“This is what made you cry”, I asked?
“It reminds me of you!”, she replied with an outpour of emotion instantly conveying to me that I was in her heart and in her mind… that I was loved deeply and without restraint. 
I had just finished reading a page from Inside Stories II upon her request as she was admittedly unable to complete the read on her own. The book is a sequel to Inside Stories containing pictures of the very labels you can find sewn inside a pocket or inside flap of one of their high quality road cycling garments. Apparently this label hit home.
It reads:
“We ride silently, like mime artists, through the city. Invisible lines guide us as we negotiate favourite corners, ridden with a little extra speed; that bench at the top of the hill, the perfect stop to marvel at the skyline; a shortcut behind an old pub, memories still ringing with drunken laughter.
We move with hardly a sound, uncovering the city with movement. Every rider draws their own intimate map of the metropolis with these untraceable grooves. The road continues to buzz with hard reality, but in amidst the din, thousands of invisible routes are blooming, as the two wheels carve new lines through the madness.”
One of the objectives of a savvy marketing team on a storied brand is to make an emotional connection with the consumer. Touch them in a way that cultivates a loyalty to the brand. To go so far as make an emotional connection with a customer’s spouse, well, then you know these guys have a finger on the pulse. I am speaking, of course, about the marketing genius of Rapha.
I discovered Rapha in 2009 while searching for tasteful cycling kit that performed well. What I found was an internet based brand with a website filled with road cycling content. The Continental was making its way across the USA, riding steep gravel roads on little known routes in some very remote areas of our beautiful country. The stories written by one of the riders in the group, photographs taken, or video filmed in iconic black and white, conveyed the effort and emotion, the very suffering experienced during a difficult climb or extended route through extreme weather. These stories reminded me of the countless hours I had spent in the saddle 25 years past.
Rapha had made that connection and then delivered on its promise.