He’s employed hundreds (disclaimer: myself included) and helped thousands more stay in shape in Juneau.
He has a bike studio in the Mendenhall Valley named after him and a relentless commitment to customer service. Oh, and he once swam in the Olympics for his native New Zealand.
He’s John McConnochie: the Juneau Chamber of Commerce’s 2017 Citizen of the Year.
The 37-year resident of the capital city and owner of Cycle Alaska was given the distinction at the chamber’s annual banquet last weekend at a Manhattan-themed Centennial Hall.
McConnochie moved to Juneau in 1980, when he partnered with the late Jamie Parsons to run the newly-established Juneau Racket Club (JRC). McConnochie bought the clubs in 1991 and was the owner in 2001 when they merged with the Alaska Club.
The Empire caught up with McConnochie on his way home from Michigan — where he was in meetings with fellow bike dealers from around the country — about his close ties to past COTY winners, his greatest bike adventures and seeds of entrepreneurial advice.
Juneau Empire: You join some pretty good company as a recipient of the Citizen of the Year award, including your wife PeggyAnn (a 2003 recipient). Which of the past winners have had the greatest influence on you?
John McConnochie: Well, you mentioned PeggyAnn right off the top. She’s has been an incredible role model and we work a lot as a team on different things. … The other one on there, of course, would be Jamie Parsons. Jamie was PeggyAnn and my business partner and his wife Mary Beth for a good number of years.
In fact, when I first arrived in Juneau in 1980, within about a week, Jamie took me down to the downtown Rotary Club which was meeting in Yancey Derringer’s which is now the Hanger on the Wharf for a Rotary meeting. He said, ‘John, one of your responsibilities of living here in Juneau is to be involved.’ Jamie coined the phrase, ‘We have to pay our civic rents,’ and I think PeggyAnn and I have felt very strongly that — that Juneau has been an amazing place for us and we’ve enjoyed living here so much that we feel we need to give back, we need to pay our civic rent.
Empire: What are the big lessons you’ve learned over the years and have adapted to?
McConnochie: Just being an owner, my job is to kick the big rocks out of the way so that my team has a clearer path down the road so they can focus on what their responsibilities are. And so they, in turn, kick the rocks out of the road for their team that they work with.
I think the other thing too is having a definite mission statement and then driving that mission statement all the way down the organization — making it very simple and clear so that people know exactly what to do in circumstances without having a handbook that’s 500 pages long. I think that’s the other critical piece.
Empire: You’ve been a proponent of racket sports with the Juneau Racket Club and now you’ve moved into cycling with Cycle Alaska, is there another sport or activity you might take on next?
McConnochie: (Laughs) No, nothing I can see in the future. You know, you never can tell what’s going to come your way and how to embrace it or not. With the clubs too, a big part of that was the fitness aspect, not just the racket sports … And then cycling with Cycle Alaska, there’s a lot of fitness in that too and just people just getting out and enjoying being on a bike.
Empire: Cycle Alaska’s slogan is, “Nothing has the potential for adventure … like a bike.” Is there a memorable biking adventure you’ve had in your life?
McConnochie: One of my goals when I was 50 — every 10 years I have a tendency to do something a little crazy — was to win the Tour of Juneau, the Tour of Anchorage, the Tour of Whitehorse and win the Kluane Bike Relay, the solo division. I made three of those, I placed second in the Kluane for the solo that year. That would have been 2004.
And then for my 60th birthday, I wanted to ride from Haines to Skagway in under 24 hours and Dr. Phil Moritz has been a gentleman that’s has been on a lot of adventures with me over the years and he came along and helped and PeggyAnn had the support vehicle. I was able to do it in about 22 and 1/2 hours so that was quite an accomplishment.
Empire: What new areas of business and entrepreneurship should Juneau be looking at in the future?
McConnochie: I think there’s always an opportunity where there is a need. I think the crux of it is identifying that need in a community. Successful businesses have always been able to find that need and fulfill that need. Now, you can fulfill it, but you certainly have to fill it with great customer service, great products, pricing, all those sorts of things. I think first identifying a need and then having the courage to trust your judgment. Of course, you run the numbers, you do all the work on that aspect too, of course, you don’t just jump in.
And knowing that at some point you’re going to have hiccups, you’re going to stub your toe, but it’s how you overcome those bumps in the road. If there’s a barrier, you jump it, you go around it, you go underneath it, but that I think is something that a lot of entrepreneurs first getting in feel like that first time is failure, ‘OK, that’s it, I’m done.’ No. How many times did the inventor of the light bulb — I think it was 1,000 times he failed before he finally got the thing right. I always think about that when I see something coming up I know is going to be a problem.
Empire: How long has it been since you’ve taken over Cycle Alaska and how much has that company changed and your product changed since you jumped on board?
McConnochie: We bought the business in 2005 and at that time it was just a tour business operating mainly with the cruise lines and contracts with them. And then in 2010, we started a retail aspect of it. We’d always had that in our plans to combine the two elements.
It’s been a successful mix of both the shop and the tour side, and there’s some crossover between the two which has been very helpful also. And then adding more elements to the shop and different services and of course our indoor cycling experience (I.C.E.) program in the winter time. Our bike adventure series that we do — people come in and talk about their different bike trips once a month through the winter. Just trying to provide people ideas and opportunities when it comes to cycling.
• Contact sports reporter Nolin Ainsworth at 523-2272 or nolin.ainsworth@juneauempire.com.
John McConnochie leads a group of Gastineau Elementary school children on Bike to School Day in 2015. (Photo courtesy of John McConnochie)
