If you’re going to open a bike shop on the busiest stretch of cycle lane in Copenhagen — a city where only 40% of people own cars and one in three ride to work — you’d better have a traffic-stopping product. Hans Fogh, 44, and Lars Malmborg, 46, are convinced that they do. Their 10-month-old company Larry vs Harry has not only manoeuvred into the jammed Danish market, its flourishing export division is helping to further “Copenhagenise” cities throughout Europe, the US and Australia.


The Danish capital has rewritten the rules of town planning. Motor vehicles are heavily taxed and the monies spent so lavishly on cycle infrastructure that around 60% of citizens say they ride because it is fast and convenient. The SUV in this city is the ladcyklen, or cargo bike, a generic term for any two or three-wheeler designed to carry stuff, from large ladders to small children. The modern cargo bike, the Christiania — named after an anarchist town — was developed in the 1970s. There are now a dozen or so brands — a blur of Bellabikes, Triobikes, Esimexes and Kangaroos — while cargo culture continues to shape Copenhagen: 25 years since the city introduced bike lanes with raised curbs on both sides it is increasing their width from 2.19m to 2.49m.


Yet Fogh, a carpenter for 15 years, says that in 2007 he was so frustrated at being unable to find a two-wheeler that could nimbly transport weighty tools, he asked his friend Malmborg, an engineer, to design one. The prototype — a twist on the Long John model but with a racing saddle where one might expect more comfort, and handlebars that invite the rider to lean into the headwind — earned so many appreciative glances the pair were emboldened to launch a business. 


Their signature bike, the Bullitt — named, somewhat ironically, after the Steve McQueen movie famous for its car chase — is no wider than a regular bicycle and just a few kilos heavier. It is available in seven variants, built over the same frame. Should no one grasp that this is a vehicle geared at those who fancy a bit more speed and a lot more style, the bikes have names like John Player Spezial and Bluebird ’71 and the frames sport tiny graphic details, such as images of Burt Reynolds and Elvis. New colours for 2009 include vibrant yellow, green and pink. The website is exhaustingly groovy; slogans exhort, “A pimp is only as good as his product” and, “You will not be able to stay home, brother!” The ferociously enthusiastic Fogh has legally adopted ‘Bullitt’ as his middle name.


Yet Larry vs Harry appears to be a serious and well-oiled operation, on course to double production and revenues in its second year in business. “We produced a couple of hundred in 2008. We already have orders for 400 for 2009. We’re also selling more outside Denmark. We’re exporting bikes all over Europe and to the US,” says Fogh, who handles the sales. 
“Our biggest market is Switzerland — where the population is wealthy, healthy and bikes are not taxed — Holland, Germany, Austria and the UK. Delivery time takes four months from when I get the order and we’ve 
already got a waiting list.”


The bikes, which retail at between €1,800 and €3,000, are produced in Taiwan and assembled in Denmark. Fogh insists this is not solely down to the relatively low production costs in Asia: “It has as much to do with technology. Aluminium frames are so big they need special machines and then there are the processes to harden the paint — this technology has been lost in Europe. In Europe most cargo bike manufacture is the equivalent of people still making the Trabant car — heavy and outdated.” 


Fogh adds that Larry vs Harry is installing gears from Shimano, a feted Japanese cycling component company, on some models for status-conscious German and US consumers. He says the company’s success partly is down to not yielding in technological design but being accommodating for customers and suppliers. “Customisation is possible for orders of five bikes but we say what can be achieved technologically. We have 25 years behind us and we know what works.” Everything else is unimportant, it seems. The company’s name, for instance, came about because “everyone in Taiwan has one name” and the founders were repeatedly called Larry or Harry. 


While the shop on Frederiksborggade — where 30,000 cyclists pass every day — is one of Copenhagen’s most YouTube-destined locations, Fogh notes that the city’s cargo bike sector is riding the crest of a wave. A new generation of pedal power was unleashed last April thanks to the relaxation of licensing laws designed to enhance street life. Apart from the 100 or so cargo taxis, messengers and postal workers, bikes now sell flowers, ice creams, newspapers, bread and seafood. Freewheeling entrepreneurs include Ole Skram, the Espressomanden, who operates a three-wheeler-cum-coffee machine, and Mads Iiseerg and Stefan Grørnn who run expanding outfit Fruitbike. 


Fogh is confident that such businesses will flourish in other countries, especially as environmental and recessionary concerns chime. Fogh says he is getting more orders from France, Japan and mid-America. “It would be helpful to sell more in dollars because we are buying components in dollars and yen, the two most expensive currencies,” he muses. “In the States cycling is like a religion on the West and East Coasts. It is ridiculous. Here in Copenhagen it is simply the best way to get around”.