Bold Helmets is Making Helmets More Inclusive for Sikh Kids
Bold Helmets is changing the way that people—and perhaps the cycling industry as a whole—think about helmets. There’s always been the vague idea that a helmet is a standard shape. Sure, it changes in size, but the basic oval shape remains the same.
However, there are many different cultural and religious restrictions that make a traditional helmet design less than ideal for some people. For Bold Helmet’s founder Tina Singh, Bold Helmets was an answer to a problem she saw in her local Sikh community in Toronto, Ontario. And now, Bold Helmets have launched in North America to ensure that Sikh kids can ride with proper head protection while wearing the traditional Patka.
Singh didn’t launch Bold Helmets as a bike industry veteran or a serial entrepreneur: She founded Bold Helmets as a mother and an Occupational Therapist who wanted to keep her kids safe when they were out riding. As young Sikh boys, they wear the Patka—a small topknot covered by cloth. And that meant that standard helmets wouldn’t fit.
“Because of the way my kids keep their hair—a Patka, which is a small cloth covering that covers a top knot, basically,” she explains. “Imagine trying to put a bike helmet on with your hair in a top knot. The bike helmet wouldn’t fit properly.”
“I want visibility for my kids: I don’t want my kids to ever have to think twice about engaging in activities and things that their friends do every day, simply because they don’t have the proper equipment for it,” she added. “Because I’m an occupational therapist who worked in head injury, I’m not going to let them go down the ramp at the skate park without a helmet. So for them to have an option that they can pick up and put on just like any other kid on the street, it’s meaningful for them.”
“As an occupational therapist, I did work in the area of acquired brain injury,” Singh explains. "And so the importance of a helmet was definitely something that was drilled into my mind very early on. So when I was stuck in a situation without having an option for my kids, that’s when I thought, ‘Okay, how hard is it to make an option?’ Turns out it is very hard!”
Months later, the design has been finalized and approved for riders aged five and up, the proper safety certifications for cycling and skateboarding are in place (the helmets are CPSC, CE, UKCA and ASTM certified) and the first batch of helmets in blue, red and dark green are on the way.
“We knew we had to have the CPSC rating, which is the standard across the US and Canada, but we also wanted to get the extra certifications to make sure the helmets would be safe for skateboarding as well,” she says. “That took a while, but it was a high priority. If you’re going to make something for a community of kids to use, you want to make sure that you cross all your T’s and dot all of your I’s.”
At first, Singh assumed she’d sell a few dozen helmets, but the idea spread quickly, and she had to adapt to the surge of orders pouring in. As for what’s next, it’s not more cycling helmets—as a good Canadian mom, she’s already shifted her focus to the other top sport in Canada: Hockey.
Bold Helmets are now available for pre-order in the US as well as Canada, and are scheduled to ship in March. They retail for $54. Learn more at https://www.boldhelmets.com/
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