Common Tread turns 10: A look back at how we got here

I explain it this way. If RevZilla was just the e-commerce business it was when it started, the only reason you'd have to visit the website is if you were buying something, thinking of buying something, or at least dreaming of buying something. With Common Tread, we give you a reason to visit as often as every day. And we believe that means you'll be more likely to think of us when you do need to buy something.

To be fair, I'm certainly not the one who came up with that idea. I'm just the guy who was brought into the organization to implement it. Ten years ago, to be precise. Yes, Common Tread is turning 10.

Staying true to the original concept

The real force behind the creation of Common Tread was RevZilla co-founder and then-CEO Anthony Bucci. Long before Common Tread, RevZilla had built unusual customer loyalty, based on quality service and a reputation as a smart, cool outfit that understood the internet. It started with being present in motorcycle forums, answering people's questions and continued with accelerating production of increasingly polished videos. In addition to countless product videos Anthony made, always wearing the same blurple RevZilla T-shirt, the team also produced a monthly "deals" video that highlighted what was new and on sale. Production values rose, concepts grew continuously more outlandish, and nobody took themselves too seriously. People loved it. A good example was the deals video of July, 2014.

By 2013, Anthony was pondering the next step to build on that reputation. Like so many other digital-age entrepreneurs, he saw the flaws in the traditional model, in which a media company builds an audience and then sells ads to a company like RevZilla that wants to reach that audience. We all know the potential pitfalls, conflicts of interest, and inefficiencies in that way of doing business. Call it "content marketing" or just the same old storytelling that companies have been doing since Ben Franklin's printing business, but Anthony saw the value of a different model.

"One of the ways RevZilla differentiates is by giving away something of value for free, which is content that we as riders enjoy," he says. "That was always the vision. If you love motorcycles, you should have lots of reasons to come visit us, not just when you need to buy a new helmet."

RevZilla was still young but growing rapidly, having moved from its original dumpy South Philly storefront to a modern warehouse in Philadelphia's Navy Yard, and had already built a solid video team. The company was loaded with talent, but nobody who had experience in written media. Through an industry contact, I found out about the opportunity and over the course of several months I had conversations with Anthony and others in RevZilla's leadership team about his ideas.

Two things made me enthusiastic about the project. First, and most critically, Anthony and I were aligned on the approach we had to take. We knew we had to put readers' interests first, not just post a bunch of articles telling people they should buy more jackets or boots from RevZilla.

Second, although I had spent 30 years working first in general news media and then in motorcycle media, I had never had the opportunity to create something from scratch. Never before had I had the chance to draw on my experience and define the best practices that we would adhere to and aspire to. At RevZilla, I never heard that stifling phrase, "That's not the way we've always done it around here," because it was all new. Instead, my ideas and proposals were considered on their merits. And I was given the benefit of the doubt, as the so-called expert in the room.

It was liberating. It was gratifying.

Ten years ago, we launched what was then called The Hub, the same name given to the lunch room, meeting space, and general hangout area of the building that back then served as both office space and warehouse. After dozens of potential names were considered, the blog was renamed Common Tread in its first year, a name originally suggested by Brett Walling, who is now Comoto Vice President of Brand Marketing and Content.

Over the past 10 years, we've published well over 3,000 articles by more than 150 different writers. More important than the numbers, we've built an audience and, to a degree I find surprising, we've neither had to nor wanted to stray from our original vision of what Common Tread should be. It should feel like talking to a knowledgeable riding buddy you trust.

"We were ahead of our time in content meets commerce," Anthony says, recalling those beginnings. "My hunch about building an authority and a trusted resource, it was right. You can tell I take a lot of pride in talking about it. It's fun to relive those early innings because we were inventing it as we went and it was working."

As Common Tread hits double digits, I also couldn't resist taking a longer look back.

2014

In the beginning, the Common Tread team consisted of me working from my home office in Ohio and Sean MacDonald as our West Coast correspondent, both of us checking in weekly with Anthony, who was still involved in guiding the project even though as CEO he had more important things to do. Among the other reporting, we staked out a strong opinion now and then, building on RevZilla's online reputation for irreverence. Sean wrote a commentary titled "Stop saying loud pipes save lives" that took on that controversial topic and drew hundreds of reader comments. Some comments on that post still flow in today. Meanwhile, when he had a break from his day job in merchandising, Lemmy would contribute, such as when he risked ticking off readers with his own opinionated piece choosing the five best and five worst motorcycle songs of all time.

RevZilla has always had some amazing, adventurous employees — you had to be somewhat adventurous to go work for the company in its early startup days — and several times over the years we've written about them. None of those stories is more impressive to me than Kate Johnston's. Just three years after she took the MSF Basic RiderCourse and became a motorcyclist, she became the first woman to complete the Iron Butt Association's Coast to Coast to Coast Insanity Ride as a rider, not a passenger. The CCC Insanity Ride is a motorcycle trip from Key West, Florida, to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, and back, all within 30 days. True Zillan spirit.

2015

With all the tribal divisions among motorcyclists, could we ever learn to just get along and respect each other despite our differences? I tried to find a way toward that two-wheeled utopia in a commentary I titled "My risk is sensible, yours is stupid."

When Sean moved on to other corners of the internet, Lemmy stepped up production and was joined by some guy named Spurgeon from the Customer Service division. We were still struggling to get attention in the industry, but we did begin doing more motorcycle reviews, such as Lemmy's test of the Indian Scout and Spurgeon's review of the BMW R 1200 RS. When the two took a summer road trip across Pennsylvania to a chopper rally in Ohio, Lemmy debuted a new storytelling approach for Common Tread. He called them his "time stamp" stories. They were written in diary form and were heavily soaked in humor, sprinkled with exaggeration. They would become a recurring theme.

2016

Rumors were flying in early 2016 and the biggest frustration for RevZilla's leadership was not being able to have the usual transparency with the ZLA Army. But in early February, the ink was finally dry on all the contracts, the lawyers gave the go-ahead, and Anthony shared an open letter to RevZilla's loyal customers explaining that a new holding company was being formed, that would later be called Comoto, in partnership with J.W. Childs (later renamed Prospect Hill Growth Partners), to be parent company of both RevZilla and Cycle Gear. It was big news for the young company, but hardly matched some of the wild rumors that were flying around.

Lemmy and Spurgeon continued their partnership in foolishness by going flat-track racing on bikes with single-digit horsepower. Spurgeon stepped up production that year, writing about seemingly every ride he took, from his crazy idea to ride the LA-Barstow to Vegas dual-sport ride on a Ural sidecar rig with fellow rider of questionable judgment Abhi Eswarrappa to the infamous tour to West Virginia in which Spurgeon senior ended up making a hospital visit. It was also the year Spurgeon fulfilled a bucket-list goal of writing an article wholly about rock 'n' roll music lore and sprinkling in just enough motorcycle content to slip it past me and get it published on Common Tread.

On a more serious note, Common Tread readers have always been interested in articles that educated them on how to ride better or delved into the causes of motorcycle crashes and how we can avoid them. One of those stories I wrote in 2016, about a study of motorcycle crashes by researchers at Virginia Tech University, went viral and is still racking up views today, making it the most-read article ever published on Common Tread.

2017

The news started off bad in 2017 with two American motorcycle brands, Victory and Eric Buell Racing, shutting down in January. It got worse in May with the death of Nicky Hayden, but we were proud to report on the moving tributes to a man who was a genuinely good human being, not just a talented motorcycle racer.

As we noted the 10th anniversary of RevZilla's founding with some fascinating stories from those who were there there in the early days, Lemmy did another of his time stamp stories about doing the Conserve the Ride dual-sport ride two-up with his wife along (spoiler alert: bad idea) and Spurgeon somehow talked his way into a free trip down the length of Baja with seasoned partner in crime Abhi.

By 2017, motorcycle author Mark Gardiner was well into cementing his position as the most prolific outside contributor to Common Tread, writing well over 100 articles for us. Readers and riders identified with Mark's genuine passion for motorcycling, and one example was his excitement at finding a first-generation Ducati Multistrada he'd always wanted to buy, and his trepidation when he learned it needed a critical repair. That led to one of my favorite Mark Gardiner lines: "I had a few sleepless nights mentally rehearsing a repair that would begin with me taking a large drill bit to a piece of aluminum that Ducati sells for $4,500. It occurred to me that I should probably stick a cyanide capsule between my cheek and gum, so that if oil suddenly squirted out of the Ducati's case, I could just bite into the pill and die."

On a less entertaining note, I also wrote another of my commentaries in 2017, called "Why motorcycle journalism isn't journalism," intended to provide the transparency that our readers deserve into the way Common Tread and the rest of the motorcycle media operate. It's all still true today.

2018

In another effort to keep us safer and make us smarter, I revisited an old subject and reported on a scientific study of why drivers pull out in front of us and then say they never saw us.

Spurgeon happily reported that his father was back to taking father-son road trips and he also showed how you could get in on the adventure-bike craze and have some fun for just $1,000. I joined Spurgeon and our media lead Alessandra Sarmiento for her first-ever track day and we offered tips covering everything you need to know for your first day at the track, complete with video.

Small-scale U.S. motorcycle manufacturers kept falling by the wayside, with both Alta and Motus ceasing operations, but fortunately not before one of Common Tread's most entertaining readers turned writer wrote his Biblical tale of buying a Motus and riding it home across the country from the factory.

2019

The year brought the debut of the Highside/Lowside podcast, as the original hosts, Lemmy, Spurgeon, and Joe Zito, discussed topics such as why some motorcycles have no soul. Going well beyond the usual motorcycle topics, Mark Gardiner took a soul-searching look at the most popular story he ever wrote and grappled with the realization that maybe he got it wrong.

The year also saw changes and portents of changes to come in the Common Tread team, as we began running articles based on the fantastic videos being produced for the Motor Trend channel by the talented team of Ari Henning, Zack Courts, and Spenser Robert, such as their account of traveling through Thailand selling hamburgers from a sidecar rig. It was also the year Lemmy left the Common Tread team as a full-time writer but he still contributes today. Guy can't help himself.

2020

We had big news even before the big news of 2020 really hit. In February, Common Tread reported that parent company Comoto had acquired J&P Cycles and, most exciting of all for us personally, that the Henning, Courts, Robert team was joining RevZilla full-time. Seemingly minutes later, the real hell of 2020 broke loose and we were reporting on cancellations and postponements, factories being shut down and races taking place in front of no fans.

All sorts of unexpected turmoil followed, as sales of street bikes fell and dirt bikes soared, Cycle World and Motorcycle Consumer News ceased publication, new leadership at Harley-Davidson reversed the company's direction, and lots more. But you probably don't want any more 2020 flashbacks, so let's move on.

2021

Andy Greaser joined the Common Tread team full-time in 2017 and went on to become the second most prolific author in CT history. His bottom-feeding buying tendencies and his fiercely do-it-yourself approach to motorcycle maintenance led readers to nickname his garage "Greaser's No-Kill Motorcycle Shelter." Maybe no stories he wrote summed up his enthusiastic approach to motorcycling better than his annual accounts — this one from 2021 — of participating in the Reliability Rally, an event for sub-$1,000 motorcycles. Never was Andy more among his own people.

We took a behind-the-scenes look at one of the most clever, well done, and popular CTXP videos produced by Ari, Zack, and Spenser when they recreated the road trip scene from the movie Dumb and Dumber.

Jen Dunstan joined the team in 2021, mostly on the video side, but she also contributed to Common Tread by drawing on her broad riding experience on everything from sport bikes to dual-sports. She showed her attitude of always pushing to improve her skills with her early story on going to the Babes in the Dirt Dual Sport Summer ride and choosing all the hardest trails.

And please indulge me while I mention one personal pick. It's not the most important or the best story I ever wrote, but it's one I'll never forget. In 2021 I was moving to a bigger city and downsizing to reduced garage space. For a few years, after my mother gave up riding, I had been caretaking her old 1996 Suzuki GN125, a financially worthless but sentimentally valuable little bike my late father had given her as a birthday present. When my nephew got his motorcycle license that summer, it was the perfect time to hand down the family heirloom, so I rode 900 miles from Ohio to Maine on a motorcycle with a top speed of maybe 60 miles per hour under perfect (downhill and tailwind) conditions, stirring lots of memories along the way.

2022

We reported on more change in 2022 as the last-ever Harley-Davidson Sportster with an Evolution engine rolled off the assembly line. Suzuki crunched the numbers and decided to pull out of MotoGP despite winning races, which led to a discussion on Common Tread and in the Highside/Lowside podcast about whether Suzuki was really a motorcycle company any more.

The Common Tread team did some really cool stuff, like Zack riding one of the strangest race bikes ever, the Harley-Davidson Road Glide Special factory bike built for MotoAmerica King of the Baggers competition, and Ari racing a Yamaha YZF-R7 specially prepped by Yoshimura R&D in a MotoAmerica Twins Cup race at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca. At a far slower pace, Zack took us along for a ride in his native Vermont on a landmark motorcycle, the 1981 BMW R 80 G/S, and this one just happened to belong to his father.

2023

Dustin Wheelen joined the Common Tread team in 2023 and introduced himself with an entry in our "Bikes that made me" series. In Dustin's case, it was a humble Harley-Davidson Sportster Iron 883 that ushered him into motorcycling, but instead of stopping there he has gone on to ride every kind of motorcycle made.

We all know it's harder to ride fast than to ride slow, but Zack took a deep dive into the science of why that's so. We also know it can be scary to get back on a motorcycle after a crash, and Ari offered solid advice to riders who are asking themselves hard questions.

With Ari out on new-fatherhood duty, Spurgeon joined Zack for an unforgettable CTXP episode as the two rode the new 400 cc Triumphs to the highest road in the world. Just getting to India was a challenging adventure, as Spurgeon outlined in his story about the difficulties leading up to the production.

We ended the year with more company news, as Zach Parham was named CEO of parent company Comoto. The Comoto family of brands is now led by a lifelong motorcyclist who literally grew up in the industry, working at the J&P Cycles business his parents founded.

What will 2024 and beyond bring? In the 10 years Common Tread has been producing content, we've seen major motorcycle print publications and online motorcycle magazines alike turn to dust. Even now, companies once seen as the media landscape disruptors are giving up themselves (see Vice Media just days ago). Anyone in this business who takes tomorrow for granted is a fool.

But after 10 years of Common Tread, I can say three things for sure: There's still no other motorcycle media outlet I'd rather be leading, I'm proud of the now-deep catalog of content we've produced, and damn, it's been a fun ride.