Not convinced many bike brands, like Kona, were anything more than cleverly marketed mass produced bikes we enjoyed in our younger more naive days, and now look upon with misty eyed nostalgia. I can understand the love for brands which were hand built by boutique bike makers for specific individuals - but even then it's only the frame which is special. One XT rear mech of a particular year is exactly the same as 20K other ones.
All that said, I still remember seeing my first Kona in the early 90s - and instantly getting why it was the geometry it was, admiring the aesthetics and feeling a little envious of the person riding it.
Well let’s look and remind ourselves at some of Kona’s history, and what sets them apart from “mass marketed” brands which has contributed so much to their legacy:
- Kona became known for their racing geometry due to their aggressive sloping down tube. That was borne out of Joe Murray’s knowledge of racing (and Paul Brodie heritage) that set them apart, from the competition who followed tried & tested geometry at the embro stages of the sport.
- In the earlier years, when everyone was thick on embracing Rapidfire, Kona stuck to their guns and were resolute on thumbshifters - because it was race proven and because it simply worked in the field. This no BS mentality paved the way for a loyal consumer following that remains part of Kona ethos.
- Kona were one of the first ‘consumer brands’ to push for weight saving components with their bikes starting with the Racelight movement in 1993. You didn’t find clever marketers Trek, Marin, Specialized, Muddy Fox & Raleigh measuring out the grams of components for people to digest and understand in the specced bikes. Kona believed in educating via their “ready to race” mentality.
- Mid-90s Kona dialled down its own eclectic style, using self effacing humour, and bright printed contrasted campaigns against the backdrop of serious racing. They have always embodied a ‘small brand’ mentality, in the face of competition. If they didn’t, they could never have produced the iconic marketing material that they became known for.
- Yes, some frames came from Asia and they weren’t a boutique brand, but a good percentage was made in the US. Kona never rested on their laurels and they developed many different frames with different tube materials and construction that (thankfully) catered for every budget of a buyer: from the entry level (so us then teenagers on paper rounds to eventually get on the Mtb train) to the eye-wateringly expensive high-end framesets (Ku, Hei Hei, KK or the Score) On the extreme-side, Kona had a semi / fully bespoke customer order programme via the Hot using Tom Teesdale.
What other brand achieved such a range of materials? Thats not playing it safe for clever marketing on mass production, thats industry ground breaking.
- Lastly, name another brand that has managed to maintain a race team for so long in Mtb history? Yeti were close, but became defunct half way through; Orange were there but as we know, with great sadness, didn't survive.
Perhaps most importantly, underpinning Kona’s legacy, despite an evolving mix of components and innovation (to include aluminium frames) was Kona’s second-to-none ability to create a beautifully consistent range under a single umbrella of brand identity.
Unlike a thin veil of nostalgia, this is why it Kona deserves to be iconic and have its cult status with such a loyal following it deserves.
Kona was never a Trek, a Marin, a Raleigh. If it was, you wouldn’t find people still avidly en-mass collecting their brochures, banners, posters and jerseys to this day.
I might be bias, but I can’t think of single company that did as much to pioneer the sport of MTB for the consumer as what Kona did.
Think about that.
. Even when positioning themselves as taking the road less trodden, it's still branding and good marketing. Just one that happened to tick your boxes and get you in the feels. We aren't talking about a guy handcrafting frames to a unique vision in his shed here, but a company that, at least at one time sold tens of thousands of bikes which were near identical to each other and garnered a fanbase (sadly not a large or dedicated enough one to survive the current era) - and that the founders sold off for (presumably) a big pay day. Nothing wrong with that either, it's a perfectly fine legacy.
