I'm officially declaring Kona part of the big four five bike manufacturers. That's right, their lineup of bikes is every bit as comprehensive as Specialized, Trek, Cannondale, and Giant. Sure we don't see their road bikes in the Tour de France - yet - but, Kona attacked the market from another angle.
Clearly most well known for their big hit bikes, Kona has really rounded out it's lineup in recent years. They've also shown that they can react to trends quite quickly as they were an early adopter of the 29'er and have fixies, cruisers, and commuter bikes - all very hot right now - in their quiver.
The Dirt Rag blog's got the goods on all that is new for Kona in 2008. Most notably for this 29'er cross-country aficionado is the expanded line of 29-inch wheeled bikes. Says Dirt Rag, "they now offer 4 models; one singlespeed, two hardtails, and a new 2.5” travel dually."
The Hei Hei 29 (pictured above) looks fast and is intended to be a lightweight cross-country dual-suspension bike. It's made from the same lightweight Scandium as the 26-inch Hei Hei and looks worthy of the race course.
Good stuff from Kona. Just need some more retailers to carry their stuff (at least here on the east coast) and they should see excellent growth for years to come.
