XPREZO, the famous canadian handcrafter is definitly closed. This is a really sad news after 12 years of great work done by Hugo and his team handcrafting steel and aluminium bikes in Bromont.
It was already on discussion last december 2015 and the brand was slowly put on hold, but everybody was expecting this great brand to find a clever buyer or investor to continue the adventure.
I personnaly own an XC bike from the brand, an Xprezo T29 than you can discover here, and for me this is more than a steel frame made of Columbus ZONA. Purchasing a such frame is like becoming part of the family and support a company. Xprezo has kept the challenge as long as possible to continue building quality bikes on site directly at their headquater in Bromont (Quebec) and never thought about producing external....undirectly it also shows their willing to support employment and keep jobs in Bromont !
Hugo BARDOU, proud owner of the brand has left a message on the Xprezo Facebook account.
Passion and a dream to create and handcraft unique products, here in the unbelievably beautiful Bromont, with a team of passionate artisans, what more would you wish for ?
A flexible working schedule, in a motivating environment for a business with great ethics and values, could be considered, by many, an achievement itself.
12 years of hard work, trials and errors, questioning that lead to small victories, we proudly made it. With every summer that passed, we've found ourselves investing more funds and more time to come up with better business plans to seek additional funding, with hopes to reach our somewhat humble goals.
The exhausting pace and never ending days would keep bringing scarce business and limited financial resources.
Despite all the positive feedback of satisfied customers, exploitation costs as well as current distribution and sales models will never make the kid's dream of building unique bikes, here in Bromont, a sustainable project.
Over the past year, potential business partners and investors sent a clear message : the risks and challenges are not worth it.
Looking back, I must admit I may have been the biggest lunatic for trying so hard to produce bikes that were 100% hand made in Quebec. The bicycle industry is a very competitive one and the constant need to come up with new and different standards to lure the customer into consuming more, new products, is it's greatest affliction.
And so I want to thank all those who have trusted us and our products, all the employees, ambassadors, athletes and all those who contributed, directly or indirectly, to making the XPREZO venture such a great ride.
We once dreamed of producing locally crafted mountain bikes, Now it's time to take our passion on a more rational project.
See you out in the trails 😉
Hugo Bardou
