MINTed: Our first dollar.

Back in the day….

It’s seems more prevalent to start a story these days with back in the day because more often than not, back in the day was not that long ago.

It was not that long ago because of the rapid pace of change in the world. Things of the norm today are obsolete tomorrow, much of which can be chalked up to technology. And even technology is not exempt from extinction.

It was not that long ago that MySpace was leading the way of the social media cause. Those of us that weren’t on it wondered if we should be but by the time we finished creating our page, no one was there anymore. Before MySpace came Friendster. Founded in 2002, Friendster was eventually sold to a Malaysian company for a reported 100 million dollars. Talk about buyer’s remorse!

So it goes, back in the day, small businesses would proudly display their first earned dollar on the wall behind the cash register. Often times they’d ask the customer to sign it – usually in big bold black permanent marker. These businesses and these dollars still exist. Next time you’re out on one of those epic adventures and you stop off at a little town market for a donut and a coke, chances are you’ll see one of those dollars on the wall behind the cash register.

Back in the day, or if things weren’t as they are, we too would have a little storefront, maybe a bell that would alert us when a customer entered, and some mint flavored air freshener hanging in the restroom. We would most certainly have our first dollar thumb-tacked up on the wall behind the register, and our register would be manual. We’d have the buck and the register and a rotary dial landline and some LPs playing in the background.

These days earning one’s first buck is often virtual. It probably even arrived through PayPal. This is our very first dollar, modeled proudly by @amycolyar standing astride her beautiful pink Colnago, a gift from her husband following a lengthy recovery from a terrible crash several years back. 

Amy’s riding the 862-mile Rapha Portland to San Francisco Raid this week - because she can. And so we thought it was the right time to give a big shout out to Amy’s husband, Matt Phillips (@ilikesushi), Gear Test Director at Bicycling Magazine, for giving us our first buck.

Since we can’t hang it on the wall, we’re going to give it to the National Interscholastic Cycling Association to get #morekidsonbikes -- because that’s what we do.