30 Years Later: Q&A with Ciclismo Classico Founder Lauren Hefferon

Ciclismo Classico is celebrating 30 years of traveling, educating and enlightening its guests. Over the past three decades changes in technology, customer trends, and industry trends have required active travel companies like Ciclismo Classico to change its offerings. Ciclismo Classico Founder and Director Lauren Hefferon took some time out from her busy schedule to answer a few of our questions and reflect on the past, present, and future of Ciclismo Classico. We discussed the challenges and growing pains, how the company has maintained its edge over three decades, and how technology is changing the future of adventure travel.
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Q: How did you discover cycling?

LH: I’ve been very active my whole life and growing up in beautiful southern New Hampshire I was always doing something outside—playing all kinds of sports, hiking, biking, swimming and downhill skiing. Then in High School, I tore my knee downhill skiing, had surgery and said to myself, “I don’t want to be injured again.” So I decided to participate in those sports and activities with less impact on my joints so I just began biking more and I quickly discovered it was the perfect fit for my curious and adventurous spirit. That’s when I became “a little” obsessed. Biking helped me strengthen my knee, but it also expanded my universe in ways I couldn’t imagine.

The bicycle helped me discover all the wonderful cultural spots, gorgeous views, and swimming holes. I spent my high school years riding every road every road within 50 miles of my home in Keene. When I visited Cornell, I mentioned to my dad how great the biking would be around the gorgeous surroundings of Cornell. He wasn’t immediately thrilled by my bike-centered thinking but he knew me well—if I couldn’t bike, I would not be energized to learn and be at my best. Biking has always inspired and energized me, kept me balanced. Its my meditation in motion, where I am free, where life is always good, fun and expansive.

Q: That’s a large step from Cornell University to Italy.

LH: At Cornell at that time, there wasn’t much of a bike culture but I began to create one! I led bicycle tour classes and led bike-camping trips for a university outdoor education group called Wilderness Reflexions. I loved it and discovered that leading tours was something that I wanted to get better and better at. The leadership component was so important that I enrolled in NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership) course that summer and for six intensive weeks of backpacking, I discovered what I wanted to do in my life—be outdoors, learning, teaching, and sharing the world with others.

Upon graduation, I received a Rotary Scholarship to study in Florence for a year. My grandmother came from a small town in Le Marche called Genga, so the call to go to Italy was very strong. I landed in Pisa, biked solo around Europe for three months then literally descended into Florence where I bought a shiny red Italian bicicletta and rode every road in Tuscany. Florentine bike mechanic legend Mario Conti befriended me at his Florentine cycle shop and there I not only found my Italian tribe but they showed my all their favorite Tuscan roads (fast). I spent more time on my bike than I did at school.

Since biking has always been the means by which I immerse myself into a place, within a couple of months and hundreds of miles of loop rides from Florence, I already knew Tuscany and all its secret treasures better than most. Bicycling the local roads has been my personal recipe to see the world and connect with the local people and this tiny bike shop and its large tribe of crazy and passionate cyclists became my extended family, my home away from home. I was in heaven.

Q: How did you feel around all those guys? Did you feel any sexism in the late 80s, being a “girl-cyclist”?

LH: I was pretty immune to it if it existed at all. It wasn’t on my radar. I mean, maybe I was a little naïve and never picked up on any of the nuances. Or if I did, I wasn’t that sensitive to let it bother me. I think I was a bit of a celebrity to those guys because I was this American girl looking to ride bikes. That’s all I wanted to do, so that’s what I did. I’m an only child—never had brothers—so all of those subtleties were lost on me. Of course, the Italians didn’t want to listen to me, but I loved doing what I was doing and nothing was going to stand in my way.

Q: It seems nothing has. The company is now in its 30th year and still going strong. What has been the most rewarding part of leading a team like Ciclismo Classico all these years?

LH: I know from talking with so many guests and reading their evaluations that we change people’s lives. Whether they reconnect with their Italian past (and write a book), spark a renewed passion for art and culture (and open up an Italian bakery), or simply bond and be inspired by their fellow cyclists, in some small way, we make a difference in people’s lives and make the world a better place. Every trip our guests take with us transforms them in some way and that is extremely satisfying. We offer the gift of active, enriching and fun travel experience which in a small way improves the human spirit. Finally, seeing our guides so committed to creating and spreading the Ciclismo Magic brings a smile to my face every time because our guides are the key ingredient but also our guests bring their unique spirit. The positive energy of our tours in unique. If only I could bottle it!

Q: Ciclismo Classico boasts having the best guides in the industry. What is your philosophy on the hiring and ongoing employment of your guides? Why are they so vital to your success and future?

LH: Our guides are the energetic connectors to the culture. In our recruiting, hiring, and training process we look for high energy, high charisma, super professional individuals who love to share what they love. That is key. They have to love to share their passion for bicycle travel more than the experience itself. Each of our guides brings a special spark to each trip. They are all well-traveled residents of Europe so they’ve got their fingers on the pulse of what’s interesting. Our Guide Manager Enrico Pizzorni knows precisely what we’re looking for: we don’t want demeaning individuals. We like highly intelligent people who can add a spark to the team. A lot of our guides have been with us for ten years or more.

Q: How did you find your guides in those early years?

LH: I always sought out kindred cycling spirits, we were drawn to each other. In the early days, when I was traveling around the country doing promotional slide shows I would have young cyclists in the audience approach me, Carol Sicbaldi (now in her 20th year with Ciclismo) met me at an REI event I was doing in San Francisco. Italian guides read about us in biking magazines. We were contemporaries and shared an incurable passion for culture, travel, bicycling, and having fun, Most importantly we were all natural born leaders with a knack for teaching. Our guide recipe has not changed to this day; we keep the bar high and wonderful talented guides come our way. It’s pretty magical and I feel very blessed.

Q: Passion seems to be a crucial element of the equation. You have created a business around one of your passions: cycling. What advice would you have for other entrepreneurs who would like to pursue their passion?

LH: Embrace, surrender to and follow your passion. Let the things, places, and people you love guide you. Surround yourself with good energy and get ready to work very, very hard to show the world your unique-ness. This will always sustain your spirit which sustains everything else. Be prepared to do everything—marketing, sales, operations, finance—learn how to do everything so you will know precisely what to delegate to who. At the beginning, you will do everything.

When I began, I excelled and enjoyed all aspects of the business: I drew, photographed and designed the brochure and all the marketing materials: I scouted, created, managed and led all the trips. I always loved talking and spending time with guests. Both my parents helped me a lot too. Mom on the phones and Dad doing the bills and operations while I led the tours. As the company grew I started hiring the most talented and passionate people I could find—Marisa Caruccio, Carol Sicbaldi, Gabe Del Rossi—they were my rocks and we were a growing Ciclismo Family.

You need to identify those other people that share the same passion. Get a tribe of those people and be the leader of that tribe but trust, delegate and be ready to make lots and lots of mistakes. Find your niche and focus in on that. The more focused you are the better off you will be. Here is the recipe: Figure out what you love, what you are good at and where you add the most value—that is your purpose and hire others with the same framework. You don’t need business school. Again, it’s hard work. It’s like having a child: you’re pregnant with this idea, then you deliver it, and then you’re on.,  

Q: Now your child is a thirty-something! What has changed the most in this business since you began Ciclismo Classico? What has been the biggest change you have seen in bike touring in Europe?

LH: The level of clientele. First, cyclists have gotten much stronger. Many of my original guests hadn’t ridden a bicycle since they were younger. They certainly didn’t know how to spin (“spinning classes” had just started in the mid-1980s), but they had a lot of energy, sense of fun and curiosity and that is really all you need!

There is so much bicycle education available today with the internet: YouTube, Facebook groups, cycling clubs and more bike stores that double as coffee shops. When people show up on our trips, they know a lot about gear, positioning, technology and much more. They are much more well-informed today than thirty years ago. The other change is the boom in biking in general. Not only has the clientele gotten wiser, but they’re also growing in numbers. It’s rare to find somebody on one of our trips that has not been riding either in spin or Peleton classes or with a local club ride.

Q: But maybe they haven’t gotten on a bike trip yet. What advice do you have for people who want to try a bike tour, but are afraid they aren’t up to the task?

LH: Look, people should sign up for the trip even though they haven’t done a lot of biking. Once you sign up, you’ll be committed and you will make a plan to ride more and invest more time. Know you will be biking in Italy is a great motivation! You shouldn’t feel intimidated: it’s a beautiful way to travel and you will meet like-minded participants that are just like you in terms of preparation. Never, have I ever heard anyone regret taking a bike trip— in 30 years I have NEVER heard anyone say, “Well, I’ll never do THAT again,” after their first trip—taking a bicycle trip is the start of a life-long “romance” with bicycle travel!

It’s a process: first you’ll sign up for a beginner trip, and maybe the next step is to buy a new  bike or get your current one fixed up. I guarantee we’ll take you from hobby to passion and then, if you like, you’ll begin to invest more money and time. Maybe you join a local bike club and or a Meet Up group where you will ride with like-minded people and make new friends. Maybe you’ll go to spin classes in the off-season to keep up your endurance and strength. After that, you sign up for a slightly more challenging trip. Repeat and notch it up (if you like).

Q: What are you most excited about in the future? What will the next thirty years hold for Ciclismo Classico?

LH: We are thrilled about e-bikes. The whole electric-assist technology will change how we look at bike touring today. People who are getting “older” used to tell me how they were limited by age. They’d say, “Well, maybe I can do this a few more years and then I’ll have to stop.” It’s as if their cycling life would end. E-bikes change that. In the past, our older clientele were forced to make this decision. Today, e-bikes have extended their cycling life. Now they don’t have to make that choice. On a bike and especially an e-bike you are Forever Young.

Other exciting news is that we will be adding educational extension packages to our more popular trips. This way the learning never stops! These extensions will include unique activities like a cooking class in Florence, a vespa tour in Roma or opera in the vineyards near Verona, you name it. Most people head to Rome after our Sicily departure—that’s great! Now, we will have an extension program in Rome and we will  organize the whole program. These Beyond Biking extension programs perfectly compliment and are in alignment with the educational mission of our tours.

Our Bike Across Series has been such a hit we are now Bike Across every country in Europe, in 2020 we will offering Bike Across Ireland as well as Bike Across Greece. Italy has always been our sandbox but Europe is our playground. We are planning a very unique bike trip designed around visiting and learning the cooking secrets of Italian Grandmothers, we’re calling it: Cucinando Con Le Nonne—Cooking with Grandma!

Finally we are excited about our Active PhotoTours in South America. On these picture-perfect tours we trade our bikes for cameras as we capture our passion for stunning landscapes and ancient cultures

At my core, I am driven to create so certainly at the core of Ciclismo there is and will always be a creative spirit. We strive to create and innovate new itineraries like our Top Guide Tours, launch new projects like our Bike Travel Film Festival now in five satellite locations, dream up new ways to connect with our guests like our Rock the Pasta Dinner alumni dinner series and sponsoring community events like the Jingle Ride, a holiday singing bike parade now in its 22nd year.

For 30 years, we have been the pioneers in Bicycle Tours for the Culturally Curious. We were the first to offer cooking tours, cultural immersion, language lessons, bicycle clinics and active photos tours. We paved the way for what has become standard for the Bicycle Travel Industry and that is something I am very proud of and have my whole talented team and thousands of loyal guests to thank.