Forge+Bond Parent Company Closes Down

CSS Compositesan American carbon fiber component manufacturer, has notified the OEM brands it creates rims for that it is ceasing operations.

The manufacturer’s customers include its own Forge+Bond brand as well as other notable brands Revel Wheels, Evil, Chris King, and Bontrager.

CSS released the following statement to their OEM customers:

Due to the enduring economic challenges facing the bike industry, CSS Composites LLC is ceasing its operations and is in the process of liquidating its assets to satisfy its creditors.

Accordingly, effective today, CSS Composites will cease to provide all OEM services relating to its composite bicycle rims manufacturing business, including: Manufacturing, Customer Service, Replacement and Repair Services, and Administrative Operations. If you previously submitted requests for a service, repair or replacement that has not been fulfilled, unfortunately, that service will not be able to be provided.”

CSS Composites creates rims in the United States with a proprietary carbon-fiber reinforced thermoplastic it calls Fusion Fiber, which notably is able to reuse carbon fiber in the process. Now it appears unlikely any further warranties will be carried out by CSS and OEM brands will have to figure out new ways to assist their impacted customers.

Chris King, one of the impacted brands, provided this statement to Velo’s sister publication Pinkbike:

Concerning CSS, my team got the news late yesterday afternoon along with what appears to be everyone else, including media. We did not get a heads-up about this situation. As far as I know, over the last month or so they have not communicated with us on some requests we were making. I guess now we and know why. This is really unfortunate and very disappointing on how it was handled by CSS.

At this point, we are assessing what this means and how we can handle future warranty claims for any King customer that purchased an ARD44, MTN30, or a GRD23 in the best way possible. Our first priority is making sure that our customers are taken care of.

—Kirby Bedsaul, Chris King

Revel bikes provided this statement to Pinkbike:

Revel stopped producing wheels with CSS a few years ago. When we launched our first wheels with them, they were incredible to work with and the wheels made a big splash in the industry. Over time, things changed, and we decided to focus solely on developing new bikes instead of wheels. Since reacquiring Revel a few months ago, we’ve seen how challenging warranty service with CSS has become for our customers, and now we understand why. We only learned of the closure yesterday from CSS’s lawyers, and I feel incredibly bad for all the employees, vendors, and riders impacted. We’re committed to exploring every option we can to support riders who purchased CSS-made wheels and may need warranty replacements in the future.

–Adam Miller, Revel

This is a developing story.