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I’ve got 3 parasitic little bundles of joy (kids) who are generally a lot of fun. Generally.
Angus, the eldest and only boy, is 5 years old and my number 1 hero. He enjoys lots of stuff but his 3 main aims in life involve building Lego, riding a bike and having fun. What a guy. Swap building Lego for drinking beer and it’s probably strong evidence that I’ve not progressed much since 1985.

Deciding a name for another human being was never something I thought much about until baby number 1 was on the way. Mrs H and I agreed on all the names that one or both of us didn’t like but really struggled to get a name we agreed on. Despite buying (approximately) 1,782 baby naming books and watching the credits to every TV program, Film and Box Set we still couldn’t shortlist any boys or girls names for the bump.

And so one evening Mrs H suggested the name “Angus” and, for once in my life, I managed to not jump out of my seat and say what was going through my head.

I’m also a huge AC/DC fan and, as you’ll no doubt be aware (unlike Mrs H), one of the founding members is the unmistakable and inimitable Mr Angus Young. Born in Glasgow in 1955, his family emigrated to Australia for a tenner in the 1960’s before he and his brother Malcolm setup AC/DC in 1975 and took the world and multiple generations by storm. They well and truly ripped it up!
Not that I’m a huge believer in the meaning of names, but Angus also roughly translates as “one strength”.

Not much more was said on the name; mentioned a couple of times, few gentle head nods and supporting “umms”. Then the sh!t got real and late on Wednesday 3rd April 2013 bump decided he/she was coming out to say hello and a little baby boy was born at 5.30am the next morning. We were all in the recovery room a while later (part overjoyed, part thinking “WTF do we do now”) and the Midwives changed shift at about 8am. The new Midwife came to see us and asked had we got a name, which Mrs H replied, “Angus”.

Aforementioned Midwife then proceeded to wax lyrical about how cute our little baby was (we wholeheartedly agreed but now realise he looked like a gremlin) and what a fab name we’d chosen. In fact, her exact words were “Great name choice, I’ve not heard of an Angus for ages………..you’re not AC/DC fans by chance?”.

Luckily I was at the other side of the room nursing our beautiful wee gremlin and, also luckily, looks can’t hurt or damage.

I do enjoy this story and it gets rolled out fairly regularly but a name is nothing more than the person behind it. It would be weird to call Angus anything else but it’s the fun, annoying, determined, noisy little person who makes him him. Basically, he makes the name not the other way round. (He’s also grown out of his gremlin features. I think).

It’s not dissimilar to a brand or business. You can get caught up in focus groups, brainstorming sessions and lots of other {insert marketing buzzwords here} to come up with a name. Having worked in the bike industry for a while I’ve crossed paths, chatted with and know some of the key players in the UK, European and global markets. I’m also lucky to call some of them friends. (The rest should just be thankful to have avoided me probably).

One conversation I had many moons ago, whilst out in Taiwan at one of the big trade shows, really stuck with me. The owner of one of the biggest bike brands in the world told me about the time, money and effort they wasted trying to come up with a name. As he put it, it doesn’t matter if you have the best name in the world it’s the products and the team behind it that matter.

And so here we are. 4 and a half months into the new Mango Bikes adventure with our first bike ready to launch. Whilst there are plenty more ideas at various stages from scribbles on the desk to designs on a laptop to prototype builds, we wanted to try something special. And we’re mighty proud of this one.

Bespoke (and truly awesome) new paint finish? Yes (textured, hammer finish)
Premium finishing and build kit? Yes (Miche wheels, cranks and more plus San Marco saddle)
Front rack from Brick Lane Bikes? Yes

Name? What? Erm……well………Genuinely, the last thing we thought about was the name.

We think the bike rocks. So does AC/DC. So does Angus Young. So does Angus Hassard.

The Gus – It Rocks, He Rocks, So Does He!

We’ve just launched and already had orders in without really telling anyone.

Happy Cycling, Mango Bikes // Andrew

PS. Use code “GUS10” for 10% prelaunch discount offer and be one of the first to ride The Gus.