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Mike Wolfe designing bikes for FELT?

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i heard an angry post,i beg to differ with your statement that everyone has an option of buying retro or vintage,thats not founded on fact,i feel alot of ppl can afford a $200,00 replica but not one of a"professional restorers vintage that prolly starts at$3500"as for as mike tooting his own horn are you not directly or indirectly tooting yours as well by BAD mouthing ppl who ride big box retro crusiers?also when you cal something junk have some specific examples to warrant your statement.i buy and refubish alot of 5 to 10 yr old inexspensive bikes that with less than $100.00 dollars worth of work work just fine for the casual rider,specific example'i recently bought a pacific schwinn,10 yrs old,original typhoontires,the brake arm was loose and turned up to the seat stay,took rear hub apart,no damage,regresed the entire bike,trued wheels,detailed,worked fine,original cost to me?$30.00,quite frankly im fed up with egotistical "professionals"bad mouthing anything but there high buck usually wall haning bies with generalized state ments about what ppl can affor to buy and what they should buy according to you.the high end restored bike is not in the demand it was 5 or 10 yrs ago,hope this post provides soom clarity for you!


I wasn't comparing highend rare restored bikes to RetroHell Chinese products. My point was that YES most people could buy vintage with MINIMAL effort if they wanted to go that route. And? YES they can buy vintage balloon bikes affordably .......plenty of entry level stuff out there for 150-300 dollars......or the equivellent of the lower end Retro bikes. The American consumer is pretty lazy overall and will buy into most any hyped product or fad. As for bad mouthing Big Box Bike (BBB!) riding folks...... The decision is theirs where to shop, what to buy etc. The point is that there is very little correlation between buying some retro cruiser and becoming a vintage bike geek obsessed with this old stuff. IF some people do find 'the hobby' we are involved in thanks to a retro cruiser? Great! I honestly don't think it happens very often.
As for Mike, no not a fan, I used to deal with him back in the 90's when he worked at bike shop in Iowa and his head was on straight, nice guy. He's become a caricature of himself thanks to the hollywood spin and YES I've talked to COUNTLESS retired people who were 'pickers' and had their livlihoods immensely damaged by the impact of the show.
Some one mentioned the Schwinn Panther he or Frank stole in one episode. To note: He also claimed the value of that bike at the end of the show to be FAR less than a good solid original Panther with tank. Something like....picked for 150.........value 250 or 300 from what I recall.
Anyway, I yawn at these marketing gimmicks the 'famous' embark on....but that's just me.

As for claiming I badmouth anything non highend or wallhanging? You have no idea what I buy or collect. For the last 3 years my rider has been a 1954 Ladies New World lightweight I won for 50 bux on Ebay. Love the bike.
Shipped to my door from Minnesota it was less than 120.00. I buy lowend all the time.....just focus on VINTAGE because I cherish that period in American manufacturing, and not just for bikes.
so pleeeeeeeeeze dude.
 
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Here's the announcement that I received from Felt a few weeks ago-

"Our latest arrival is the next in Felt’s line of highly sought after limited edition cruisers, the Antique Archaeology Red Wolfe 3-SP. As you may know, Mike Wolfe, of American Pickers, is an avid bicycle lover and collector, so, when he approached us about offering a custom cruiser, it was a match made in bicycle/picker heaven! The result, seen below, is beautiful and available to ship NOW! Make sure you order today, so you can have it on your floor in time for Christmas! These won’t last long, so don’t wait… "

Mike Wolfe Felt cruiser.jpg
 
[]My 2 cents.

honestly....I don't think the 'retro' bikes do much for introducing people to true vintage. The craze has been going strong for about 20 years now.....companies cranking out Chinese etc "retro" cruisers. There is such a 'glut' of these wannabe bikes out there, it's ridiculous.
They totally water down the impact of original vintage balloon bicycles.
It's a cheap and quick fix often times for most people and I think it actually steers folks away from making the effort to 'seek out' vintage bicycles.
Here in So Cal there are so many of these 'retro' import throwaways all over the beach cities where I live, and already rusted and looking 'old' and "patina'd".....that they pretty much dilute the style and image of the actual vintage products.
People have become immune to ACTUAL vintage bicycles .......and these days? Anything that is shiny and restored
rolling around, no matter how rare or bitchin?..... pretty much gets ignored by the casual observer or passerby as they assume it is new product.
I think mainstream America has grown numb to a landscape of repop/retro/classic looking Chinese disposables that look 'vintage'.
Just what we need another 'felt' ballooner adding to the clutter of import confusion.
LOL]

Whether bikes or most any collectible, the gest of this statement is true.

I've collected antique marbles several years and in the early 90's it skyrocketed, 10 cent littleglass balls by 2000 got identified properly, barns shaken for droplets, factory sites across the globe dug with blood on hands, seriously, lol glass remains sharp, duhh.

there were a few makers left 15 years ago, and two began trying to make em like the oold. one maker has ruined the types they made 60-70 year ago, another maker is just following the color sceem trend, and a lot of new commers, even old guys/gals pick em up thinking they're the actual marbles they had in the 30's.

But that didn't hurt it too much, the nails are being made by one more. replicating old ones, but with their own sense of design, it's getting really tough for an expert collector to tell one from another. about a million a year being bought up by collector's exclusively. in 2002 or 4 when this guy started and the marbles hit e-bay, some actually went to 200 bucks, a ton or so 20-30. He makes 120,000 at a time at a expense of $15k.. that huge profit margin didn't last too long, but nice for those who got em cheap and auctioned for that. currently about 70k of em can get an average of a buck each at e-bay so,, pretty nice profits to them still. large quanties previously picked through a quarter, or un-picked .50-.75. Steve Jobs, 'Dirty Job's' TV show made a episode there too.

But now the hobby is so diluted with those new over priced marbles, an average of 1 million a year flooding collector's pockets, , new fields have opened up, and new and old marble collectors squabble..


regardless, as he says here, the hobby has become diluted really bad, there's so many floating around,.. The drive to find old marbles is dwindling rapidly..

The new ones have taken a large portion of the money flow. the population of antique marble collectors is dwindling rapidly.


There's nothing wrong either way, everybody's satisfied one way or another..

people get bikes they might not otherwise get to experience when new copies old, and old well, it's always old, that can't be duplicated.


Just the fact, dilution into any collectible causes an abundance of supply issues and the actual item, the antique suffers. Interest for the antique dwindles.

And when people don't play with a toy, don't scratch and knick the thing,, paid more than a average toy, that supply doesn't disappear. the actual stimulant 'antique' bears the burden. eventually the new replica fails in value, and for the supply drags the collectible down with it.

There's no fix, but the point is valid.
 
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went to pionneer bike shop and looked at the bike in person,beautiful bike{the assembly was perfect by nick]gonna get one,can hardly wait till the new foose comes out,dont care for the earlyer foose,also have the coddington but not the 2 barris ones,anyway to use an overused phrase pics dont do it justice
 
Whether bikes or most any collectible, the gest of this statement is true.

I've collected antique marbles several years and in the early 90's it skyrocketed, 10 cent littleglass balls by 2000 got identified properly, barns shaken for droplets, factory sites across the globe dug with blood on hands, seriously, lol glass remains sharp, duhh.

there were a few makers left 15 years ago, and two began trying to make em like the oold. one maker has ruined the types they made 60-70 year ago, another maker is just following the color sceem trend, and a lot of new commers, even old guys/gals pick em up thinking they're the actual marbles they had in the 30's.

But that didn't hurt it too much, the nails are being made by one more. replicating old ones, but with their own sense of design, it's getting really tough for an expert collector to tell one from another. about a million a year being bought up by collector's exclusively. in 2002 or 4 when this guy started and the marbles hit e-bay, some actually went to 200 bucks, a ton or so 20-30. He makes 120,000 at a time at a expense of $15k.. that huge profit margin didn't last too long, but nice for those who got em cheap and auctioned for that. currently about 70k of em can get an average of a buck each at e-bay so,, pretty nice profits to them still. large quanties previously picked through a quarter, or un-picked .50-.75. Steve Jobs, 'Dirty Job's' TV show made a episode there too.

But now the hobby is so diluted with those new over priced marbles, an average of 1 million a year flooding collector's pockets, , new fields have opened up, and new and old marble collectors squabble..


regardless, as he says here, the hobby has become diluted really bad, there's so many floating around,.. The drive to find old marbles is dwindling rapidly..

The new ones have taken a large portion of the money flow. the population of antique marble collectors is dwindling rapidly.


There's nothing wrong either way, everybody's satisfied one way or another..

people get bikes they might not otherwise get to experience when new copies old, and old well, it's always old, that can't be duplicated.


Just the fact, dilution into any collectible causes an abundance of supply issues and the actual item, the antique suffers. Interest for the antique dwindles.

And when people don't play with a toy, don't scratch and knick the thing,, paid more than a average toy, that supply doesn't disappear. the actual stimulant 'antique' bears the burden. eventually the new replica fails in value, and for the supply drags the collectible down with it.

There's no fix, but the point is valid.




You couldn't have nailed and supported the point I was trying to make more concisely.

"RETRO" hell dilutes the genuine articles.......and does it BIG TIME!

Just as the Repop Flood has dilluted the classics original bikes watering them down and BLURRING the distinction between
original and Repop. Happens all the time and it blows. Phantoms loaded with repop, rare parts made that can't be
distinguished from original equipment.

20 year old Chinese 'retro' bikes......have aged to the point around here (coastal climate, salt air, rust etc) that a 10 or 15 year old
Felt or whatever actually "LOOKS" antique....thanks to mother nature. LOL.

This is a forum for CLASSIC ANTIQUE bicycles...........maybe best to stick to the theme here instead of
who's doing what in the "industry" today.
Surely there's a forum somewhere for "Cruiser bikes" or the like.

Retro bikes have done more damage to the MARKET of antique/ vintage made in USA machines than good and
NO one can dispute that fact............regardless of the miniscule percentage of people who get into the vintage
hobby through owning a Retro whatever.
The mainstream consumer will opt for the Retro bike generally speaking...

 
I see it this way; If, instead of Mike Wolfe being involved with this bike, it was the sole domain of Walmart, no one here would give it a second glance, all things being equal. That's not to say they won't sell, however. P.T. Barnum's famous observation very nicely sums it all up here, I believe.
 
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