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We get more people cycling using our online platform, local promotion and good ol’ human interaction
Our approach achieves sustained behavior change. On average:
40%
of non-cyclists start cycling weekly
31%
of non-cyclists now cycle to work once a week
43%
of occasional cyclists now cycle 2+ days/week
32%
of non-commuting cyclists now cycle to work each week
Who takes part in our program?
30% Non-cyclists
19% Occasional Cyclists
51% Regular Cyclists
237,716 participants
60,565 non-cyclists
4,356,306 trips logged
47,932,206 miles logged
We’ve worked with 13,933 companies
In 10 countries
How we change behavior
Behavior Change Theory
Love to Ride has been designed with behavior change principles, techniques and tools at its core. This is to ensure that our approaches are as effective as possible at encouraging cycling.
Understanding your audience
We use quick surveys to discover key information about each person, how often they ride, what barriers they face.
Targeted Information
We are then able to provide people with information that is relevant to them.
Overcoming Barriers
Because we find out the specific barriers each person faces, we can effectively support people in overcoming them so they can start cycling, cycle more often or to work.
Reinforcing Behavior
People can record their rides, see their stats stack up, receive positive reinforcing messages (with a mild dose of humor), set goals and earn incentives and rewards.
Way More Than Just a Website
Website + App + Real People + Local Promotion = Love to Ride
Website
Designed to engage and encourage people – with behavior change principles at the core. People can log their rides, set goals, encourage others, and keep up to date with how Joe from IT is going.
App
Our smartphone app allows people to record their rides easily with GPS while they’re on-the-go. People can get at-a-glance updates on how they’re tracking towards their goals. It’s quick and easy, and makes riding more fun!
Real People
As well as our local and central staff, we also engage your local existing riders, businesses and other stakeholders. Together, using good ol’ human interaction, we encourage others to give cycling a go.
Local Promotion
Including Workplace Cycle Challenges and community wide Cycle Challenges. We promote your local cycling initiatives and provide marketing materials to help spread the word around town.
Want Love to Ride in your area?
We can set you up a local Love to Ride website.
You can then promote your local cycling activities, routes, news and messages to your local Love to Ride online community.
Get in touch to set up and grow your community.
What our funding partners say
“Changing habits and behavior is a notoriously difficult nut to crack. The workplace cycle challenge targets the right people and genuinely encourages behavioral change in a fun and accessible way.” – John Nicklin, Senior Pollution Officer, Lewes District Council
“The Workplace Challenge exceeded all of our targets and expectations from a point of view of participant numbers and companies involved. It worked so well that we are in the process of organising another one!” – Mike Davies, Programme Manager, Cycle Cambridge
“The Cycle Challenge provided us with an easy access, popular and hugely effective tool that has been taken up with massive enthusiasm by Leicester businesses.” – Andy Salkeld, Cycling Co-ordinator, Leicester City Council
“The Workplace Challenge has been a fantastic benefit for Milton Keynes – it gave us the opportunity to build stronger partnerships with our business community.” – Ceri Griffin, Cycling & Walking Officer, Milton Keynes Council
What participants say
“I hadn’t ridden a bike for over twenty years before the Challenge and so it was quite daunting to start with but I soon built up my confidence. I find it such fun now and an easy way to keep fit.”
“I had forgotten how much I enjoyed cycling. Although the weather hasn’t been brilliant I have managed to cycle at least once each week since the challenge.”
“I’ve been meaning to buy a bike for years and this was a good ‘bump’ to make me buy a bike and cycle to work.”
“The challenge was the kick I needed to get on the bike… now I have I’m loving it and cycle to work whenever I can. I even miss it when I don’t cycle!”
Meet The Team
Thomas Stokell
Director
Thomas has 14 years’ experience in social marketing and cycling promotion. He piloted New Zealand’s first ‘Workplace Cycle Challenge’ in 2002 and has been designing and implementing other successful behaviour change programmes since. He established Love to Ride in 2007 to bring the ‘Workplace Cycle Challenge’ program he developed to world. Thomas likes to play the piano, enjoys the outdoors and loves getting around town quickly and enjoyably by bike.
Sam Robinson
General Manager
Sam’s professional background spans the private, public and charity sectors, most recently working in Corporate Social Responsibility, where he created award-winning staff engagement and international development projects. Having read Communication & Media Studies at Sheffield, he’s especially interested in how riding a bike can improve our mental health and wellbeing. A regular player for the world-famous Easton Cowboys football team for over 15 years, Sam also loves exploring local bike routes with his family and is a massive advocate of the balance bike as the best way to start life on two wheels!
Tim Norton
Director
Tim is a passionate web and social entrepreneur who builds global communities of action. Tim saw the potential that Challenge for Change had to get millions more people cycling on our beautiful planet. He is a founding Director and angel investor of Love to Ride. Tim is at home in nature, loves being physical and traveling the world learning and living.
Phillip Darnton
Chairman
Phillip has spent most of his career working for multi-national businesses, Unilever and Reckitt and Colman, in marketing and general management roles. Phillip’s involvement with the cycling world began in 2000 when he was the Chairman and Chief Executive of Raleigh UK. He was invited by the Department of Transport to join the newly created National Cycling Strategy Board, becoming its Chairman in 2004. He led the creation of Cycling England which aimed to get “more people cycling, more safely, more often” and chaired the body from 2005 to 2011.
Arleigh Jenkins
VP of Marketing and Growth
With a career in sales and marketing, Arleigh has been working in the bike industry and advocacy for 15 years. A strong proponent for women and family cycling, she has founded BikeShopGirl.com and currently sits on the Board of Directors for BikeDenver and has sat on several boards promoting healthy living through cycling. Arleigh is an avid bike commuter, mountain biker and cyclocross racer. You’ll easily spot her around Denver riding her bright orange Bullitt cargo bike with her daughter sitting in the front. She believes that cycling can solve many of the world’s problems and is passionate in keeping cycling fun and inviting to all.
Kevin Simmons
CTO
Kevin has more than 17 years experience in tech and web development. He has been leading teams and the architecture of a number of web apps for the last 11 years. We love the way Kevin approaches and solves problems. The depth of his knowledge and his technical capability mean that we can all rest very well at night knowing that Kevin is on the job. While Kevin started programming professionally in 1997, he started coding for fun when he was 8 years old on a TRS-80 (which had a 5mb hard drive!)
Jesse Doud
Rails Developer
Jesse has seven years of professional experience building clean, beautiful web software. An Atlanta native, Jesse is a bike mechanic and advocate, teaching people to build and maintain their bicycles at community bicycle co-ops. On a bicycle tour of New Zealand, Jesse decided to stay and now resides in stunning Wellington. Jesse is interested in bicycles as a vehicle to promote sustainable cities, public physical and mental well-being, reduction of carbon emissions and to add some fun to daily life. He also enjoys puns.
James Cowlishaw
Senior Developer
New to the team, James has spent the last 17 years developing software; including network security, enterprise software, games development and web applications. Sad to have given up a cycle commute (he now works from home), it looks like a daily leisure ride will take it’s place. James also races dinghies at weekends, where pedal power is frowned upon.
Johann Weber
Partnerships Manager
Johann comes from the dual worlds of advocacy and academia, having spent the last 5 years working on a doctoral degree in environmental and transportation policy at Georgia Tech (with a thesis exploring the factors influencing the local implementation of bicycle infrastructure). He has also accumulated extensive experience working as a planner, educator, and advocate in the nonprofit and public sectors at both the local and regional level. Johann believes in the importance of supplementing good engineering with even better encouragement efforts, and is a passionate cyclist and pedestrian. He also enjoys Ultimate Frisbee, hiking, mountain biking, and is generally obsessed with transportation.
Claire Connachan
Program Development Manager
Claire is the Program Development Manager in Scotland. She has worked in digital marketing and communications for nine years and has worked extensively within the Scottish third sector. As a founder member of Belles on Bikes and a committee member of Cycling UK Scotland, she’s particularly interested in getting more women cycling, sustainable transport and 8 – 80 cycling infrastructure. If she’s not exploring Scotland on two wheels with laden panniers, you’ll spot her around Edinburgh on one of her three bikes.
Fleur Ammerlaan
Project Coordinator
Fleur is our Project Coordinator based in Bristol. A recent Geography and Environmental Management graduate from UWE Bristol, Fleur has a big interest in how behaviour change theories can be applied to help encourage individuals to make healthier and more sustainable travel choices. New to cycling, Fleur has overcome her own cycling barriers in the past 3 months and is now a daily bike commuter.
