I went to visit our company's bike factory in Shenzhen (深圳) this past week and it was very interesting to finally see how the bikes we sell are made.

Tubes that will be made into bicycles

The bike manufacturing operations of our company are much larger than I imagined and occupy several large multi-storied buildings in the Shenzhen area of China. The last time I was in China was over 14 years ago and I had never visited the Shenzhen area and I wasn't quite sure of what to expect.

What struck me first about the factory was that all the workers, from office staff to the line workers, all had different types of uniforms to differentiate them according to the type of work they did. This requirement makes perfect sense because you can tell at a glance whether or not people are being at places where they are supposed to be.

The building of a bike is a pretty straightforward process. The company I work for produces both steel and aluminium framed folding bikes, but the overall process is pretty much the same for each type of metal.

Welding a frame together