About Yeti Cycles
Yeti's home base is located in Golden, Colorado, with a long and rich history in mountain bike construction and racing. Founded by John Parker in the mid-80s in California, John took the Yeti name from the sleeping bag maker he worked for at the time after they had gone out of business. Yeti moved to Colorado in 1991 in order to be closer to the epicenter of mountain bike racing in Durango, becoming one of the core brands dedicated to the future of mountain biking, through innovation and investing in the sport. Yeti was one of the first brands to adopt full suspension bikes, while also forming a partnership with Easton which gave them an edge in frame tubing design. Yeti also formed the first ever professional mountain bike race team.
By the mid-90s, things were changing. Scott USA had just purchased Schwinn out of bankruptcy and merged their bike departments with headquarters in Boulder. A few years later, John Parker sold Yeti to Schwinn. By the late 90s, things began to unravel a bit. Schwinn, along with Yeti, had been put up for sale by Scott in '97. Soon thereafter, John Parker and Schwinn had parted ways, and by '99, the Yeti factory in Durango closed. Interestingly enough (to the ski crowd at least), Volant Skis purchased Yeti later that year in the hopes of developing an off-season brand. Over the summer of '01, Volant went under and a group of employees came together and purchased Yeti, engineering more than a decade of innovation and fun.
evo x Yeti
Yeti defines themselves as "decidedly not corporate," with "creative types, number crunchers, vegetarians, craftsmen, hockey players, fly fishermen, bearded guys and cue balls" among their ranks. At evo, we have our own legion of vegans, hipsters, nerds, and vegan hipster nerds, so we can get down with that kind of company culture. In the end, Yeti loves what they do, much like us. Did we mention Yeti makes radical mountain bikes?
