A bike parts company ditched Amazon to support indie shops instead
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Bicycles are not toys. They are vehicles that need maintenance. You can do much of that maintenance yourself if you're a nerd, but the vast majority of cyclists are dependent on local bike shops to sustain the cycling community.
The bicycle/parts manufacturers need a large cycling community to sell products to. The large cycling community will have novice and intermediate cyclists that will abandon cycling if their bikes break down. The novice and intermediate cyclist need local bike shops to do maintenance on their bikes at affordable rates. The local bike shops need a revenue stream beyond labor for maintenance to be affordable. Thus, the major bicycle manufacturers need to give a oligopoly status to the local bike shops in order to keep their user base large.
As a life long cyclist, I've seen the industry grow and wane, and throughout it all, I've seen the vast majority of people think bicycles are some type of sports-equipment. Decisions like this are one of only a few business models that I can see sustaining the community. I'm actually surprised and optimistic to see the major manufacturer Trek start building their own brick and mortar shops in certain major cities, though I'd prefer to see this happen through a major cooperative between the various brands. If you care about making cycling a serious, sustainable transit alternative, we need to maintain the entire ecosystem of ridership, which means the race to the bottom on amazon must be stopped.
Named your small bike shop after a famous bicycle race and French town (roubaix)? Specialized will try and sue you because they have a model of bike with the same name (and don't even own the trademark). https://capovelo.com/Specialized-Threatening-to-Sue-Bike-Sho...
Exactly the same as trek and giant will do. There's a whole other game involved when dealing with the top 5 consumer brands of $1000+ bike, as a local bike shop.
As someone who has worked in multiple bike shops, and also broken their own Specialized bike and had to deal with their warranty department, I'm never giving them any of my money again.
Admittedly this was 15 years ago but still, never had a bad experience with them.
Modern bikes, with all their bells and whistles, which are light years better than their counterparts from 20 years ago, simply wouldn’t exist had this R&D not occurred.
Also their triathlon bikes have multiple unique features
It's been an interesting observation to see how all the big brands have been massively increasing their margins through cheap manufacturing in China (a frame that costs >$4000 retail is less than $300 for those guys to get to the US) while the margins are incredibly low for the actual shops (<10% often) especially on high end bikes. I know many shops now make their primary income on bike servicing.
I think specialized avoiding amazon is more a case that they don't want to stay the big guy that can push the small shops around, instead having to deal with the 500lb gorilla that amazon is.
Bikelanes also are mostly just there (in practice) for rideshare services and delivery services to drop off goods. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, given the problems with right turns and doorings mentioned earlier. It is problematic in name however, but because new cyclists treat them as actual bike lanes and are just gambling with the probability of eventionally getting hit.
We should have more bike infrastructure, but putting money into this garbage is a mistake.
I've also biked on streets that became "super sharrow" streets: one lane striped with a giant green stripe that supposedly provides a big visual indicator that a bike can use the full lane. This was terrible.
> We should have more bike infrastructure, but putting money into this garbage is a mistake.
What bike infrastructure would you like to see, if not bike lanes?
That sounds pretty great. Unfortunately in my area the bike lanes are straight into the door zone (see for example https://goo.gl/maps/nMnKZEVZduEfkups8) and this seems to be the general design for bike lanes in the South Bay.
In fact, the city of Sunnyvale's own bike map [0] says to avoid the four feet door zone, yet the bike lane is less than 4 feet wide and straight in the door zone.
It's frustrating. You'd think they'd favor the safety of the unprotected squishy humans over the ones in two ton metal boxes, but it seems like the opposite most of the time.
[0] https://sunnyvale.ca.gov/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?Blo...
In my experience, the more in the way of cars you are as a cyclist the safer you are. You still need to have clear markings, but you should always be in sight of drivers IMO, as an active participant in traffic.
Junctions are where drivers tend to kill cyclists, so junction improvements are far more effective than anything along the "normal" road. Bike boxes and, ideally, dedicated light phases for bikes help far more than lanes.
We have that in SF and in the year before COVID I basically spent every morning commute berating at least one person that tried to cross in front of me on a bike-only light. It's really hard for Americans to give up the right-turn-on-red.
In NYC they just hand out tickets like candy to people who don't know that right-turn-on-red is illegal through essentially the whole city. In 2019 though I didn't see any enforcement at all of bike-protection lights and lanes.
Actually, let me show you my commute when I was a student several years ago. This is in North America.
1. Walk to the local park (https://goo.gl/maps/CdCinYAp24MgCBBm7)
2. Grab a bicycle from the local bike sharing system (https://goo.gl/maps/46vzmXzx5CPSPFRE9)
3. Bike a minute to the bike path (https://goo.gl/maps/gpkXGcXxMHYH4epn7)
4. Hop on a bike path, wave to the other cyclists (https://goo.gl/maps/JiRSC6yhwqanRn1K7)
5. Bike some more (https://goo.gl/maps/jvSoQQ2rmB1F2NNo8)
6. And then some more (https://goo.gl/maps/u2WyLVGvJBfNL5718)
7. And then even more (https://goo.gl/maps/LcxSoUZ9BzgsovU97)
8. Exit the bike path (https://goo.gl/maps/AyqzZUuo89osSEPf6)
9. Bike on surface streets, sharing the street (https://goo.gl/maps/NNyhCU9gZEXVxk5D8)
10. Arrive at destination, drop off bike at the bike sharing system dock (https://goo.gl/maps/qCy5GESLL4AxHuL99)
That's an example of good bike infrastructure. For the parts where bikes interact with cars on low speed streets, the streets are either narrow so that cars drive slowly, or there is another lane for cars to pass bikes easily.
Note the lack of painted lanes; bikes and cars share the street, and cars pass bikes whenever it's safe to do so. Also note that in most of these street views perspectives, you can pan the camera and see other people biking.
I don't think there's really a solution to the turning problem, unless you're proposing tunnels at every intersection for cars/bikes. I'm hopeful that newer cars' safety features help to fight this back (I would also like people to, yknow, pay attention when driving).
My principle (especially after getting a drivers license and realizing how little visibility one actually has while driving) is to not listen to music (so I can actually hear cars etc) and to basically slow down at every interesection that has even a bit of doubt. It's annoying but at least I'm not rolling the dice on every intersection (or at least not as much)
Personally I’d argue that it’s extremely odd that we dedicate so much public space for people to leave their private property laying around.
And like for deliveries... what do you want people to do? Not stop in front of the place they are delivering?
If there's an argument for it being a public space, it's also a public space for things like deliveries, dropping people off, etc. "People should be more careful" is a glib thing to say for this stuff, and I think we should make improvements to things, but if we're talking about public space, cyclists are _also_ not the only thing on the road and accomodations can be made for stuff like delivery
It establishes the wrong principle - it makes drivers feel entitled to exclude cyclists from the main road lanes. A bike lane that isn't wide enough, isn't adequately maintained (sweeping, filling potholes...), leads to blind corners, or just dumps you out into the main lanes at junctions, is worse than useless - it actively makes cycling more dangerous, because drivers feel no need to share the main road lanes.
> I don't think there's really a solution to the turning problem, unless you're proposing tunnels at every intersection for cars/bikes.
The solution is to have bikes be part of the main traffic stream at that point. If you have a bike box at the front of the queueing area, and ideally a bike phase on the lights, that can help a lot.
In the Netherlands, for example (well, much of the Netherlands, I haven't been everywhere), the bikes are on the bike lanes, the cars are on the car lanes, and that's that. You have no motivation to go on the car lanes (except on small alleys with no lanes), since the bike lanes just get you wherever you want to go.
These are some of the fist ones through the CBD - https://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/traffic-and-transport/roads-... - As part of this they closed a major bridge in the middle of the city (Victoria Bridge over to South Bank) to road traffic. Before it was two bus-only lanes and two car lanes, but now it's three bus lanes and a separated bikeway.
They're also building four bridges over the river dedicated to cycle and pedestrian to link up different bike routes, and the State Government has been doing some good work with their 'Veloway' next to the M3 highway. A lot of intersection and road upgrades (and new roads) are starting to add separated bike paths too, like the overhauled Kingsford Smith Drive that finished recently.
I'd be especially curious to know what the good alternatives are.
IIRC physical dividers like reflector poles actually do make bike lanes safer, and sharrows are mixed on whether or not they make lanes more effective.
Open Streets: https://openstreetsproject.org/
From my experience (in the UK) how usable those lanes are depends hugely on pedestrian discipline. There's one of those running alongside the seafront in Brighton that in my experience works well. The same style of lane that I've seen in and around London generally doesn't work as well: there are often pedestrians on the wrong side, not infrequently looking into their phones and/or wearing headphones.
What makes matters worse is that in the UK the rules are asymmetric: while it's an offence for a cyclists to go on the pedestrian side, there are no rules preventing pedestrians from walking on the cycle path (source: [1]).
Except now every street crossing becomes a death trap because you're outside the cone of visual awareness of drivers.
Traffic travels too fast in the US, and I do not want to share roads with cars going 40+ mph
Watching subdivisions going in with utterly unfriendly approaches to people who want to get around with anything but a car is horrific to me.
As a motorcyclist and former electric skateboard rider, welcome! Everyone is trying to kill you and it's always your fault.
Cemeteries are full of people who had right of way.
¹IANAL; in the jurisdiction I'm in, but my understanding is that this is common
He eventually did a half lane change, buzzing me as he went by, then got stuck at the next red light while I caught up. Ridiculous.
(Of course my area also has reckless motorists who don't respect the rules of the road, but they seem to believe they are above the law whether they are interacting with cyclists or other motorists.)
If I keep to the edge of the lane folks pass by me really close. If I'm going back and forth a bit and taking a whole lane up, cars give me the entire lane. It's wonderful
The exception is on left bends. There it's best to stay on the right, for three reasons: better visibility, you can have a straighter trajectory with a higher speed and if there is only one lane in each direction, cars going too fast in the opposite direction may cross into your lane.
A good example is a Bubb Rd, the part north of McClellan, in Cupertino (which has a bunch of Apple offices): much improved signalization and there’s now a bumper divider between the car and bike lane, making it very safe.
They also added much improved commuter bus access islands.
This is just one example. There are others. I don’t know if it’s because of COVID or because these things were already planned, but the lack of usual commuter and school traffic definitely made it easier to do the work.
Yeah, sadly a kid died on that stretch a few years back — likely why they added the new improved bike lane.
This has been done in places in Cambridge UK (a reasonably bicycle friendly city). If your cycle lane is part of the road you can act like a car does - you get to ignore turnings because anyone joining the road has to give way as per normal. If you're on the pavement though, you're like a pedestrian - every turn off is a road you have to cross. Even if there isn't any traffic you have to slow down enough to look and as a cyclist what you want is constant speed.
If you can't quite see what I'm talking about aee this example from Milton Road: http://www.rtaylor.co.uk/images/milton-road-1.jpg The 'main' road is the one going into and out of the picture with cars on, and the image pictures a junction. You can see where the cycle lane 'crosses' the joining road and how you'd have to look for traffic (even ignoring the bump down and up that messes with a nice cadence).
(from this blog post I found via Google: http://www.rtaylor.co.uk/anti-social-cycling-north-cambridge...).
Unless you meant something like [1] or [2] where there is a raised bicycle lane effectively on the sidewalk.
But even if they're part of the road that's not necessarily a problem [3], but in that case you'll want to have a reasonable speed limit (that sign on the road is 30 km/h, not 30mph) and you'll have to teach cars they're supposed to just be patient and slow down if they can't overtake.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ciclovia_Povoa_Varzim.jpg [2]: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gonzaga_ciclovia.jpg [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fietsstrook_Herenweg_Oudo...
On the other hand, if there are enough pedestrians, they will spill on the bike lane thinking it's a sidewalk. Or in some places, people really don't pay any attention and don't have a single care in the world, and will be totally oblivious to the fact that they are on a bike lane, even after ringing a very loud bike bell a few times right behind them.
My commute happens to have both of those configurations, and the second one is hell, to the point I'll rather ride on the bus lane (which is forbidden to cyclists) than risk a collision with a pedestrian.
Edit: I almost forgot, but since it tends to be between the road and the sidewalk, cars turning right will always check for pedestrians, but often fail to give way to cyclists, depending on how used they are to see cyclists coming. Some intersections have high change of T-bone because of that.
1. How often do pedestrians wander into those bike lane?
2. What are the rules at intersections? Specifically, does a bike lane along a major road have priority over minor roads at intersections, or are bikes required to give way to all traffic from both the major and the minor roads?
3. How obvious is it to drivers turning right from the rightmost lane that they might, in fact, be crossing a bike lane?
1. Depends on where. In busy areas it happens a lot. You just have to be careful when there are people around.
2. The bike lanes have their own traffic lights, which are on the same cycle as the cross walks to the right of them, and the main road/lights to the left.
3. It's obvious since these bike lanes are everywhere; it's just apart of driving. I will say it's a little worse in the West of the city though!
2. The sidewalks and bike paths run together, and road crossings are dual marked. Everyone needs to exercise extra caution, of course.
3. Riders for the most parts have the same traffic flow as pedestrians. If you're turning right, you'll most likely cross both the sidewalk and the bike path at the same time.
The online model is also amazing for consumers as well (not to mention small indie bike manufacturers). Instead of choosing between maybe 2-5 bikes that might match my basic preferences and be in stock at my local bike shop, I have dozens if not hundreds of models to choose from made by any manufacturer around the world.
Sure, shops that do bike maintenance are important, but none of what you're saying here explains why any special interventions are needed for them. Won't the demand of more people using bicycles, and needing them fixed, be enough to keep these maintenance businesses healthy? I think bicycle advocates are much better off focusing on getting bikes to more people, and then improving cycling infrastructure to make it safer and more accessible to average people in everyday situations. The number of bike mechanics available is certainly not a major bottleneck that is keeping anybody from taking up cycling today.
The best i could do to verify is this article about fake knockoffs from 2015: https://www.bicycling.com/bikes-gear/a20045553/to-catch-a-co...
I'm shocked that i can't find an old article about when they announced the change. Maybe my memory is wrong, and it could be, but I remember the local bike shop as being one of the main reasons for the change, even if that was just marketing.
The good news is that bicycle fashion has tended towards more "city bikes" in the last decade or so. These have fewer frills and thus are simpler (== more durable) and also more maintainable by someone who is willing to learn the basics. The "basics" would be lube, fixing flats, brake maintenance and simple shifter adjustments. I think that's better than the earlier trends of "mountain bikes" with too many parts and stuff that's too hard to adjust for people without enough tools.
You look at the towns that still have quality book stores. You have a few cities that have thriving bookstores: Boston (likely because of students) and SF (likely because of cultural nostalgia and real estate laws, but these are now failing). You then have the consolidation model, where cities have one good bookstore that can compete against amazon: NYC (The Strand), Austin (Bookpeople), Portland (Powell's).
My point is that i would rather the cities follow this consolidation model than fail. You have one, trusted brand within the town, whose entire business model is built on quality and trust, because all parties know there's a cheaper alternative. This is where performance bikes failed, as they sacrificed quality service for price competitiveness. I was actively advising my friends to avoid their mechanics like the plague. The Trek shop seems to be moving in the other direction, as a boutique, with reasonably trusted service, so long as your using their products and, like apple, the added cost premium they charge.
This is not idealism, this is a practical model based on what is honestly a sense of fatalism. The automobile system we have is a path-dependent clusterfuck, and we have to be, not just willing, but be happy to take less than ideal outcomes to fight for real alternatives.
I used to be a bike tech. Somebody ordering a $5000 mountain bike might take a full day to put together. But if you gave me $5000 in cruiser bikes, I could have them all put together well and get some maintenance done. I really loathe how cruisers look, but goddamn they're some of the sturdiest pieces of junk I've ever worked on
I was actually thinking more of crappy $800 50lb "mountain bikes" with those cheap-ass all-plastic grip shifters and shitty "suspension" forks VERSUS an $800 basic city bike with low-end Shimano internal gear hub (or even single-speed).
I think many folks have developed a taste for actual practicality in their cycling needs and this is a good thing.
It's an excellent design ergonomically speaking
To be honest this is not an unreasonable bottom-end price. If your budget for a bicycle is lower than this you are better off looking at buying second-hand.
I agree with you that used is a better value, but Walmart will sell you a kid’a bike for a quarter of that price that is perfectly fit for many use cases. It will weigh more, be less durable and serviceable but if you’re looking for something that will be used to go around your 1/5 of a mile street a few times a week (a common kids bike use case) it’s fine.
For a long time I was a student (yes, I did a PhD). I didn't have the cash for local bike shops.
Buying and supporting local is a luxury for the rich. I could not afford the $600 bikes they were selling. I bought $150 used bikes on Craigslist and repaired them myself. And no, not with parts from the bike shop. I could get the same parts at half price online, including from Amazon. Usually I could tune up a $150 bike for another $25 in parts and that's a lot cheaper than $600.
If local bike shops want my business, and pretty much the business of students in general, they need to get with the beat and be cheaper than Amazon.
Oh btw -- last week I changed my bike pedals for one that I got on Amazon for $20. I have never seen a bike shop sell such good pedals at this price point. I have never even seen a bike shop sell this brand ("ROCKBROS"). They usually sell some super expensive brand like Shimano only. They also seem to have politics against selling competing brands sometimes, and Amazon has none of that bullcrap, you see all the brands and you buy the best.
Commuters who want to spend less than $200 on just something to get them moving, parents riding with their kids are also here.
Cyclists who spent 10-20-40 hours per week on a bike. For a hobby that you spend 60hr/mo on it's reasonable to spend $1300 on an entry level road bike and much more as you progress. Especially because it's good for your health.
Obviously there's money to be made with cyclists, but commuters would be so cheap and budget concerned that there's no money to be made from it.
Amazon is perfect because you're not looking for quality. I use a rockbros sweat catcher for my indoor training bike setup and it's great because it's just fabric.
You want LBS to stock $20 pedals? Who is going to buy them? What would the margins on that be? I wouldn't trust $20 clipless pedals (because if they fail you will get hurt/injured) and if they're flat pedals then bmx people would buy flat, but they're going to be so heavy that it'll be bad performance wise. There's only broke students who would buy it, and at that point just get it from Amazon.
I spend a lot of time on a bike. I don't spend $1300 on bikes.
There are people who want the latest carbon fiber blah blah just because they are using it for sport. I have no problem with them. But I have my current $200 Craigslist bike, it would have been $900 MSRP, but it rides fine, it's a little heavier than those carbon fiber things but so what? I get more exercise, and worry slightly less about theft, which buys me a LOT of freedom because I can just lock it up in downtown San Francisco and enjoy my day. If it gets stolen I just buy another bike, no biggie. If my landlord confiscates it, I just buy another bike, no biggie.*
Yeah, I agree, it's reasonable to spend $1300. If you have $1300. But it's also okay to NOT want to spend $1300 and still want to take it up as a serious hobby. I for one am pretty happy with my $200 bike.
I don't use clip pedals, I just use flat pedals, and these $20 aluminum flat pedals are nice and solid. I tried SPD clips before and hated that stuff. To each is own.
I have done many long distance trips, and I avoid proprietary or hard-to-find components because it's awesome that I can find replacement components in some random village in rural China or rural Myanmar or rural anywhere I go.
*Saves me on rent anyway because apartments in my area with proper bike storage OR enough apartment sqftage to store bikes inside have rent rates higher than my current rent plus the cost of a new bike per month. It still saves me money to stay at my current cheap apartment, lock bike to the pool fence (because property manager refuses to install bike racks on the premises), get it confiscated every now and then, and keep buying new bikes.
You don't need carbon to workout or bikepack, but your comfort level increases.
I love SPD, but that's because I have had my feet slip on flat pedals and seen how close I was to getting injured because of it
If you're going bikepacking in a place where there's not going to be any high end mechanics then I agree that using the most common components makes sense because then anybody can help you. Although I've heard that to go bikepacking in China you need a local handler in a car following you, so I would probably just have them carry spare components there.
And yeah, I don't lock my bike outside, only in groups where we can maintain eye contact with the bikes while sitting down. If I commuted by bike I would use something much much cheaper.
how is using lighter expensive bike using fancy 0.5% less friction gearboxes better for your health? If you wanted health benefits you would be using the heaviest shittiest bike possible for more resistance.
Aside from that, the joy of riding is what gets me out. Many cyclists choose tough hill climbs for added fitness gains and challenge. There is a good kind of difficulty (steep grade somewhere picturesque) and a bad kind (unresponsive bike that doesn't roll well)
Additional point: shitty bikes usually have really terrible geometries and will fuck up your health if you decide to use them for sport. If your shitty bike calls itself an 'MTB' and you take it onto a trail, it is very likely for it to actually break if you catch even a tiny jump (let's say 20-30 cm root) because the welds are terrible, and the metal is brittle.
But also, a higher performance bike will help you go further & faster. It doesn't mean you will end up exerting less effort, it just means that you will go faster and you'll keep putting in the same effort. With this time saving you can try new routes, feel more comfortable going further or bike packing with higher quality gear. It wouldn't change how long I ride for, but it increases the options for where to go.
Yes there are diminishing gains as with anything, but an entry level bike is still going to be below the Shimano 105 point of performance vs cost.
Guess they're just a chinese integrator/reseller and quality may vary a lot among different products but I have to say I'm really happy with my backpacking bags (waterproof top-tube and frame bags) I got from them on amazon. I wouldn't trust them with anything "mechanical" though.
Pedals, especially flats (which btw are used by plenty of MTBers), are a breed of their own... they usually come from the same few factories and final price depends on who puts their logo on them. For a good while you could find the very same pedals from HT and from plenty of other minor brands for prices varying from 30 to ~150 euros.
Sometimes if it is just poor assembly quality you can patch it up yourself easily. If screws are unscrewing themselves out all that's needed is a little Loctite or lock nuts. The metal is still perfectly fine.
Sometimes it's just patents that drive up prices in the US, for some stupidly simple thing like a bike pedal patents shouldn't exist, and for practical purposes it would be laughable to have a patent on some low tech stuff like that in China.
Oh and trying to find one in stock is a nightmare in the UK most be even worse else where.
Pedals are a good example, ridiculously overpriced at the shops. Luckily we have a non-profit called "The Bike Collective" that strips donated bikes and sells parts super cheap, they also help with repairs.
RockBros is a Chinese brand. I have a few of their parts and in my experience they're pretty well made.
This is extremely myopic. The entire point of cycling-as-transit, is that, as an investment, it's by far the most inexpensive alternative. If you're under the assumption that you'll already have a car, or free access to transit, or live on campus, then I see your argument. However, cycling as an alternative to these things is wildly, wildly inexpensive, even factoring in bikes that cost thousands of dollars.
The cost of luxuriously maintaining a bicycle is about $100-$200 annually. The cost of maintaining an automobile is about $8000 annually, it's just that the costs are broken up into micropayments on things like fuel or hiding in the depreciation.
> The cost of luxuriously maintaining a bicycle is about $100-$200 annually
That's if you fix it yourself. I spent <$100/year on maintaining my bike.
Changing brake pads at a bike shop cost upwards of $60. Wheel truing, probably >$200. Attempting to buy brake pads and refusing brake pad changing service usually involved a stupid long conversation with them to convince them you didn't need service, and they would price gouge you on the brake pads. With Amazon it cost me a grand total of $8 for the new pads, shipping included, and not having to convince anyone that I'm competent at fixing my own bicycle.
I once had a pedal stuck in my crank and just needed a longer wrench with more leverage to get it out. Damn bike shop wouldn't sell me the wrench. They wanted to do it themselves and charged me fucking $40 for TWO MINUTES of work. WTF. Needless to say I never visited that shop again.
I wouldn’t be too optimistic. We have one in Toronto. When I brought in my trek that I bought from them to fix it, it cost a fortune and they didn’t actually fix it properly.
Similar to servicing your car at the dealer. It’s super expensive. Difference being the quality of work is questionable (no doubt varies quite a bit).
Lesson: learn to fix your own bike or settle for crappy big box bikes instead.
I don’t agree with this reasoning. Why wouldn’t maintenance be priced at the true rate? In what way is it better for consumers to overpay for their equipment in order to underpay for maintenance?
I went to get a replacement inner tube--nothing special, just a 26x1.95 with a Schrader valve--and all they had was some Chinese brand (Hilong or something like that?) for $35. I want to support local businesses, but come on. The only thing they offered over Amazon is that they would install it for you for a modest $50 in labor.
They also basically don't stock anything under $800 if you are looking to buy a bike, and even those are Giant brand mountain bikes with trash tier hardware. I went looking for something I could commute to work on every day and they were trying to sell so much fragile carbon fiber stuff that was miles outside of my budget range. I don't need to shave 5/10ths off of my commute, I want low maintenance, comfort, and ruggedness. Apparently that's totally uncool and biking is all about ultralight and ultrahard--feel every crack in the pavement through the hard plastic saddle! I wasn't impressed with the line about "it's more comfortable because you use less energy to get there".
There are commuter bikes for $100 but it's just not worth servicing them because telling someone it'll be 40% of the original bike price in labor + parts to fix something not major is hard for them to accept.
> low maintenance, comfort, and ruggedness. Apparently that's totally uncool and biking is all about ultralight and ultrahard--feel every crack in the pavement through the hard plastic saddle!
Carbon is more comfortable by reducing the vibrations that you'll feel compared to aluminum.
The reason why they stock shitty parts is because they appear to service really cheap bikes and for people who buy cheap bikes, that's what they want. I know many shops who wouldn't service cheap bikes and I know many shops where they would but I wouldn't trust them with my more expensive Trek road bike. So it's strange that they also stock carbon frames.
This is self-awareness issue. At what point did you realise you'd wandered into the wrong shop for your target segment? Judging by the misrepresentation of the genuine preferences of folks like me, as being somehow nonsensical or antithetical, I suspect, "not yet".
I'm reminded of the vegetarian who visits a steakhouse and complains there's nothing for them on the menu but salad.
> all they had was some Chinese brand
Place of origin indicates nothing about the item manufactured, and product labeling even less so. Most bicycle tube & tyre production is in E/SE Asia.
I wonder if these people are internally consistent enough to eschew the use of ramps or pulleys.
In London there a few mechanics/coffee shops that stayed profitable that way.
If more people cycled I'm sure you would see more 'just mechanics' but in most places they can't afford to be that.
If e-bikes take off they could help. There are a lot more moving parts to break and especially electrical issues to track down. Electrical issues are real moneymakers in diagnostic fees on cars.
So if the "true" rate ends up being more than the market will bear, and you dont have alternate income, you close down.
So it isn't really a situation where one thing had an artificially inflated price and the other an artificially deflated price, more like the way bike shops as we know them work is to have diverse income streams, and removing an important one means that the business model as we understand it ceases to function.
I truly believe that cycling, as an activity, can just fail and cease to exist. It has ceased to exist in many areas in America. Many, many, many novice cyclists would rather abandon cycling than pay a large premium on bicycle maintenance. Perhaps there is a different business model that would work, but I see the large manufacturers as having in interest in creating an environment where maintenance service can be delivered at-cost.
The only way I would operate a shopfront business of any kind is if I owned the building. But I'd need to build a business first that could pay for the building. If I can build such a business, then I likely wouldn't bother with the shopfront until you get "Apple" big.
And you don’t want to deal with counterfeit items either.
If you ask a store, the answer will always be replace. They don't want to deal with liability questions ("but that store told me it would be good to ride"), so they will pick the safe answer.
This will be especially true for components like a carbon frame, where even the best equipped stores will lack the equipment to perform a proper check - like an x-ray device.
However the store might help you getting a discount on the replacement or get it warrantied.
There are plenty of other things that need work beyond frames.
Yes and no. I think what most people think of when they think bicycle is the throw away kind that you buy at you local big box retailer or sporting goods store. These are toys in the sense the they were likely meant for casual recreation and at most might get a tire patched or some other simple repair.
But yeah, I think the GP is speaking aspirationally. We need to get to a place where bikes are considered infrastructure the way a vehicle is, that everyone has one, and has a selection of shops around them to service it, same as everyone currently has lots of garages, dealers, and gas stations around to meet the needs of their automobile.
I buy almost all of my parts to service our cars online. Amazon, RockAuto, and brand-specific parts suppliers (PeachParts, HandA/Bernardi, Ricambi, etc.) I can recall going to a physical dealer 3 times in the last 20 years and each time it was for a “I need it exactly this afternoon and I’m willing to pay for it in dollars and inconvenience”.
Additionally, most places I've lived didn't have bike racks (small to medium sized towns in Indiana), nor did a lot of workplaces put much money into employee break rooms. You can change out of those wet clothes in the public restroom, but it would be unacceptable to show up wet with sweat.
Cars just require parking spaces, and employers don't have to provide those.
Sure it's not a race bike, or mountain bike, but they still work just fine for transportation.
(Speaking as someone who personally would be highly unlikely to buy the type of bike you're describing.)
But yeah, the majority of the US population probably thinks recreational bikes for their kids and maybe the ones they own to ride with their kids.. Also toys.
This is true. Although, I'm afraid the business model of a local bike shop is not sustainable at the moment, at least in Europe where the markups on components and service are just outrageous. It almost seems like the industry is following the footsteps of car industry which is based on franchised D2C sales points and incredibly high margins on servicing.
Unfortunately, for folks who want to save money the only option is to learn how to maintain and fix your own bike using components sourced from online stores.
I do most of my own maintenance, but for basic things and low cost parts (chains, tires, wheels) my experience is that bike shops lie about the necessity of replacements and bill 2-3x markup for parts, in addition to billing for labor.
That is the issue with Amazon, it’s easy to get things from and cheaper, which also increases our want to buy more crap we don’t need, and fuelling a business capable of potentially doing serious harm to the competitive landscape.
My partner recently purchased some specialist cake toppers, from a one woman shop, they where super expensive but they looked really high quality, and she was so happy we was happy with the product, and I think that should be part of the purchase experience, that we can get a sense of satisfaction that we have helped a small business stay open.
I think Jeremy Clarkson said it best (surprisingly), and it was something alone the lines of the following. Stop haggling, a dollar is a lot of money to these people, it’s nothing to you, just pay them the price asked.
Wait, wasn’t this always the case? I recall multiple Trek stores in the Toronto area at least a decade ago. I always though this was part of their model (vertically integrated retail), although other stores did sell their bikes also (exactly like Apple).
I just bought a Trek bike at a local Trek store a couple months ago and it definitely wasn’t a new store. Looking now, there are six (!) Trek stores all over the San Diego area. That’s actually more than the number of Apple stores IFAICT.
Maybe they are just expanding this model to some other part of the world?
I do my own maintenance and choose to use local bike shops to source parts. I'm not really a bike nerd. I service my own bike since it's more convenient to pull out my spare bike to buy some easily transportable parts than it is to transport a bike to the shop. I can also fix my bike in an evening and have it ready for the next day, while it may take a shop a couple of days to get around to it.
I’m finding this to less true these days. As bikes become more ‘integrated’ with components specific to the model they’re becoming harder to fix. It’s particularly bad with aero bikes that have aero handlebars, weird stems and internal routing.
Even if you’re a bike nerd, what you know won’t really apply on another bike anymore.
Sheldon Brown had some good articles about their versatility.
From the FTC: "Price fixing is an agreement (written, verbal, or inferred from conduct) among competitors that raises, lowers, or stabilizes prices or competitive terms ... Price fixing relates not only to prices, but also to other terms that affect prices to consumers, such as shipping fees, warranties, discount programs, or financing rates. Antitrust scrutiny may occur when competitors discuss the following topics: ..., Capacity, Identity of customers, ... Defendants may not justify their behavior by arguing that the prices were reasonable to consumers, were necessary to avoid cut-throat competition, or stimulated competition." [1]
Is there a lawer who can say if that was price fixing?
[1] https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/competition-guidance/guide-a...
[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/resale_price_maintenance_agr...
But the legality of this kind of thing depends on the circumstances. From what I have read, it seems unlikely to be illegal (it is perfectly normal for a manufacturer to supply a product and attempt to stop a buyer selling into a particular channel) but I am not sure it is a great idea to say you are doing this specifically to increase prices.
To give you an example I came across recently, when Sony came to the US they dealt with US wholesalers. Some wholesalers would sell to product to retailers who wanted to aggressively discount product. So Sony eventually stopped selling to wholesalers, and sold directly to retailers who wouldn't discount their product. It is a fine line but the manufacturer always has the choice of not selling to a certain buyer anyway (and tbf, as dollar stores have shown, some retailers will get around the manufacturer's rules anyway).
So I don't think it is particularly unreasonable for a manufacturer to tell customers to stop putting product into a certain channel, and it probably isn't anticompetitive (because it doesn't limit the ability of competitors to sell on Amazon).
This is another way of saying, "charge the customer more". While this may work in the short term, there is likely another parts company that will not feel this way and once again look to sell on Amazon since they'll be able to undercut while still making a profit.
If people want to buy on Amazon for less, somebody else can buy parts from the same OEMs and sell them on Amazon.
Some years ago, Amazon was pushing "Ortlieb bag" adverts on Google to redirect to Amazon where the bags were not to be found and was sued. Amazon lost[1].
[1]: https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/netzpolitik/ortlieb-gegen-am...
I will be a lifelong customer, but the bags are so durable I might never need another for myself.
Conversely, maybe it's important for both big and small businesses to realize that investing in your online presence and building out a high-quality local delivery network is much more important than the high-rent place on Main Street?
A lot of the reasons I buy on Amazon are that it offers a much more pleasant experience. In fact, if you go to the manufacturers' sites for a lot of the products Amazon sells, they have a slow checkout process, scammy discount codes and email signup incentives, and generally optimize for consumer lock-in rather than getting the product to the consumer quickly. Imagine Google if it had popped up a discount code for "Get 200 searches at 15% off!" every time you searched for something, and think of how successful they would be if they did that.
As for a lot of small-time local shops I know, they seem to place an unduly high value on prime real estate, and their websites are at the level of “My nephew says he knows Dreamweaver”.
In summary, I am not super surprised they are being beaten out by Amazon, and it is unclear to me as to why I should subsidize their bad web design and reluctance to invest in building a consumer-friendly online experience.
Ironically, this leads to a place where the only long-lasting relationship the customer ends up having is with Amazon, which is a pretty shitty company.
> somehow it's moral to ignore all externalities in the name of pure market efficiency
I am not saying that, or I don't think I am anyway. I think the retailers are not taking the externality of reduced attention span in a serious way like Google or Amazon. The technology totally exists for a local retailer to get my location, and deliver a product to me with 3 clicks in under an hour.
And yet, apart from food delivery startups (that are not local, and simulate such an experience via a layer), few actual goods retailers (say, my local hardware store) have invested in building such an experience. I can't recall any of them having the courage to at least test out a pilot program with such an experience.
Either way, I do try to support my local retailers as much as I can; and my usage of Amazon has seen a slow but steady drop-off over the last 3 years. But that's mainly due to the fact that Amazon makes
Sometimes that long-lasting relationship is what ends up paying dividends in better service, though. I'm by no means unwilling to shop around, but I have been a long-time customer at my LBS and will always look to them first. I crashed in a weekend cross race two years ago and bent my rear brake rotor when the rider behind me rode over it. My LBS didn't have my rotor in stock, but they called around and found when at another shop in the US and had it shipped up before the weekly Tues night series. That's for a lowly low-category masters racer.
When you have a personal relationship with a business, it is possible for them to pull out all the stops when it matters.
Now, it’s full of fake/cheap crap with manipulated reviews and “sponsored” search results. Before it was good about exposing useful data (e.g.: “others who searched for x eventually bought y” and other similar features. That’s all but gone now. You only see what is useful to Amazon for you to see.
So, my question is, where do I go to find that same general search function for shopping? It’s not google. I’m not sure it exists but it’s needed. (Or anyone have a link?)
Amazon makes it trivial to buy pretty much anything I want and get it the next day. Sainsburys sells the same stuff between themselves and argos, yet they failed miserably at competing. They could have worked with companies like royal mail and leverage their logistics expertise to compete, but they failed miserably to even realise why I shop at amazon.
I'm not some 1970s afficiando going out to a high street to buy something in person, it's very unlikely I need something right then and can't wait for 24 hours for someone to bring it to me. I have better things to do with my time.
It was truly chaotic. The amount of money they wasted on Accenture consultants should be criminal. I know it's a cliche to say money is wasted on consultants, but really, no work happened. A lot of energy was expended but nothing was built or created.
I was in a newly formed "innovation hub" which had a lot of very talented people but we were blocked from doing anything by internal and external staff at every turn.
One time we tried to have a QA environment set up so that we could demo and test our work. We were told it would take _9 months_ to provision a server for us. We were a team of about 20 in expensive central London office space and we didn't have an environment to test our work. It took about 8 hours to do a deploy to production, so if something was broken the BEST CASE scenario was it would take 8 hours to fix. I never saw the best case scenario.
The most talented and motivated staff in the innovation hub slowly left after we were told that the pace of change had to be "glacial".
Argos never stood a chance of competing against Amazon.
Once you do that you start to realize just how much of the consumer goods world Amazon has already put out of business. I live in silicon valley and there is no where I can go for electronics any more. My last amazon purchase was getting some 2.5A fuses because every store that would sell them locally has closed ( either before the pandemic, or because of it ). I tried to buy a video card, and the local computer equipment retailer literally couldn't get allocated any stock from the manufacturers, somehow Amazon managed to get first dibs on supply. I don't like that world, and I don't want to live in it.
I love local businesses in my neighborhood but only if they add value. Theaters, cafes, grocery shops, restaurants, book stores with cafe/events, places for kids, etc. Not an expensive electronics shop that I might visit once a year.
And then instead of having to go to that store, the shopkeep could even send someone to bring you the goods. It would be like the olden days.
I have rarely been to a high street to buy stuff (rather than say a cafe or haircut) for 10 years. Imagine having to traipse somewhere, then actually walk around looking at random things on shelves hoping to find what you want?
I have been to large out of town shops like B&Q on occasion, the experience is better than a local hardware store, but still massively inferior to shopping online.
For your example, from the fuses search page (https://www.digikey.com/en/products/filter/fuses/139) you can apply the 2.5A, fuse type "Cartridge, Glass", mounting type "Holder" and still have a wide variety of options starting at $0.25 per fuse. No free shipping though.
Amazon's supply and logistics are way superior to their competitors, and their app usually is too. This does introduce a bit of friction when making the switch, including a slightly higher price sometimes. However, all in all, it's still worth doing.
(And no I don’t work for Argos!)
Interesting how quickly things we did fine without become needs.
This is classic Prisoner's Dilemma. No one wants to defect (boycott). In the end we all lose.
If a lightbulb blows, I could get in the car, drive to the local shop, find one which will do (but probably not the right one), and drive home, or I could just go click-clikc and get on with the gardening safe in the knowlege that someone else will bring a replacement to me tomorrow.
These are good things. I would like an alternative to amazon (like argos or whatever), but they just don't get it. Royal mail has had an amazing delivery network throughout the UK for decades, delivering mail and parcels next day from Lerwick to Hugh Town, from a random shack on a road 30 miles from Inverness to a central London office. It's such a shame that this wasn't utilised to provide competition to amazon, because old people like the idea of a "high street" and living like the 1950s.
At that point, you might as well buy from Aliexpress and cut out the middleman (for stuff you want from China).
Or drastically cut down purchases (which is what I chose).
To me, Ali Express is great for simple items that are practically fungible commodities, where workmanship and build quality aren't that impactful, and you can afford to wait a long time for it to arrive, and you can afford to receive some nontrivial percentages of those things and they turn out to be substandard or broken or substantially different than what was pictured. No matter the co-mingling issue, the same cannot be said of Amazon.
Still, I hear you – and I get your strategy for, say, athletic shoes or a new TV or maybe even a small electric appliance for the kitchen. But what about the space where there isn't a great set of discovery resources?
For example - I needed a desk lamp recently. I didn't have a lot to spend, but I thought $30-50 should be sufficient. There isn't dominant name brand in this space, AFAIK (sure, I could go to IKEA, I guess) – but it's also not a space to find many reviews on sites like wire cutter, or some gear mag, or specialized niche community on reddit, etc. etc.
So - I gambled on a well reviewed lamp on amazon... and it died within a few months - shorting and killing USB power supplies in minutes. So, I started over - and picked a different but equally arbitrary brand in about the same price range... and we'll see. But how do I research that sort of thing? I can't afford to go through these every few months...
Then once I've ordered, I have to track 6 different packages. If anything goes wrong, I have to track down which vendor, and how to contact them, and hope that they have a good policy of fixing things like this.
What we need is a replacement for Amazon. Federation could solve a lot of my pain points. Just give me an interface like Amazon that is connecting to hundreds or thousands of stores, where the orders are just dispatched to the store you ordered from. It doesn't fix shipping speeds, but it does give me:
a) a sane way to order from multiple stores
b) an easy means of tracking what I've ordered from all the stores
c) an easy way of tracking the shipping for packages I've ordered
d) a single point of entry when I know I want to buy something
Amazon cornered the market, not on prices, but on convenience. If we want them to stop being so dominant, that's where you want to kick them.
Most of whom use Shopify, it doesn't do all of what your suggesting but shopifys "Shop" app seems to handle the tracking part pretty okay.
The local businesses I was worried about going under were restaurants and others in the food/service industry(would lump experience in there as well; the zoo, botanical garden, museums, and etc).
Is that because you don't believe in the negative externalities or because you think they're worth the convenience?
I drive 20 minutes to the mall. After finding parking and getting into a shoe store, there’s no one really there to help me. Once they get around to me, they don’t have my size. And it’s also apparent the person working there has no interest in helping. Whether they have my size or whether I found what I was looking for is basically not their problem. So I drive at least 40 minutes round trip, plus the hassle of parking, finding the store in the mall, and waiting on someone to help me.
Now my time is valuable. I lost my time. I paid for gas. I also put miles on my car. And depending on the day, I also had to deal with traffic.
IMO businesses refuse to compete. If Amazon is doing it better than them, then hats off to Amazon. If a business is doing better than Amazon, then I’ll go with that business.
IMO the “negative externalities” puts blame on Amazon while pretending like these other stores even try to compete.
Btw this binary view of the world where Amazon is bad and others are good (or vice versa) seems to be a very American thing.
It's not.
In France it's the same thing. But the "Amazon is bad" is not really about destroying businesses (since it was done decades ago by malls, now cities are just banks, insurances and clothing crapshops like Zara) but about the fact that they are not paying taxes and they provide awful work conditions to people.
So you tend to be considered as someone who doesn't care if you buy at Amazon. (But we're still waiting for proof that companies trying to compete with Amazon don't act the same way).
These threads of Amazon-bashing always read like something out of parallel universe, I should go have a worse shopping experience because of some "greater" objective of opposing Amazon?
Shoes fall in the category "things I want to physically try before buying". And that category of things does not work with on-line shopping.
In general, there is no standing in the way of progress that improves efficiency and gives consumers what they want. Interestingly, there seems to be an overlap between the crowd that says we need to hold business accountable for packaging waste and those who believe if they virtue signal hard enough Amazon will disappear and everyone will flock back to inconvenient, higher priced shopping.. Going against the general consumer demand grain typically ends up niche. But I digress.
Amazon(and other online retailers) are destroying lots of low skill jobs, but that's true for most major gains in the efficiency of producing a product. Usually this is associated with automation, but this shift touches many aspects of the logistics providing a shopping experience to consumers. This is a good thing to me as it will ultimately increase our GDP and standard of living. Resources, particular labor, are freed up to work on other stuff. Over 600k small businesses are created every year. There are millions more small business than there were a decade ago. These efficiency gains create a TON of potential.
I think that's good, so what of the net negative in raw job numbers? People without jobs. Well, weren't we at "full employment" pre-pandemic? In any case, I'm a big fan of tackling that with job re-training. We do a really poor job of that in the USA compared to other countries.
But there are a number of solutions to different negative externalities that aren't swimming upstream against consumer trends. Unionization failed but it could happen. That could help address some of the workplace issues. The government can trust bust.
I don't view this as a binary choice. Different people seem to have different pet grievances with Amazon. Some of them I agree with, some I don't(like Amazon doesn't pay taxes, which is a sound bite to me; ya basic), but generally I believe boycotting Amazon(and other online retailers) isn't really going to affect real change.
Furthermore I am very convinced it makes the lives of everyone, except the tiny minority that are actively exploiting everyone else, much worse. Good jobs are lost, supply chains are made fragile, and monopolistic tendencies are encouraged. I would rather the inconvenience of shopping around than encourage a world with a private entity as the sole source of all consumer goods.
If we think Amazon business practices are immoral, we need to make them illegal.
There is a fundamental difference between stopping an abusive business practice with a vote verse with your wallet. With a vote, your choice is to allow the bad business practice and get the benefit of shopping there, or don't allow the business practice and don't get benefit of shopping there. The choice goes together with the consequences, good or bad.
On the other hand, choosing with your wallet doesn't couple the choice with the consequence. Even if I don't shop there, it is very likely the business will continue. Me losing the benefit of shopping there doesn't cause the business practice to stop necessarily.
Lots of people would be willing to give up shopping there if it meant the business stopped, but not if it doesn't.
If we did not mandate them by law, people could "choose" not to work at places that did not offer the above. However, that choice would probably entail "not having a job at all" which tends to be rather shitty.
My point being "it is voluntary" is not a reasonable excuse for treating lower class workers inhumanely.
That should be followed by a long discussion of what counts as "inhumane treatment". Where there is much room for disagreement still. But I don't think it is defensible to claim "they could quit" when someone else says "these conditions are inhumane and should be stopped".
I already avoid Amazon as a consumer when the brand, quality, or delivery date really counts.
But I also avoid Lowes when I'm buying appliances for tenant properties because they can't be relied upon to call before they deliver. And I don't buy from Harbor Freight Tools when equipment failure might be fatal because some things I've bought there haven't survived their first use.
But those places have saved me a ton of money over the years when their model has worked to my benefit, just like Amazon has made a vast improvement in certain areas of my life.
I suspect companies like PNC are coming to similar realizations about Amazon as they see that their returns (or the implications on their reputations, or their confidence in continued sales) paint a picture that's less attractive than pursuing alternatives.
Then those bikes didn't show up because of shipping delays.
Then there was a big spike in demand, as people realized a couple of things: 1) Cycling is an outdoor activity that seems like it carries a minimal COVID risk. 2) It's a way of getting to work if you're still working but public transit is shut down. These things, together, ramped up demand for both cheap and expensive bikes simultaneously.
Shops ran out of bikes, and then it became very hard to stay in business, even if there was still demand for repairs and parts.
Bike parts have always been a problem in the US. There's too much variety for any shop to be able to maintain a decent stock, so a lot of things have to be ordered. In my own case, since I ride older bikes, it's highly tempting to order stuff from Amazon or even (preferably) eBay because of the selection. Some stuff, such as Sturmey Archer hub parts, have to be sourced from overseas.
But this has even been the case with my much-weirder winter bike, my kids' bikes that have off-brand shifters, etc.
I know Sheldon Brown (RIP) catalogues a true nightmare history of incompatibilities that have built up over the years, but I think in reality, most of that stuff is pre-1990. If you have a non-imported bike purchased in the last three decades, it's going to either be Shimano or be knockoff parts that are Shimano-compatible.
Did much of public transit actually shut down? In my local city it was deemed an essential service and everyone kept working with transit still running, with a mask requirement of course.
It sounds like shops should have done well, but we’re subject to shortages which lead to purchases at online retailers instead.
IANAL, but is this not collusion or price fixing?
My one gripe has been that they put a huge sale sticker right on the box of the animal crossing edition switch I bought. At least it was on the side and not front and center, but it would've been nice to not do that.
Adding on to the Amazon alternative, Target is also great. I've happily purchased many electronics, home supplies, etc from them. Costco too, though they sell a different kind of inventory. Again, not quite mom and pops, but IMO anything that's not Amazon or Walmart is still an improvement.
See also “Parallel Polis”: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_Polis
And, Havel’s The Power of the Powerless: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_the_Powerless
it amuses me to read that they're setting that up now as if it's new, as it is how it used to work for a very long time.
At this point selling on amazon makes me trust you less — i’ve gotten way too many fake parts accidentally over the years to trust them with.
I have a Loam lever, a Rainier dropper, and Range stem. They're all excellent parts with tasteful branding. PNW's customer support is excellent, when it comes time to inevitably replace a sagging dropper. The stem's bottom has an unusual design that excited some bike wizards on bikes.stackexchange when I had questions about using stems without spacers. That certainly isn't a whitelabeled, off-the-shelf component.
With the state of Amazon being what it is, I would never even have thought to look for bike parts on there. The likelihood of accidentally buying a counterfeit part is way, way too high. I buy all my bike parts direct from the manufacturer, whenever possible. PNW has a nice Shopify site, why give Amazon your money?
I heard before that Trek does the same thing with their Bontrager posts.
Now they have engineered a few unique products you can't get elsewhere though they are all made in asia. Like they make road/gravel style drop style handle bars in uncommon widths.
The main challenge is discoverability; for a lot of people, websites like Amazon is the first port of call, and people are willing to pay the convenience fee just so they don't have to scour the internet for an alternative.
That said, they now have to scour Amazon to find a decent product instead of 'knockoffs' / race-to-the-bottom competitors.
Anyway, Have you dealt with a lot of "local bike shops" -- I have dealt with too many to count.
Lets look at a few pros and cons of "local bike shops":
Pro:
-- Support a local business
-- Go in and talk to an actual person? (maybe)
Cons:
-- Many gear-head bike shop employees (specifically the mechanics) have a BOFH attitude, are gruff, rarely have time to talk - generally have an attitude.
-- Many of the local shops are now pushing bikes that are fucking $10,000 -- I looked at a bike in Mikes Bikes just last week - and it was $15,000
-- Gear selection is limited to a couple brands, and prices are no better than amazon
-- Bike shops aren't like starbucks - they are fucking far apart.
-- I have biked DAILY for over a decade. I have gotten HUNDREDS of flats - and I always carry 2 tubes with me (yes, I want to go tubeless, just havent done so yet) - getting tubes off amazon is ideal. Having to have to drive very far to go buy a tube is a non-starter
Local bike shops currently have shitty inventories because of the supply shortage from china - and to have to again drive to the bike shop to find out that their inventory is low, that the lowest end bike is $5,000 and they want to sell every garment for >$50 with stupid logos and printing all over them to show that you, the customer-turned-billboard are "serious about your biking"
-- Having to stand near too many weekend-road-warriors who really don't need anything but want to instead show you how much money they threw into their entire kit....
-- Having to deal with upsell in certain cases
-- Having to get blank stares with questions about anything outside of what the store actually sells and too many answers of "gee, I don't know"
---
Yeah, While I hate Amazon's monopoly as much as everyone -- this does NOT make all local bike shops even.
Yes, I have met some awesome ones - not not enough to where every bike shop nearest me is a good one in every single city I have loved in all over the greater bay area all the way up to Tahoe City...
I have had a few bikes that would pop a tube when just riding off a six-inch curb.
I have had so many flats all on different bikes for different reasons - that my riding behavior changes when I know if I have a spare tube on me or not.
Amazons top priority is the customer, and thats how they got to this point, but everyone else suffers, from their 3rd party sellers to their suppliers to their own employees.
Here is a list of stuff Amazon does:
-Anti competitive behaviour on the buy box (Amazon doesnt have the product in stock. You have it, but your offer is still not shown)
-Banning sellers for no good reason, and you cant contact anyone helpful
-Screwing over their suppliers with Vendor Central, where they buy from you wholesale. They dont pay, they just say the goods were never delivered and dont accept your proof of delivery. I know sellers who are owed over 30k from amazon.
-Customers are able to send back items 1 year later. If you dont agree, they can file an “AZ claim”. If you get too manu claims, they ban you.
-Support for sellers is the worst combination of overseas call centers using some cookie cutter templates to answer questions. Often you are just copy pasting your question 5 times, until you get somebody with have a brain
-Use data from their sellers to create their own products and then force them out of the market
-creating huge incentives for chinese sellers which flood and undercut the local sellers
Its just a huge behemoth were nobody knows whats going on.
In my opinion this company needs to be split up by gov and reigned in.
But who knows, maybe more sellers will follow suit and the pressure will be increasing to change things.
This is not and should not be true. If it were true, Amazon would operate completely differently. It should be more true than it is.
https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/industries/an-inside-look-at-th...
I very much don't like this as a consumer.
In my view, another way of looking at it is that selling on Amazon favors sellers who can figure out how to manage those risks, and one way of doing it is to be basically a "fly by night" business. If you can spin up multiple sellers, make your nut on the first sale, and pull the plug on the seller if anything goes wrong, you've got what it takes.
Or, if your margins are high enough that you can afford to eat the bad sales.
I think there are a lot of things Amazon can do better, but your solution is interesting.
“I am not happy with Amazon. The company should be broken up by the government.”
If everything you stated is absolutely true and systemic issues, IMO let the market and consumers punish Amazon.
It sounds like you’re saying Amazon is good enough that it’s impossible to take away their customer base. On the other hand, you’re describing what seems to be a completely broken company not worth a minute of my time.
Which is it?
I must be getting old.
How did these companies get so massive without any meaningful customer service departments? Amazon, Google, Facebook and many, many others where customer service is not even bothered with, yet people continue to use their products and services.
As a customer, I've had no trouble reaching Amazon customer service when I need help, and they've always been helpful - refunding or replacing the defective product.
The parent also didn't mention that Amazon has a policy of not allowing sellers to sell their products for a lower price on their own website. If only customers knew how much Amazon is screwing over sellers, they would be wary. Many sellers I know themselves don't shop on Amazon themselves due to this.
They can't wrap their head around how you can have useful-ish software with shitty incomplete out of date documentation and tech support via people competing to get noticed on StackOverflow for their resume.
The more time goes on, I'm not sure I can wrap my head around it either...
Don't corporations typically have non-compete clauses to prevent an employee from exploiting proprietary knowledge they gained while working for the firm? Would we be supportive of someone who left (e.g.) a small bicycle parts company to help Amazon rule that market?
1) Copyright - protects outright copying of an IP asset 2) Patent - protects against the reimplementation of the same IP 3) Trade Secret - Similar to patent, but enforcement is trickier especially for software as you have to demonstrate a benefit to it being secret as well as your efforts to keep it secret.
Non-competes are more of a blunt instrument and a controversial topic. Amazon is infamous for having them. Typically only hear of companies trying to enforce these at executive level as any enforcement at a lower level can impact recruiting heavily.
Quality matters a whole lot for the kind of products PNW makes. Not every cyclist has the ability to figure out whether a part was manufactured correctly (no cracks or voids in castings, etc etc).
Maybe they outsource them. But finding contract manufacturers who do a good job is a highly skilled business.
And cyclists depend on stuff like this to work. I once had the top of a cheapo seatpost break off on a road bike, in the late fall, far from home. Cheezy metal manufacturing. Cold couple of hours waiting for a rescue. Happily I didn't crash.
I learned my lesson. Now I buy stuff from my local bike shop, or sometimes REI if I'm far from home. The possibility of counterfeit parts is frightening. I know I can trust the local bike shop to source decent parts.
It varies by state though, so not sure about Washington and elsewhere.
Here in Europe, Amazon would be the last place I would go to buy anything bike related. We have _specialized_ large online retailers, like CRC in NI and Bike24 in Germany who are excellent, also tend to ship the same day and actually do care about their customers...
I wonder if there's value in creating a website that is just a directory of online stores in various categories.