UK-based bike care & performance specialist Muc-Off notes that it has been able to make its bottle of fluorescent pink bike cleaner a go-to option for two-wheeled obsessives across the world. However, facing into a global pandemic, Muc-Off CEO Alex Trimnell shared his perspective on how doing business today.
Trimnell said “Like taking part in the Downhill Mountain Bike World Cup, blindfolded, it’s going to take guts and resolve to get through it with a fair share of spills thrown in for good measure.
“Watching the enormity of the pandemic play out across the world has been a nightmare on so many levels. Supply chains started slowing and then retail took a hit as lockdown started to grip the globe.
Muc-Off notes that ‘staying in is the new going out. Pelotons have vanished from sight; mountain bike trails were handed back to the wildlife and the motorcycle is out for essential travel only. The two-wheeled world has changed, literally overnight.’
Faced with a quantum shift in human behaviour, Alex and the Muc-Off team created two short term goals: keep the business going with the team intact and take the fight to Covid-19 by supporting front line key workers in the NHS.
Alex Trimnell commented on the short-term operating model of Muc-Off in the current crisis. “We needed to manage our cash really carefully and balance the team to ensure that we could get to an operating structure where we weren’t slamming on the brakes whilst having enough gas in the tank to safeguard the future of the business and our people.”
Within hours of making the call about the new business plan, offers were out to multiple branches of the NHS offering immediate support. From swift offers came equally swift replies and suddenly thousands of anti-bacterial products were heading to nurses and paramedics across the UK.
“We view our NHS support like racing. Get a strong start and then generate sustained momentum until the finish,” Alex added.
For this reason, Muc-Off has not only been deploying its initial support to the NHS, but adds that ‘a shed load more is yet to come’. Bottle supplies have been diverted to help producers of sanitisers. Anti-bacterial moisturising creams (normally used for saddle soreness) are being used as moisturisers for intensive care nurses to help with chaffing from their face masks.
Meanwhile, Muc-Off’s R&D team, who usually test chain lube efficiency, have turned their 3D printer to non-stop production of PPE faceguards for local hospitals. The business is also pledging to donate 100,000 anti-bac products to front line NHS workers as part of a project now dubbed ‘Anti-Bac Fight Back’.
Muc-Off CEO Alex Trimnell continued, “We created our Anti-Bac Fight Back programme to operate on three fronts. Supporting our front line workers, help people protect themselves and invest in the World Health Organisation to help whip Covid-19.
The Muc-Off team has created a new range of Anti-Bac sanitisers & gels for personal, household and tech care. This new range has been fast tracked to get off the starting grid this month.
The company has also teamed up with local distiller, Conker Spirit, to provide bottles for sanitiser production destined for the NHS as well as working with Beryl Bikes, the British Bike Share Scheme, to ‘clean up the act for NHS commuters across the country through supplies of anti-bac equipment cleaner.’
10% of profits from its new range of anti-bac sanitisers & gels will be donated to the World Health Organisation’s Covid-19 Solidarity Response Fund.
