5 Canadian bike brands you might not know about

Learn about some smaller bike companies from across the country

Canadian Cycling Magazine September 28, 2020

Most cyclists can easily rattle off a list of some of the most common bike brands: Trek, Cannondale, Giant, Specialized, etc. Some cyclists will even know which companies have a Canadian connection—Argon-18, Cervelo, Norco and so on.

What some people don’t know is that there are a surprisingly large number of Canadian bike brands. Smaller companies have more unique offerings and can be a great option when you’re looking for a personal relationship with those building and selling your bike. Here are five such small Canadian bike manufacturers:

Panorama

Panorama is a Montreal-based company that makes carbon fibre fat bikes and gravel bikes. The brand is focused on adventuring and exploring—its bikes are designed to be loaded up with all kinds of packs racks and waterbottle mounts. Recently, the brand collaborated with Vancouver-based artists Pellvetica to create a unique frame design for the Katahdin bike (pictured above.)

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Naked bicycles

Naked Bicycles, based on Quadra Island in B.C., has been building custom frames since 1998. Founded by Sam Whittingham, Naked Bicycles makes road, cross and mountain frames out of steel and titanium.

The raw titanium of the brand’s bike can be modified with a range of colours through anodization.Naked bicycles will decorate its frame with colours from deep blue, through violet to purple to light gold.

T-Lab

After Guru bikes folded in 2016, Tony Giannascoli created the Montreal-based bike company T-Lab. The brand builds titanium bike, designed engineered manufactured and finished all in their facility. T-Lab makes road, adventure and mountain bikes—all of the bikes are stiff yet light, made using the company’s proprietary precision forming method.

Landyachtz

Landyachtz was founded 20 years ago as a skateboard and longboard company. When founders Mike Perreten and Tom Edstrand took an interest in cycling the Vancouver based brand started making bikes. As of 2016 Landyachtz has grown its bike offering significantly, selling city, touring, road and custom bikes.

KindHuman

KindHuman is a Toronto based bike company, founded by Adam Abramowicz, Gavin Brauer, and Ayal Rahat. The made-to-order brand offers stock sized frames and gives customers control over the bike’s colour, groupset and components. KindHuman sells road, gravel and cyclocross bikes.

All of the company’s bikes are painted and assembled in Canada—creatively named colour choices include “Bob Ross’ Blank Canvas” and “Adam’s Senior Prom Tie” but, for a slightly higher cost, KindHuman can also paint the bikes with any colour you can imagine.