EVANSTON, IL (BRAIN)—Lake Cycling will not have any interruptions through preseason, said Josh Greenberg, managing director of Lake Cycling, in response to questions about whether its majority owner, Veltec Sports, would alter the distribution model for the shoe brand.
News that Veltec Sports would no longer have exclusive distribution rights to the Sidi shoe brand in the United States next year fueled speculation over whether Veltec would shift resources and focus to Lake.
According to outside sources, Veltec Sports’ CEO Manfred Krikke told Veltec sales reps earlier this week that Veltec would offer them the Lake line to replace or augment Sidi during a one-year transition period.
But Greenberg said he was unaware of any plans to roll Lake into the Veltec distribution channel.
“There are no plans to roll Lake up into Veltec. Right now we’re all focused; they’re focused on preseason for Sidi and we’re focused on our preseason launch, presentations and preseason book,” Greenberg said yesterday at the end of two days of Lake line presentations to retailers in Portland and Seattle.
Since Greenberg joined Lake in April, he has revamped its distribution model, building a team of 22 outside sales reps covering the country, turning off multiple distributors and shipping product out of Illinois. Greenberg, who previously was with Veltec Sports for eight years, said that Lake has been run as a completely separate subsidiary. “It was, and is, two totally differently run companies,” Greenberg said.
But Krikke told BRAIN earlier this week that Veltec will look at what is optimal for the two companies going forward. “We will look at where we can be going forward. It probably makes sense to combine them for economic purposes,” Krikke said.
—Megan Tompkins
