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This could in turn keep them from riding as hard and helping the sport progress. I see Levis and Nike doing this right. Do you think Nike gets even half the money back from BMX as they have put into it in the past few years?? No way. Either Nike really cares about BMX or BMX is a big tax write off to them. Now here’s the flip side of that coin. Some of the "corporate sponsors" are just HORRIBLE in the way they make BMX look to the average person. It could be through terrible TV commercials, magazine ads or by sponsoring riders that should not be a spokesperson for the sport. My suggestion to you big companies looking to use BMX as advertising.... do your homework and find someone inside BMX to call the shots. Another good example of this is Mark Losey and Nike.

It seems BMX has progressed at lightning speed over the last few years. Tricks are getting bigger, wilder and sometimes almost unbelievable. Do you think athletes push themselves harder than ever to try to secure one of these "elite" sponsorships where they can make a great living riding or do you think there is no correlation between the two and the trick progression was just inevitable?
I think that most (notice I said most) BMX guys involved in the big comps such as the Dew Tour and X-games ride for the thrill of it first...the money second. What a lot of people don’t realize is that sponsors don’t even pay most pro BMX riders. Many of them live off of contest winnings, doing shows, etc.... A lot of the guys that do make a good living have been around BMX through the lean years where the pro purse at a big contest was $500. Those guys didn't ride for the money then and are just lucky enough to make good money now. I think progression is natural. A lot of the tricks are all about confidence. The more of that you have the faster you will learn stuff. Once everybody sees one guy do an "impossible" trick they know it's possible and it opens the floodgates.

There is no question that these "corporate" sponsorships have increased the awareness of action sports and more specifically BMX (Dew Tour, X-Games etc). What do say to riders/critics who categorically reject and resent the "corporate" influence? Is it justified or just resentment? Can you still "ride for fun" and "do what you love" when your role is essentially to increase your sponsors market share?
Many "hardcore" riders seem to frown upon the big comps (Dew Tour, X-Games etc) for some reason. I guess to some it's "cool" to hate the big corporate companies. It would be fun to lock a few of them down and really find out why. My guess is they would have no real reason other than "it's gay" or "the riders are all sell outs." I've spent a lot of time at Dew Tour events and there are a few downers but on the other hand they treat the riders quite well. Lots of catered food, cool parties, free drinks and they pay well. Is doing something you love to do and getting paid for it selling out? Is Jamie Bestwick doing a 15' air on a vert ramp in front of 15,000,000 people on TV a bad thing? Bottom line is if you grabbed any "hardcore" rider off the street, offered him a Nike sponsorship / salary, and told him you'd give him $15,000 to grind the rail he was about to grind anyway in front of a TV camera he'd do it in a second. What are you most proud of when you think of the types of things Albe's has done to support BMX (i.e. perhaps how you support your own team riders, donations to local skate/bike parks, supporting local jams, etc)?

We try to support as many comps and jams as we can on both a local and national level. We like to have dumb little contest on our website often too just to give stuff away. This week we are doing the "Barspin Challenge." Dane Wild does as many bunny hop barspins as he can in one minute. The challenge is for other to try to beat him. The person that does the most in a minute wins a price. Is this a dumb contest? Hell Yeah! Is it Fun? Hell Yeah!

We often try to pile riders into the Albe's bus and take on trips as well. I try to make this accessible to anybody. We have had trips with just team riders like, Chad Kagy, Daniel Dhers and Matt Sparks yet we've also filled the bus with just a bunch of the local kids. Taking the local kids on small trips is pretty cool. They are stoked to be part of something and go ride some place new. In most cases if we show up at a park with 15 people the locals are stoked to ride with and meet new people. The amount of friendships that have been made by doing this is countless. I like to think of BMX as a big happy family and that's just a small way we try to keep it like that.

We've been around a long time! 1988 is when were started doing BMX stuff exclusively. In that time we've tried to help everybody in BMX we could from X-games gold medalists to little Timmy down the street. We are all very giving here and if it was possible would just give stuff away to everybody. Anybody that knows anything about the BMX business knows we are not getting rich over here. All of us get an ok salary and the rest of the money goes back into the Albe's for more products, team, road trips, comps, jams, parties, etc...

Do you feel "corporate" sponsors allow team riders other opportunities not available to traditional BMX company sponsors?
For sure. There isn't a lot of money in BMX. Most bike companies can't afford to pay their riders let alone give them insurance and whatnot. Without sponsors from outside BMX there would be a lot less international travel for riders for sure.

Obviously Albe's gets lots of requests to supports events. How do you decide which events to support and why?
It's kind of a crapshoot. We have a lot of friends / customers from around the country so if it's a name we recognize we try to help them for sure. We try to help even the smallest little jams out even if it's just with a t-shirt or two.

Do you feel the increase in awareness about BMX has increased your own business? Do you think other smaller companies are more financially successful because of this increased awareness? Is there possibly a downside? I am wondering if the increase in corporate marketing budgets has pushed up the cost to place ads in BMX magazines etc, thereby forcing some smaller companies to scale back or eliminate advertising in these kinds of publications.
Good question! I think the increase in awareness can help and / or hurt some places. The BMX pie is getting sliced pretty thin. BMX is become more popular and more kids are starting to ride, which is great! On the other hand more and more places are starting to sell BMX stuff. As long as new kids start riding in bigger numbers than new BMX dealers are popping up then we should be ok. If the new riders to new shop ratio starts to slip it's going to get messy for the business end of BMX. I like to think that we are well enough established in BMX to not feel it as much as a normal shop would but it's always in my mind. I guess it's probably part of the growing pains of our sport.

I don't see the cost of print ads going up too much. I'm a fan of magazines but I'm not sure how much longer they will be able to stick around with everything being on the web the second after it happens. Web ads on the other hand are a different story.

There is no question corporate sponsors are making a huge impact on BMX. In my own experience however, building and running a free skate/BMX park, nothing can compare to the support, generosity, advice and assistance provided by the smaller and more traditional BMX companies. I’ve gotten everything from free helmets to bike parts and everything in-between. No matter how involved corporate sponsors get into BMX, they are never going to replace the relationships between companies like Albe’s and the local park scene. In the end, for me anyway, that’s what BMX is really all about.