We Are One Composites: Carbon, done different. Canada made.

Canada based We Are One Composites isn’t interested in being just another ‘designed here, made there’ carbon manufacturer. They’ve made hard decisions to do things their own way, including building the entire business in Kamloops, British Columbia.

CEO Dustin Adams was the top-ranked North American downhiller in the world when in 2004 he quit competitive biking. Having stood on the podium alongside Steve Peat and Fabien Barel that competitive streak remains, and drives the business to this day.

Founded in 2017, with the aim of producing the entire product, from design to manufacturing, in Canada, “at first, the only people who believed in the idea were a machinist and Dustin’s first engineer, a Scotsman named Fraser Andrews whom he met through bike industry connections and who was looking for a project after a gig with Rolls-Royce.”

Oh, and for those wonder, ‘where’d the name come from?’; Dustin’s wife, Sherri, can take the credit for that, as well as being encouraging and supportive when banks showed no interest in financing the fledgling business – so they re-mortgaged the family home to turn the idea into a reality.

Today “sales growth tracks between 100 and 130 percent annually. The company, which now has a fleet of 5 rim models, last year introduced its first carbon fibre bike frame, The Arrival, to critical acclaim.”

As Andrew Findlay points out, “It’s not that carbon fibre was new to the biking world…. most North American companies design their wheel frames domestically, then offshore the manufacturing to factories in China and Taiwan that produce for many brands.” Not something Dustin wanted to replicate. He’d seen the way this process worked first hand, and was convinced that not only could he manufacture a better product, but that he could also do it in a more considered way, sourcing materials locally (within a 500 mile radius – with nearly all of the raw materials used to build its bike frames come from within that radius), and build a local workforce.

And things are moving pretty fast for the We Are One team. Launching their first bike definitely had people sitting up and taking notice. “We’ve grown a lot over the past one-and-a-half years.”

“We Are One now produces 4 bike frames per day, with 2 more models in the works and another 2 on the horizon. In June, the company moved into a 25,000-square-foot facility in Kamloops that will enable a boost in production from 100 to 300 bike rims per day. Adams says he’ll grow his staff from 86 to 120 by the end of the year.”

Whilst Dustin acknowledges the route We are One have taken is “definitely not the easy route to market” there is an undeniable power to the story, and a commercial advantage this presents the brand; stuff which gives brand wings. People connect with that.

For UK based readers Dustin comments, “We’re currently restructuring our approach to the market and have a small distribution agreement with Creation Cycles.”

Of the future, “We are looking to build a stronger foundation here in 2023 and bring a larger scale to work in those markets more effectively.”

Lead ‘in article’ image credit: Lisa Novak Photography / bcbusiness.ca