Interview with Jamie Milroy, Founder and CEO at E-Bike Subscription Service: DASH Rides

DASH Rides is a UK based e-bike subscription platform, on a mission to transform the way the world moves for good. Through our unique approach to the Cycle to Work scheme, we are making e-bikes more affordable and accessible – all for less than the cost of a sandwich a day.

By working with businesses across the UK, we provide them with the tools they need to get closer to carbon-neutral, as well as make a transformative impact on their employees’ health and wellbeing at a time when it’s never been needed more.
 
 

 

How did you come up with the idea for the company?

 
I started my career at PwC and by the fifth year, I sensed my learning curve relative to my ambitions was starting to plateau. I asked for a six month career break to get some wider experience and a different perspective. Those 6 months ended up being transformational for me. I got to work across a range of projects, from fundraising for a startup, all the way to helping a business go through an exit.

Fast forward 18 months, I was back at PwC, but had become increasingly aware of, and interested in, how inefficient people and businesses are at moving over short distances. At the same time, I got first-hand experience of sustainability rising to Board level but seeing profits get in the way of action. That’s when the opportunity clicked into place and DASH popped into existence.

With DASH Rides, we’ve created a fast, easy and no-cost digital platform, that allows businesses and their employees to utilise the power of e-bike subscriptions to transform the way the world moves for good. Good for people, good for the planet, and good for profits.
 

How has the need for e-bikes evolved during the pandemic?

 
At the beginning of the first lockdown, city planners struggled with the same issue: how to reopen sustainably and safely. In places like London alone, two million people a day ride the tube and over six million take the bus. Now, nobody wants to be on an overcrowded bus or tube and risk catching coronavirus- if they can avoid it. Electric bikes have been impossible to keep in stock as a result. Sales more than doubled, with one in every five pounds spent on cycling now invested in an electric bike.

Governments have also taken note of the electric bike’s value, and are investing heavily in it, in a bid to get workers back in the city. The race to build the right infrastructure and increase adoption is on. Ministers have already pledged a £2 billion package for cycling lanes and are looking this year to subsidise the cost of owning an electric bike by one third.

People have realised with an e-bike they can get from here to there in less time than taking public transport or driving. On top of that, they’re sustainable, anyone can ride – regardless of age or fitness level – and allow you to socially distance whilst being active. It’s clear people are changing their behaviour and attitudes towards cycling in ways that will outlast the pandemic which we should all celebrate and encourage.
 

What can we hope to see from DASH Rides in the future?

 
With DASH Rides, we want to change the way the world moves for good. We believe that if it’s profitable and effortless for businesses to empower their employees with cost-efficient, healthy, life-affirming, carbon busting ways to travel and move – that’s exactly what they’ll do. We want to get things moving and make progress happen faster by providing businesses with the “how now”.

Our vision for DASH Rides is the pursuit of making cycling as affordable as possible. We want to engineer a world and set of circumstances where our riders are actually being paid to ride a DASH e-bike. This is our (handle)bar and we call it action engineering.