A Better IKEA Bike

One of the pieces of information that has come to light as the IKEA bike giveaway story (other than this lovely video footage of proud Cincinnati store managers riding the giveaway bikes out on to the floor, forks proudly and prominently installed backwards!)  has spun out is that this isn't the first time they have done this. In 2006, they gave all 9,000 of their UK employees a folding bike:

That bike makes about a million percent more sense than this years' giveaway bike. Especially if the intent is to get people riding to work:

• It has a chain guard, which keeps grease off your pants.
• Fenders- so riding on wet streets won't result in the dreaded "stripe."
• Logical frame configuration- unlike this years' bike, there are no extraneous frame members, no faux suspension, etc. 
• Rear rack- kind of a nice thing when you actually want to take stuff with you on your commute.
• Finally, it's a folder, which makes getting it on to a bus or train or what have you much easier. 

Oh yeah, and the fork is on the right way, as opposed to the Ikea bikes in the video I posted above, and in this screengrab: