Emily Ladau:
Hi, I am Emily Ladau.

Kyle Khachadurian:
And I’m Kyle Khachadurian.

Emily Ladau:
And you’re listening to another episode of The Accessible Stall.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Emily, what are we going to talk about today?

Emily Ladau:
I am so pumped for this episode. It’s actually a sponsored episode and I know what everyone’s thinking, “Okay, now you’re just going to shill for a product.” But no, I am thrilled about this because we are talking about adaptive equipment and quite honestly, I feel like we need to have more conversations about adaptive equipment, specifically adaptive bikes. Sorry, spoiler alert.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Can I tell you a secret?

Emily Ladau:
What?

Kyle Khachadurian:
I can’t ride a bike.

Emily Ladau:
Can I tell you another secret?

Kyle Khachadurian:
Yes.

Emily Ladau:
I definitely also cannot ride a bike.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Then this is something that… This is as educational for us as it is supportive of them.

Emily Ladau:
Right. This is going to be perfect because I have never ridden a regular bike in my life, but that doesn’t mean that it can’t happen. We’re going to talk about bike riding, we’re going to talk about adaptive equipment, and we’re going to do it with a really cool group of people. So welcome Freedom Concepts team. We would love to have you tell us a little bit about yourselves, about Freedom Concepts. Give us some background. Who are you? How did the company start? What kind of products do you make?

Gabrielle:
Hi, nice to meet you guys. I’m Gabrielle. I’m our vice president here at Freedom Concepts, and joining me is James Wall.

James:
Hello everyone. Thank you for having us.

Gabrielle:
Thank you so much for having us on.

Emily Ladau:
So who are you, what’s your role with Freedom Concepts? Why don’t we start with you, James?

James:
So I am the sales manager here with Freedom. I’ve been with the company 21 years now, so time flies. Freshly out of college, I met Gabrielle’s dad working at a sporting goods store and we kind of hit it off and a couple of decades later, here I am.

Emily Ladau:
Wow. So this runs deep. And then Gabrielle, what about you?

Gabrielle:
It does.

Emily Ladau:
What’s your story?

Gabrielle:
It runs deep. Well, like James said, it was my father that started Freedom Concepts and we have been around now for 33 years, which is wild. It’s been a long time. And myself, I really joined full-time. I was exposed in a part of the company for many years, but I’ve been within the company for six years now and I’ve moved through stages with our engineering team to working side by side, almost executive assistant style, with Ken.
And then now I am actually our VP and I’m running our day-to-day alongside all of our managers such as James, keeping the flow of our day-today going and trying to get more what we call butts on bikes.

Emily Ladau:
Butts on bikes.

Gabrielle:
Butts on bikes.

Emily Ladau:
Before we dive into the biking conversation, can you just give us the top line overview of Freedom Concepts, what you do, what makes you tick?

Gabrielle:
Absolutely. So Freedom Concepts really developed, like I said, 33 years ago from a special request to build a bike for a child with cerebral palsy. And really that bike was a big success and that was locally here in Winnipeg, Manitoba. And it really opened the door to just many requests that spiraled into what now we’ve honestly imagined and designed over from one design to over 18 different types of designs and counting. Always innovating, always making something new.
We’ll probably talk about it later. Also customizing something completely out of the box. And then years later we also developed a secondary product line called the Chill-Out Chairs as well. So those would be our bread and butter, the bikes and the chairs, and they’ve brought a lot of joy and mobility to many individuals all around the world actually.

Kyle Khachadurian:
That’s really cool. As somebody with cerebral palsy myself who cannot ride a bike, I am particularly interested in what exactly adaptive biking means and what it means to you and your company.

Gabrielle:
Want me to take this one, James?

James:
You could take it too. I can add to it.

Gabrielle:
Of course. Well, adaptive biking, really, we see it as a form of therapy, a form of activity and mobility, getting mobile, getting outside, going inside your schools, we see it all the time, but it’s also about inclusivity. It’s about getting people out in the community, out with their friends and family and having that rite of passage, that great moment of freedom as we call it. I don’t know if you want to add anything, James.

James:
I mean a lot of people start off, maybe it’s the therapy angle, it’s the inclusion, all that good stuff, right? But it’s amazing how many emails we get afterwards. It’s just the sense of pride and the joy and just being able to ride like everyone else in the neighborhood. It’s just awesome. I think it’s in us all to naturally want to ride a bike. We say around the office, it’s a rite of passage.

Emily Ladau:
So I’ve got to tell you, I have ridden multiple adaptive bikes over the years. When I was little, I had a bike, I think it was called Step and Go. And the point of that-

James:
I know it well.

Emily Ladau:
I would step up and down. But I am a very tiny individual and it definitely was not custom fit to me. As I got older, I switched from standing to using a wheelchair full-time, and so sitting was an easier option for me and I had the opportunity to try a couple of different hand cycles. There was one that attached to my wheelchair and then I tried one where I would transfer out of the wheelchair and use it.
And both of them are perfectly fine for someone, but my human dimensions don’t quite work with the ones that are on the market that are not custom. But I understand that your bikes are tailor-made, right? So can we talk a little bit about that process? How does that work? What kind of customizations can you add to a bike?

James:
Great question. So it’s kind of like the sky’s the limit. I mean, my job is to say yes and we can do it and then run to the engineers and say, “Okay, we’re doing this. How do we do it now? Make me look good.” So I get the fun job. I say yes. But we start off, we have a order form that walks you through what is kind of our standard accessories and items. And to be honest, just with a team of parents, therapists, individual riders, over the years we’ve kind of come up with the stuff that we know is going to work for the majority of individuals, but everyone is unique. And even with the great accessories and designs that we have, that’s not going to accommodate everyone.
And we hear it all the time. And maybe similar experiences that you just shared there, Emily. Sometimes it works, but it doesn’t work that well. And ultimately if it becomes a frustrating experience, then how often are you going to want to do it, right? So what we want to do is build something that is going to work great for that individual, that they’re going to love and enjoy because then that just means they get on it that much more. They get that much more therapy and they get that much more fun and freedom. But we can do custom, custom. I was just thinking, Kyle, with you being in the DC area, there was an Abilities Expo there years ago.
And there was a lady that came up to our booth and she’s a little person. She said right away, “I can’t get my leg over this crossbar. This is exactly what happens all the time.” And I was like, “Well, hold on a second. I got you. This is easy. Lift your leg up. I’m just going to measure.” I just measured from the ground to the bottom of her shoe. I’m like, “Where are you comfortable lifting your leg up to?” We got that measurement, I came back to the team here and said, “We need to customize a frame.” They looked at how does that impact safety, the design, is it functional?
And we were able to build her a bike knowing that as long as we got it low enough for her leg to get over because it was really important for her to be able to transfer on independently. So we did a custom frame and she got a bike and she loved it. So that’s what I love about this company is we can do that custom, custom. We don’t have to say to someone, “Look, it’s going to work, but you’re going to kind of have to deal with this or deal with that. Let’s solve those problems and get you the best bike.”

Kyle Khachadurian:
That sounds incredible. And it sounds like you cater to pretty much everybody who wants a bike. So let’s talk about that. Tell me who can get a bike and what are the options for making that happen because we know that you have multiple avenues for that, and we are very specifically interested in your Dream Bike Program. That sounded really cool and we’d love to know more about that.

James:
Absolutely. I mean, I’m sure we’ll probably both add to this, but anyone and everyone, we have hand cycles, the upper extremity models, lower extremity models. We have combos, upper and lower extremity. We have different styles. So it’s really, we see any age, any ability. It’s pretty awesome. And I know you guys have mentioned that it sounded like biking isn’t an option. I don’t know everyone’s situation, and I don’t want to go so bold as saying, “Oh, I could get you to ride.” Because sometimes I do though. We are at trade shows and parents are walking by with their child and I’m like, “Come try a bike.”
And they look at me like I’m crazy like, “We can’t ride a bike.” And it’s like, “Well, why not?” 20 minutes later, we’re seeing the child pedal for the first time and do a little bit of movement too. We have tilt in space features, we have laterals, headrests. We’ve done one design that sticks out. We were approached by a gentleman, he was born no upper extremities, and he heard that we can do some custom stuff. And he approached us and said, “Is there any way I could ride a bike? Obviously I can’t steer.” And we said, “Well, would you be open to steering with your knees?” And he’s like, “Well, what other choice do I have? Absolutely.”
So we built a custom knee pad where he could just basically steer the bike with his knees. And in order to break, we added a coaster break so he could backpedal. So it was an older individual, but it was his first time being able to ever ride a bike and better late than never. So I love those kinds. I mean, every bike that we build, every client we meet is a special moment, but some of them stick out, especially when it’s a little bit more challenging. It’s not challenging in a bad way, it’s challenging in a good way. Let’s get you riding.

Emily Ladau:
And then how do the person actually go about this if they want to get a bike? Is there a way to navigate funding? What I can imagine must be an expensive customization. How does that work?

James:
So that’s a great question. I call it the million-dollar question. It’s easy for people to want our products, but how do we make it affordable? They’re not cheap, obviously. They’re all handmade, custom-made for that individual. We want to make the best bikes. It doesn’t allow us to be the cheap, cheap, cheap attractive price for most people. So Kyle, you mentioned about the dream bike earlier. We’ve done a lot when I first started. I see the tears of joy when people try the bike for the first time. And then I jokingly say when I tell them the price, it’s like they’re crying now. It’s maybe over the price.
So in being in sales, I want to be able to help individuals and some people we meet absolutely will take the ball and run with it and they’ll find funding. We have a partnership with Help Hope Live, a great crowdfunding organization that is specific to our industry and our community. Some people are just like, “I don’t know where to start.” So we have options too. We try to send them direct links, make them feel comfortable as well, taking those steps and reaching out. Whether it’s knowing that this is the executive director of the foundation you’re going to be approaching, they know us.
They know the price of our bikes and they’re willing to help. Sometimes just making that warm connection there makes it that much more likely that someone is going to be able to reach out. And then with regards to the Dream Bike Program, it really actually started over Covid. A lot of our partner foundations that love doing our bikes, helping individuals. They couldn’t have those gala nights, those golf tournaments, those big fundraisers and funding started to drop off. Yet at the same time with everyone social distancing and not being able to get that critical physical occupational therapy in-house, they were turning to bikes.
And so we have funding dropping off and we have interest increasing. So it was a perfect storm. And it’s like, “What do we do?” So we’ve noticed over the years that some of our nonprofits, their donors, they often would gravitate towards the bikes and we started to reach out to some of those donors, some of those corporations to see, “Hey, would you ever want to consider buying a bike?” And we’ll do branding on the bike and you get to be able to meet the family. It could be a team building, whatever your angle is. At the end of the day, some deserving individual gets their own bike, and that’s really the point at the end of it all.
I call it a win-win-win. Everyone that’s involved in that program gets something out of it too. And some of our corporations don’t want any publicity. Others are up and coming and they really want to get their name out there and they really want to show that, “Hey, we support our community and we support the disability community as well.” So I’ll shut up now. Gabrielle.

Gabrielle:
Again, you said it best, exactly. The Dream Bike Program. It’s definitely something our whole organization has gotten behind or got behind, sorry. And we’ve tried it all throughout North America and there’s many different ways to slice it as well with corporations. They can definitely utilize it as a team building moment with their team. We’ve had companies do a build a bike program, so to speak, with the dream bike, meaning that we send the bike to the organization, not completely finished, and then our team gets online with them and helps to put it together from certain pieces of the bikes to deckles.
And then at the end, so they’ve done this as a group, they’ve come together as a team, and then in turn they have a beautiful piece that they’re able to deliver to someone within their community, have a little presentation, see whether… So if it’s a child, mom, dad, everyone, have that moment and it’s really special. Really neat. There’s that aspect to it. There is the aspect of branding and customizations that we do of all sorts as James said earlier. You can check it out on our website too. Some of the examples that we’ve done, it’s pretty neat from embroidery, cool deckles, name plates to sprinkled, donut rim covers and bells and whistles.
All the bells and whistles. But it’s pretty neat and they can get fun with it. And sometimes the kiddos have ideas too and they get fun with it too. So it’s really neat, really special and does give those companies who maybe don’t have something they’re working towards or able to give back to an opportunity to find that through this.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Speaking of customization as well as earlier in this conversation, James, you were talking about an individual who had no upper extremities and steering the bike with their knees. And I’m looking at the wall behind you and I’m seeing this mosaic of custom bicycles. It’s on my mind that I have to ask, do you have any standout bikes in your head that have some cool modification that is, I would say, atypical for you? Do you have a favorite one you’ve ever done or a very cool looking one or one with an out of the ordinary adaptation that you’re very proud to have made?

James:
Wow. How many hours do we have here? Four or five hours. Perfect. Buckle in listeners. One that I think really stands out for me. There was an individual that was unfortunately in a motorcycle wreck and he approached us and his motorcycle was everything to him. I remember I kind of tossed out the idea of, because he had a sissy bar, it’s a long bar on the back that stands really high. And he had a custom design with a cross and we were looking at building him a hand cycle. And I threw out the idea of, “Well, why don’t we repurpose that? We have the shop right here, we can weld anything”
So we fabricated and did that pretty much exact sissy bar with custom design on the back of his hand cycle. So he got to ride again, it wasn’t his motorcycle, but it’s his new motorcycle and it’s the same thing. It’s freedom. Hit the open road. So that one definitely, I mean I could go on and on. There’s so many cool and unique bikes that we’ve done, but in a way they’re all very, very special. But that one for sure would stand out. I know being from DC there, I don’t know if you saw, we did a Washington Capitals bike for an individual locally as well. So we got to team up with the team and it got all over the news.
Tom Wilson came out for the presentation and the local children’s hospital there actually emailed us and said, “There’s so many eyes on that that now a lot more families and individuals are looking into getting bikes because this child was a bit more physically involved.” So it just kind of opened up some eyes that regardless of your situation, it can be a possibility to ride. So that was a really cool one too, just to work with the capitals.

Emily Ladau:
I am so into the bikes, however, I also understand that adapted bikes are not the only thing that Freedom Concepts make, and we really want to hear more about some of the other cool custom products that you work on. I know for example, you have the Chill Out Chair and I am sitting over here in a recliner chair right now wishing that I had something that was better fit to my body. So please tell us about the other things that you make.

Gabrielle:
Absolutely. The Chill Out Chair would be our other bread and butter product. The Chill Out Chair is an all foam chair. It’s part of or what we call alternative seating. And the chair comes in two different models. So we have a rocker or a roller, and they too, like the bikes, come in a variety of sizes, come with a variety of accessories. And really they’re built with a combination of high grade foams and it provides the user’s comfort and support. It encourages proper positioning and also just a safe seating environment that’s different than being in a wheelchair, power chair, bed even. And gives just that sense of safeness.
We’ve seen people use them in schools, at home, [inaudible 00:22:22] clinics, whatever may suit. And our rocker literally rocks back and forth. It has a feature called Lock the Rock, so you can lock it into various degrees of tilts. And then we have our roller model. And the roller model, you can add a feeding activity tray to it and you can move it easily room to room, really works well again at school or at home. And they also come in a variety of different fabrics. So whether you maybe want to use it for multiple people, there’s easy wipeable fabrics or you can get soft plushes, indoor-outdoor as well, whatever it may suit.
A lot of families and individuals love it because they can tailor it to their house. It doesn’t look necessarily very medical, so you can really have fun with it. It looks like a cool piece of furniture. You can enjoy a good movie, games night, you’re at eye level with the rest of your family sitting at the table. It’s a pretty neat product.

Emily Ladau:
You guys thought of everything.

Gabrielle:
You’re trying.

James:
I was going to add to that too, the aesthetics. The aesthetics are very important to our customers too. And when I was around, when we’re just launching the chair too, it was… We say around the office, looks count. We want our bikes to be a statement piece and the same with the Chill Out Chairs too. Families love that it looks like… It matches the look of the furniture that they have throughout their house. I mean, most of it is the design is more functional and we’re looking at hopefully avoiding skin breakdown and pressure sores and changing up that positioning throughout the day, which is super critical.
But again, looks count. I recall one that was really interesting. We had a family down in New Orleans, all of the furniture because of the high ceilings with a lot of the old houses in New Orleans, a lot of the furniture has extremely tall backs. And a mom actually approached me and said, “Can you build my son an extremely tall back part of the chair? Because we want his chair to look like our furniture.” And I thought that was really cool. And I said, “Absolutely, let’s do it.” So it was excessively tall, looked like a Game of Thrones kind of type chair. But it was really cool and her son loved it too. Looks count.

Kyle Khachadurian:
They do. Our next question is for both of you, but I imagine that you’ll have separate answers. What is the best thing about working for Freedom Concepts?

Gabrielle:
Wow, that is a good question. Who wants to go for-

James:
Working for Gabrielle because she’s my boss. I have to say that. No, I’m just kidding. Well, you know what? I get to be at the frontline. I get to meet the families, the individuals that are actually going to be the ones using our products. I love that. You’re just seeing everyone’s attitude and positive outlook on life. I know everyone has struggles and there’s those tough days, but it blows my mind that how amazing people are and just to be able to maybe add just a little bit of extra fun into their life and extra freedom.
It’s a blessing. And I get so much out of it. I mean, why would I stick around for 21 years if I didn’t enjoy it? But it’s an amazing community and I’m just happy to be a small part of it.

Gabrielle:
Well said. And myself, honestly, from a couple different perspectives. From a company perspective, we always say we’re a small company, but we have a big deliverable and it’s definitely true. And I think every day it just brings new challenges to the forefront. And everyone that is a part of Freedom Concepts like James, 21 years, it’s such a testament. Everyone behind the products of Freedom really do have a passion for what we do. They are so energized when our sales team brings wonderful stories or a new custom order that we can reinvent the wheel and figure out how we’re going to get everybody mobile.
It’s such a neat thing to be able to do every day, but really grateful that our team is just so passionate and inspired behind what we do. And like James said, we’re happy to be just a small part and hope to continue to be a small part of delivering these products to the community.

Emily Ladau:
I love that you are literally reinventing the wheel.

James:
That was a pun.

Emily Ladau:
It was great.

James:
I caught it. [inaudible 00:27:23]

Emily Ladau:
Before we wrap up, this has been so awesome. And Gabrielle, you mentioned it a little bit about your hopes to continue being a bright spot for people. What is the overall vision moving forward for Freedom Concepts in terms of goals and how you’re hoping to continue making a difference for the disability community? So basically, what should our listeners be taking away from this conversation and what should we be on the lookout for from Freedom Concepts?

Gabrielle:
Absolutely. A lot of things. Like I said earlier, we’re constantly… Our team in-house is constantly looking for ways to innovate, to improve our products. Anyone listening who has our products already, who have seen them, the therapist community as well. We love our feedback. It always helps us improve and get things to a better place. So I think our goals moving forward is to just continue innovating, making more mobility products, maybe something that’s not even there yet. Being able to have that justification behind our products is really important as well.
Medical justification helps provide support that the bikes not only are for the recreation and fun, but also therapy. As James said earlier, there’s so many people that think, “I can’t ride a bike,” or “They’re just bikes, what do you mean?” But there’s so much more than that and we see over and over again just how impactful they are and we would love to get more companies on board. Dream Bike Program is so huge. These are products that aren’t traditionally funded, and we need people to come up and step up and fund those products. They’re so wonderful and they really, really provide those moments of freedom to its uses.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Excellent. And for anyone who’s listening who might be interested in a Freedom Concepts product, where can they find you?

Gabrielle:
They can find us at www.freedomconcepts.com. We’re also on Facebook, Instagram, X and LinkedIn. Absolutely. We’re all on there at Freedom Concepts.

James:
And they could also call our 1-800 number, it’s 800-661-9915. And it’s concepts with an S. A lot of people miss that s. We have more than one concept. We got many.

Emily Ladau:
Well, we will have all of your contact information and places to find you all online in our show notes. But I have to say, this one is a really fun conversation. I am jazzed about the fact that you are doing this important work and quite frankly, already scheming about how Kyle and I can go for a cute little bike ride. [inaudible 00:30:40]

James:
I was going to say, as the sales manager, we got to talk off-air here and see what we can do.

Emily Ladau:
Right. I would love to see Kyle on a bike. I would actually pay good money for that.

James:
There you go. That’s how [inaudible 00:30:58]

Emily Ladau:
This has been fantastic. You guys are both great. Gabrielle, James, thank you so much for joining us. This was a ton of fun and we hope that everyone will check out Freedom Concepts. We hope that maybe there is a future writer in our audience or several. And thank you so much for joining us.

Gabrielle:
Thank you so much for having us.

James:
Thank you guys. Thanks to all your listeners. Hopefully it was enjoyable and absolute pleasure. Thanks for all you guys do.

Emily Ladau:
Thank you. And we would be remiss if we didn’t end this episode like we end all our episodes.

Kyle Khachadurian:
Might we say you all look good today.

Emily Ladau:
You look very good today. Thank you so much for listening. Bye.

James:
See you next time.