A Visit To The Specialized Museum – BionicOldGuy

Specialized Bicycles is headquartered in Morgan Hill and also has a beautiful museum on site. My Tuesday riding group had visited before in the spring of 2020, just before the Covid pandemic hit. We went again last Tuesday, and this time our guide was Robert Iger, who has been their creative director for years. He designs their concept bikes, many of which are in the museum, and also directs future directions for the production lines. He’s also a good, funny guy and a great storyteller.

It was fun to hear him tell the story of how Mike Sinyard, CEO, founded Specialized Bicycle Imports, which grew into the company it is today. I’ve told that story here, but we get some new tidbits from Robert.

The next fun anecdote was how Robert joined the company. He had a degree in industrial design and was working for a bike dealer in Los Gatos in the early 1980s. A customer who Robert didn’t recognize came in and was asking questions about a lot of the products that Specialized makes. Robert might say that the Specialized product was pretty good, but that’s why the competitors’ model was better (their bike bags are made sturdier, or their water bottles have a wide-mouth opening so it’s easier to put ice in). When he later found out that this was Mike Sinyard, he thought he would be fired if Mike complained to the store owner. Instead, Mike called him and arranged for him to come to Morgan Hill for a visit. He hired Robert on the spot, and gave him his first task – to supervise the improvement of all the parts that Robert thought were not the best.