What does Jeep have to do with this bicycle?

Jeep-branded bicycle, Salvation Army, New Westminster, BC

Jeep-branded bicycle, Salvation Army, New Westminster, BC

Jeep-branded bicycle, Salvation Army, New Westminster, BC

Among 4x4 buyers, the Jeep brand is pretty well respected. Obviously someone at Jeep, and/or the company that sold these bicycles, thought that Jeep's reputation would transfer over to these mountain bikes.

But like many licensed products, the Jeep mountain bikes are a poor imitation of the real thing. The bicycles are low-tech and heavy. It would seem that the designers were more interested in hitting a price point than any performance goal. Any serious cyclist would avoid them like the plague.

But Jeep was happy to get its percentage for the use of the name and consumers ended up with a bad taste in their mouths as they grappled with a bicycle that offered neither the legendary off-road performance of a Jeep, or the simple functionality of a well-designed bicycle.

Not a trademark any more?

Toot Toot Beep Beep by Emma Garcia

Toot Toot Beep Beep by Emma Garcia (Detail)

One of the biggest fears of any brand manager is that the brand-name becomes a generic term for the category. This has happened to Hoover, Tannoy, Escalator, Thermos, Zipper, Aspirin, and Heroin. (Heroin was trademarked by Bayer in 1898) Other brands are fighting it tooth and nail. BandAid and Xerox are just two firms who seem to police the use of their brand quite aggressively.

It is somewhat telling that the editor of this book didn't think that the word "jeep" was worthy of capitalization. Is Jeep headed down the road of becoming a generic term for any four-wheel drive vehicle? Fiat had better hope not. Jeep is one of the more valuable parts of the whole Chrysler organization.