21–30 of 134 posts
Is it just me, or are there seemingly far more people trying to invest and profit off bikeshares than there are using them? I've lived in several cities in europe and i'm not actually sure i've ever seen anybody using them. Yet there seems to be tons of competing companies putting out bikes in the street. On top of that, they don't even seem to bother marketing or anything. The first I'll hear of a new company is see…
It's a shame that there's been little innovation from road bike manufacturers in the past 10 years or so. The last major innovation was aero carbon frames. Since then everyone is just copying each other and trying to improve by fractions of a percent for weight, stiffness, and efficiency. Most of the value and innovation has shifted to the groupset suppliers, with Shimano taking the lion's share of the market and a f…
Why bother innovating when its not needed? Expensive bicycles are in the same market as fancy watches. Its all just wealth signalling. Nobody needs 10% lighter frames, or 5% more aerodynamic shapes. If you want to drive faster or burn less energy you go electric, If you want health benefits you buy the shittiest heaviest bike you can find and pedal harder.
Also, safety is important, and shitty bikes are less safe.
It's a shame that there's been little innovation from road bike manufacturers in the past 10 years or so. The last major innovation was aero carbon frames. Since then everyone is just copying each other and trying to improve by fractions of a percent for weight, stiffness, and efficiency. Most of the value and innovation has shifted to the groupset suppliers, with Shimano taking the lion's share of the market and a f…
Is it just me, or are there seemingly far more people trying to invest and profit off bikeshares than there are using them? I've lived in several cities in europe and i'm not actually sure i've ever seen anybody using them. Yet there seems to be tons of competing companies putting out bikes in the street. On top of that, they don't even seem to bother marketing or anything. The first I'll hear of a new company is see…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why bother innovating when its not needed? Expensive bicycles are in the same market as fancy watches. Its all just wealth signalling. Nobody needs 10% lighter frames, or 5% more aerodynamic shapes. If you want to drive faster or burn less energy you go electric, If you want health benefits you buy the shittiest heaviest bike you can find and pedal harder.
Don't get a shitty bike if you want exercise. Shitty bikes are unpleasant to ride, making the experience not fun, and discouraging you from doing more (and longer duration) riding. Also, safety is important, and shitty bikes are less safe.
I think we all agree, buy something shitty and you get shit, especially with things you put between you and the earth. A medium quality bike, which costs an order of magnitude less than a "fancy" bike, will do literally everyone who isn't a cat 1-2 racer fine, objectively. Price difference is $1-5k for a mid range vs $10-20k for top of the line.
I don't think anyone is advocating for $300 walmart bikes here.
It takes a while for things to find their level. The 'Boris bike' is now a feature of London, the other bikes haven't established that niche in the streetscape.
The road bike was also innovative, if flawed. Plenty of bikes and plenty of bike groupsets are flawed when they first come out. It takes a couple of iterations to get right and the costs of getting it wrong are terrible.
Years ago in the days of the mountain bike craze a brand came out with a few of their own components including a bespoke freehub body. This did not last long on any given bike and it did not take long before the warranty returns aspect of the business fixing whole wheels took over. There was no scope to develop the brand when all hands are literally swapping tyres and tubes onto new wheels and getting them out to customers.
Sometimes bikes that don't actually work don't bounce back. During the mountain bike boom there was a shortage of Shimano components and a rising Yen. This made it hard to get the gears and brakes needed to build a bike. So European components might be substituted. And they would not actually work together, no matter how skilled the mechanic, no matter how new everything was, the gears would not shift and the brakes would not stop the bike.
Very few of these frankenbikes made it back. They just sat in sheds and garages, never to be ridden!
The SpeedX bike was not a bike that would be just dumped in the shed or bought as a well meaning gift. They could not rely on 90% of the problems not coming back.
They also were never going to do well with the cycling press. Or the industry. The cycling business is actually really conservative and there are chunks of it controlled by people who never actually ride..
Is it just me, or are there seemingly far more people trying to invest and profit off bikeshares than there are using them? I've lived in several cities in europe and i'm not actually sure i've ever seen anybody using them. Yet there seems to be tons of competing companies putting out bikes in the street. On top of that, they don't even seem to bother marketing or anything. The first I'll hear of a new company is see…
In Paris, the private bikeshares seem to have been entirely replaced with scooters and a smaller number of e-bikes. The publicly sanctioned bikeshare is in shambles after an operator change. The only thing keeping the public system alive is it’s offerings outside the city’s core.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don't get a shitty bike if you want exercise. Shitty bikes are unpleasant to ride, making the experience not fun, and discouraging you from doing more (and longer duration) riding. Also, safety is important, and shitty bikes are less safe.
This response to the person ahead of you makes me think you either don't know much about bikes or you missed their point. I think we all agree, buy something shitty and you get shit, especially with things you put between you and the earth. A medium quality bike, which costs an order of magnitude less than a "fancy" bike, will do literally everyone who isn't a cat 1-2 racer fine, objectively. Price difference is $1-5…
Yes, the person I was replying to was advocating for department store quality bikes. I don't see how you can interpret it any other way. He literally said "shittiest heaviest bike you can find", not "$1-5k medium quality bike".
I just see the same thing with this bike company. Ignore all the rideshare stuff, the push to grow so fast and not having a sustainable product and its the same story. They took a standard Aero fram and tried to make it appear as a "high end" product. The problem is, once you've ridden a high end road bike you suddenly realize the amount of engineering and R&D that goes into those bikes to get them to perform at that level. You can't just reproduce that overnight, it takes time and a lot of money. From the article (and the scathing reviews of the bike) it didn't sound like they really tried to make a quality product, just another carbon Aero knockoff with a cool integrated stem. At that point, it was easy to undercut your competition on price.
The lessons are all too clear and which you see a lot of. You can't cut corners on products like this and sell it off as "high end" and expect to get away with it.
Source: I worked in the bike industry for almost 15 years. Had various stints with Specialized and Cannondale.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Don't get a shitty bike if you want exercise. Shitty bikes are unpleasant to ride, making the experience not fun, and discouraging you from doing more (and longer duration) riding. Also, safety is important, and shitty bikes are less safe.
This response to the person ahead of you makes me think you either don't know much about bikes or you missed their point. I think we all agree, buy something shitty and you get shit, especially with things you put between you and the earth. A medium quality bike, which costs an order of magnitude less than a "fancy" bike, will do literally everyone who isn't a cat 1-2 racer fine, objectively. Price difference is $1-5…