Dirt Rag: More Bang For The Buck
Geoff Ringlé helps with the 1991 Media Kit and more.
So here I go posting on Substack. It just might get me to express myself more often. Do people want to hear about the old days of Dirt Rag? I may continue as I feel like it, perhaps more if people subscribe and send beer money1. I’m trying to set it up so you can send small amounts, rather than committing to $60/year. That bugs me.
I love this love letter Geoff wrote for us for the Dirt Rag media kit to be presented at Interbike 1990. What a guy. We had asked a few advertisers to give us testimonial quotes, and Geoff’s was the best. Our back cover, “Anchor Tenant” advertiser. Yes he was. The support was so gratifying.
Then, at the end of 1992, Geoff called and wanted to buy a full-page color ad, the back cover specifically. We had never printed 4-color at that time, and Geoff provided the impetus for us to print a color front cover with his ad for multi-color anodized parts on the back of the “Book”. We were totally game, and came up with a deal that would work for both of us while pushing Dirt Rag into the world of color printing. These were heady times. Soon there would be 4 pages of color, then 8, then 16, and so on until the day we were on presses that were 100% color.
Beth Covington provided the art. Of course, it was the first issue of 1993, coming out in February, and Beth surprised us with some well-themed art. And Jeff got his ad.
Here’s the 2nd ad Ringlé ran in Dirt Rag. The first ad featured Indy Car driver Paul Tracy, an avid mountain biker. The 2nd ad featured the miryad of parts and colors offered by Ringlé.
Anyhoo, we became friends with Geoff. I remember listening to the older/better Steve Miller albums at Geoff’s home in Trenton, New Jersey. As well as having a few huge dinners with a bunch of MTB luminaries. Great dinners with people like Richard Schwinn, John Parker of Yeti fame, and John Grafton of Grafton Engineering. There’d also be famous racers around, due to the fact that Ringlé and Grafton were sponsoring Yeti.
That’s all for now. Want to see more? Leave a comment, I’d love the dialog.
Success! People have sent money, so I have to write more. Thank you.
Loved reading this. I sure do miss Dirt Rag.
John P, Geoff and John
G were some of the first accounts who advertised with me in the pages of VeloNews back in those heady days that marked the beginning of my career in media sales and business development. They were also to become dear friends along the way and I couldn’t be more grateful for them.