Main Sponsor Pulls Plug - Help Save Ride to Boston!!
[Note this is in Bike Baltimore because this ride will be coming through here.]
Last week, and, in hindsight I could feel it coming for months because their business was off the mark, the Main Sponsor for my ride pulled the plug. The quarterly payment that I got from them for web work and soon the advertising exposure they would have gotten for helping the two most photographed vehicles in the world get from one coast to the other, fell victim to bad economic times. It was this money that I had planned on using to get me out of the gate come May 3.
Nor can I feel at all mad at them. When the orders were not coming in, they had to figure out some way to keep themselves fed. Nor do I know what more I could have done. I moved forward in good faith finishing my book, learning this backwards HiWheel so I could pedal the mountains, and even though we barely broke even, holding fund raisers so we could maybe actualize some of the bigger dreams I had for this ride.
Instead of using this month of April trying to add a few sponsors so I could buy some needed supplies in addition to the motor home I had planned to rent to blog and stay in touch with Mayor's office from, sag my ride and get the Busycle back to Boston, I am finding myself starting from scratch. Besides dollars, I also lost my sponsor's office support, so I will have to build two crews in three weeks time - one for the road and one for here at home.
Do I crawl in a hole and throw the last six years away? Or do I look for new ways to make all of this real? I suspect that those of you who have read my book, "Awake Again", know the answer. I was up against a lot tougher odds in rebuilding my broken body, mind and the world I had created then. So, just as I got better from my setback by listening for God's voice, I am doing the same thing now. And it does seem that a Bigger Power is saying that I need to come before my community of friends for help. Here is how:
Sponsor a day (or more!) on the road - for $100 you can keep us fed and pay the daily cost of fuel and motor home rental - in exchange you will be listed as a Day Sponsor at the main page for our 7th Annual National Mayors' Ride http://www.bikeroute.com/NationalMayorsRide2009 . You will also get free on line copies of "Awake Again" and "How America can Bike and Grow Rich, The National Bicycle Greenway Manifesto".
Loan us your motor home or bus - our first most important need is for a vehicle that at least one other (a driver) can sleep in that is also strong enough to tow the Busycle from San Francisco to Boston. Kitchen, toilet and shower facilities are also a must! It would be great if we could also sleep a blogger and a publicist!
Surely there is someone out there with undecided vacation plans who might like to lend us both his or her vehicle and services or has a motor home or bus that is moving very little due to the high coast of fuel (for which we are building a war chest). And yet there again, there just might be such a truck that needs to be delivered to the east coast and can wait until August 3rd for it to be there.
Sponsor an NBG Day - at the above link, you will see the 25 cities we are visiting. You can adopt one of them, like Angle Tech Cycles has done for Denver, for $500!
Donate via Payl Pal - to NBG@bikeroute.com (nonprofit ID 770344732)
If you want an even bigger presence at this ride, your business name can be silkscreened on to my helmet visor, front handlebar pack, the side panels of my biking shorts, on my buttpak or on to the side panniers I am thinking about running. Heck you can even sponsor one of the chapters in my on-line book.
Help me make this a people's ride. Contact me at 415-240-4712 or hiwheeler"at"gmail.com
THX 4 all of U!!
What's Related