Holy Rolling

When Brother Michael Spence finished assembling the Liahona Mission bicycle prototype earlier this year, he rode it to his local bike shop in Diamond Bar to ask how much it should go for. “The guy said, ‘Hey, I’ve never seen a Liahona,’ ” says Spence, a customer service representative for Southern California Edison. “I said, ‘You probably won’t either.’ ”

That is, unless the bike shop guy becomes an emissary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. L.A.’s Mormon missionaries--usually pairs of young men dressed in white shirt sleeves and neckties who travel by bicycle for two years to spread the word--were finding their 10-speeds weren’t keeping pace with Southern California’s famously challenging roads.

“We have a gentleman from Taiwan who was a convert to the church, and he wanted to be more helpful to missionaries,” says Spence, a lifelong Mormon who rode a 10-speed Schwinn on his mission 30 years ago, “and he said, ‘You know, these bikes are really bad.’ ” So Spence and the grateful convert created the Liahona Mission Bike, a 21-speed mountain bike sold exclusively to Mormon missionaries, also known as elders. Spence assembles the bicycles himself--the frames come from China, the Shimano parts from Japan--in a Diamond Bar storage unit, about 600 so far. Named after a compass in the Book of Mormon, the Liahona’s design is based in part on recommendations from elders--its most Mormon-specific feature is a plastic sprocket guard to keep trouser cuffs oil-free. Introduced in June in the Carlsbad mission area, the bikes were an immediate success and are now ridden by missionaries in Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and 49 other U.S. missions. Of the 200 elders in Los Angeles, 25% proselytize via Liahonas.

The total Liahona package, which includes assembly, helmet, lights and a 16-millimeter U-Lock, comes to a modest $400. The bikes are covered by a two-year warranty--coincidentally, the exact length of a mission--a boon to elders, who traditionally pay for parts and repairs.

Since Liahona is not a familiar brand, it’s hoped that someone asking, “How can I get one of those bikes?” will open the door to an appointment for conversion. As for theft, long a problem for missionaries, Spence notes: “If you see a hippie guy with long hair riding a Liahona down the street, and he doesn’t have a shirt and tie on, you know the bike’s not his.”