Veloeye – Uniting the community to counter bike theft
Sadly, bike theft is growing increasingly common. Veloeye is the brainchild of two British entrepreneurs who have had enough, taking advantage of the smartphone army and community support, Veloeye’s inexpensive tamper proof stickers could help reduce bike theft and reunite loving human/bike couples split asunder by felony.
It’s always sad when something you love gets taken away, and there’s something so personal about a bike. You’ve spent a lot of money on it, lovingly chosen everything from the grips to the tyres, you wrestled with yourself over whether you needed SRAM Eagle or not, and now some bastard has fecked off with it. They aren’t even appreciating that the wheel decals match the frame or the hours spent setting up the perfect rebound.
Social media offers a good way to track down your bike, tapping into the hosts of similarly outraged people and creating an army of wrath, but it doesn’t take long until everyone forgets. We, as a species, have longer memories than the average goldfish (up to 3 months FYI) but everything fades and we need constant nudging. Welcome Veloeye, coordinator of your watchful army and sergeant major of the search.
Introducing Veloeye
Veloeye wants to get that technically savvy army together and united to get your bike back to you. Veloeye’s success will be in its simplicity. You simply get one of their £9.99 tamper-proof stickers and put it somewhere on your bike, and trust us, when it is on, it’s not going anywhere! You then download the app to your phone, register your details and link the stickers QR code to your specific bike. Job done!
If you are unlucky enough to be parted from your pride and joy, you get to the app and change your bike status to ‘red’. The app will inform other people in the network that there is a bike in trouble so they know what they’re looking for – that’s all pretty straightforward but, what Veloeye really want to do is keep the army marching all the time. Even if a specific bike is forgotten in the annals of stolen bikes, we’re all still on the lookout.
Community Service
If you see a bike with a Veloeye sticker and you have the app, you can scan it to check the bike is in the right hands. If the bike has been registered as stolen, your app will activate the Veloeye system and the owner will be informed of the whereabouts of their bike and hopefully, they can be reunited.
“We want to build a community of people who will look out for each other – and this requires a change of mindset. If you are having a coffee in a cafe and see someone scanning your locked up precious steed – be grateful, it’s likely someone is saying hello and making sure your bike is with the right person. If your bike status is green when scanned, everything is fine. If it is red, the scanner will notify the owner of the location of the bike”.
Our impressions
Anything that helps limit bike theft is good in our books. Our initial worry that the stickers could easily be removed proved unfounded, as attempts to remove one from an old seat post proved super frustrating. Veloeye is a simple idea that utilises the strong community that unites bikers, we all nod and wave when we see a fellow biker, now we can help out a bit more by getting more bikes home safe and sound.
For more information check out Veloeye online and on facebook
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Words: Photos: Finlay Anderson
