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Comment by hprotagonist | Hacker News Reader

Shops that do well are shops that earn their place as community hubs, and that's a pretty organic process. It takes time and care to build trust.

I am very lucky, my LBS has all of sheldon's old bikes on the wall next to the mechanic's station. They are respected enough and established enough to sell everything from $15k S-Works to $6k rivendells to $250 giants. You'll find everyone from Cat-2 guys to the local daily commuters there and it's a chill scene because everyone feels welcome.

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Meanwhile, as a touring cyclist, I got a lot of cold, hostile service from the staff at my LBS. When I finally complained to the owner, he said "Look, you're a tourer. You know how to do most of your own maintenance and you buy low-margin gear. A bike shop needs to focus on the racer and clueless commuter crowd to stay in business, and serving you probably is probably a net-negative for us cost-wise".

This really opened my eyes to the importance of margin on bikes and bike parts; it is no wonder that shops like to sell the latest carbon frames, because the margins are huge.

> serving you probably is probably a net-negative for us cost-wise

I never understood why businesses do things like this. In many industries there is often a class of customer that it is proclaimed "we don't make any money on them" and as such they provide a low quality of service. If you actually lose money why don't you raise prices on them? Why are you worried about losing a customer you claim not to want in the first place?

It's in the article. Because these are the kind of customers who provide no loyalty back. They'll drive an hour to get a part from a different shop because it's cheaper. There's nothing you can do to attract this kind of customer apart from lower margins. So why bother with them if you can run your business well by focusing on everybody else?

If you aren't happy with selling items at the price you are selling them at, why sell them? I just don't see the reason to be rude about it.

Then increase your prices to a level you would be happy, and if they want to buy somewhere else, let them.

Doing low quality work is a great way to lower both your reputation and job satisfaction. And you better be 100% certain of each customer's lifetime value, otherwise you'll have a problem.

> And you better be 100% certain of each customer's lifetime value, otherwise you'll have a problem.

This resonates with me. When i was younger I used to get ignored a lot at certain kinds of store. Now I have more money I still avoid them on principal.

The article’s point is that they can’t, or they’ll lose the custom of the people who have no loyalty to their LBS and shop on price alone.

I get the exact opposite point from the article...

Anyway, if you want to serve low-margin customers, optimize your business against them, and be happy with those low margins, because you won't get any of the high margin ones.

Also, publicize your low-margin focus (tell up-front that you won't do non-billable services, and what service comes with what item), otherwise you'll be full of annoyed customers wanting reparations after a bad interaction.

The claim is that this particular customer is net loss. In that case, the customer driving elsewhere because you raised price or stopped selling is a gain.

The concept of selling part in a loss instead of raising price and then treating customer badly so that he does not buy that is still mystery.

The more absurd idea is stocking parts that sell at a loss (outside of a specific loss-leader sales campaign).

I do some basic repairs myself (up to changing the chain or ball bearings) but I don't want to do anything that requires special tools or dynamometer keys or just too much time. Sometimes the shop owner tells me to buy some parts myself (I remember the rotors of the disk brakes of two new wheels.) I bring them to him and he does the repairs. Maybe he was me pay more for his time but it's OK.

Btw, the shop was flooded by customers looking for new bikes at the end of the lockdown here (Italy.) That lasted for a month with long lines at every bike shop until the warehouses run out of parts. I saw an increase of people using bicycles at least until temperature got past 30 C (86 F.)

I'd expect some cases it's about customer development and long-term relationship development.

If you sell me a $200 basic steel bike, you might be selling near or at cost. But if you've earned my trust and comfort as a customer, I'll be back to buy my spare tyres, oil, replacement parts, and eventually the higher margin $800, $1500, $6000, and $20,000 bikes.

You must be joking, though? Who spends more than randonneur, with their hand-made frames, hammered fenders, and leather saddles?

Touring cyclist != randonneur. In any event, for tourers those handmade frames tend to be steel, and the majority of LBSs (i.e. specialist shops in a handful of countries aside) are reluctant to stock steel touring frames because they will seem too heavy and overkill to the majority of local consumers. As for leather saddles, maybe the margin on a Brooks isn't actually that high.

I guess I'm lucky that around here there are shops that cater only to steel frame buyers (like Stone's Cyclery in Alameda), shops that sell mostly cargo and family bikes (Blue Heron in Berkeley) and several others where you won't find anyone from the carbon and lycra crowd hanging around. Those folks are well-served by places like Mike's Bikes, but I don't want to go to a bike shop where most of the customers arrive in cars.

Why would one want a steel frame, besides it being somewhat cheaper? I've seen Al for $250 so the savings don't seem to be so great either. Maybe as a beach cruiser.

Some people prefer steel frames over aluminum because they transfer less vibration to the rider. So the aluminum-framed bike is usually a harsher ride. It's also generally more durable.

I own two bikes, a gravel bike with carbon front and steel frame, and a touring bike with aluminum frame. I did some 200 km day rides on both at about the same pace. The gravel bike is more comfortable off road. The touring bike is more responsive and probably faster on paved roads but I do my serious cycling with the gravel bike now. Those are the expected characteristics of steel vs aluminum. A full carbon frame would be the best, comfortable and fast.

Steel frames generally have a plenitude of attachment points for bags, which is important for people who need to carry all of their food, clothing, and shelter (and tools and spare tires) on the bike.

Aluminum is generally more challenging to machine and weld correctly. I've personally had stock aluminum frames split, and I know that failure mode is much more likely than in steel. For those and other reasons steel is also easier to safely modify if you ever need.

It's not necessarily cheaper. Only budget hi-ten steel models are cheap. You'd want a quality steel frame if you have skinny wheels and value ride quality or if you're a tourer and want a bike that has many attachment points as is weldable in any shop or if you're a BMX-er and throw your bike around all day long or if you're a bike messenger or a fixie type and want a long lasting serviceable bike or if you simply like the looks of skinny tubes.

Steel frames gives you a much smoother ride, and unless you do a lot of short climbing, the difference in weight doesn't matter that much. In fact, a heavier frame carries more momentum, which can be a benefit in some cases.

This seems odd. Most people don't understand bikes, although they are very simple. You'd think they'd want to keep you on side as someone who could refer others.

this is what i meant about getting lucky: sheldon's old shop is very friendly towards people like you and me.

I bought my steel frame there, and had them install the headset, and then i built the rest of it myself and had their head wrench give it a safety once-over for $50 or something.

they're a rarity.

Tourers also need stuff like a wheel or a chain or a tire or at least a tube. Or having their rack welded.

Carbon frames are a seasonal fashion item: a new model will come out and the shop will be stuck with the older one.

That's a strange flex, but I like it. I had forgotten about Sheldon Brown. He was an excellent author and I learned a whole lot from readin his writing.

His site is a great example of what the late 90s/early 00s web was good at doing: https://sheldonbrown.com/

Clicking the "what's new" was a great lesson in the difference between old-web and only-somewhat-old web: it took forever to load and I was like "huh, I didn't expect that, given how fast the index loaded and how it looks", then when it did finally load it was obviously a Wordpress site (old web is very very fast, somewhat old web is slower and full of "too many SQL connections" errors, new web is all 5MB of Javascript to display 100K of text).

> I am very lucky, my LBS has all of sheldon's old bikes on the wall next to the mechanic's station.

Do you mean Sheldon Brown? His website and all the information about bike maintenance is still one of my favorite things.

Their shop built my first fixie hub and wheel for me years ago, with lots of advice. Sadly someone stole that wheel from me, but it was great for 16 years.

I only ever got to experience Sheldon virtually, but he seemed like a really amazing person.

You know, I had jury duty at the nearby courthouse and meant to visit. I’ve moved out of the Boston area now. I a immensely envious that that’s your LBS.

If You get a chance, CycleLoft is a Brompton dealer and seems like it might fill a similar role in that community. I made the trip from Somerville when I needed some Brompton parts. They also sell a wide variety of other esoteric brands. Love them.

ETA: Bicycle Belle in Cambridge is another lovely shop that knows their customers by name.

Shops that cater to commuters seem to be lovelier in general. At least that’s been my experience, and it seems to be echoed by TFA.

This is also super important for small online businesses (e.g. specialized e-commerce shops).

A McMaster-Carr Or ThermoFisher that moves online already has a customer base and channels. But a site that sells, say, lactation aids, needs to be more than just a storefront.

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