Did you know that the world’s finest handcrafted bicycle saddles are made in Smethwick?
If you want luxury for your bottom, then Brooks Ltd is the place to go – and it’s been making saddles for 150 years.
Now the traditional firm is featured in the BBC2 series Inside The Factory.
The series sees Gregg Wallace and Cherry Healey getting exclusive access to the places where they make everything from baked beans to crisps.
And tonight’s episode sees them make a bicycle from scratch, starting at the UK’s biggest cycle factory, Brompton in West London.
They produce 150 folding bikes every 24 hours and a new bike comes off the hand-built production line every three and a half minutes.
More than half of us own a bicycle and we buy more than 3.5 million bikes a year.
The programme also features Redditch bike historian Doug Pinkerton who shows off his penny farthing.
When it comes to putting the saddle on the bike, there’s only one place to go – Brooks.
Watch how Brooks makes saddles
JB Brooks was founded in 1866 just off New Street in the centre of Birmingham by young entrepreneur John Boultbee Brooks.
They produced leatherware, mainly for the equestrian trade. But horse saddles became bike saddles when, in 1879, the horse that Mr Brooks used for commuting died.
A friend of his lent him his bicycle but the wooden saddle was so painful that Mr Brooks began his quest to find a more comfortable alternative.
He soon filed his first patent for the B17 leather bicycle. As he expanded, he moved to a larger building near Snow Hill and then to Smethwick.
Gregg Wallace visits the factory there to see how they make saddles from the hide of UK cows because the cold weather means they have thicker skins.
The process – the same one which has been used since the early days – can take up to 36 hours and involves softening the leather in water, then moulding them and curing them in the oven for three hours.
