure recreational bikes, but the racks/baskets don't seem ideal and I can't tell if they have the connections required for other standard gear.
    I do love a freaky-looking, folding bike, though, and internal cable routing is nice, too.

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