Sticker Shock at the LBS !!!

[Sven]

I went last week to the LBS to have my Schwinn 1950's middleweight fork stem re-threaded. I wasn't spending $270 for the Park Tool for hopefully a one time deal. Now,.. I haven't been in a bike shop in years, I'm talking decades. The staff was helpful and all. While I was waiting for my work to be done, I wandered around looking at the new bikes. BMC, Pinarello, Cannondale, Seven cycles..Very nice and pretty. Most looked not very comfortable , due to the seat so far up and the handlebars so low. My brother-in-law pointed out a Pinarello he liked. looked normal...$4199.00:eek:. There was a bike , cant remember the brand ,there for a little over $12,000.
KrAzY
Different world, not bad just different....I'll stay in my world of old steel.

 

[Freqman1]

I've envied some of that new stuff as well. Saw one I really liked a few years back--a Pinarello and was told $14k! The depreciation on these is incredible though. My Bluebirds and Speedlines seem to be holding their own so I too will stick with vintage! V/r Shawn

 

[Duchess]

Parlee Cycles was about a mile from my old house. They only built the expensive frames in the US and I think their "cheap" frames were the $3500-5000 ones. Useless to someone like me, but if you're a sponsored racer, the value is there. I guess it's like the ridiculous prices of exotic cars, but for someone who races . . . oh, yeah, nobody races them and only .001% can actually use them to their capability on a racetrack and an actual, much cheaper track car would be a better choice for such work, but hey, it attracts a certain type of woman and if they didn't have the wallet substitute for willy-waving and stories about women being gold diggers to talk about with the other guys at Cars & Coffee (one of the certain type of woman those things attract, the other being the party girl who's burnt out by 30) . . . well, I guess they'd have to talk about sports and that's only one step above elevator small talk, which is a toss-up with Chinese water torture.

Got sidetracked with cars—at least someone notices those—I think the wallet-waving and component name dropping is about all those spendex bike guys have, but a very high end plastic bike is still a lot more affordable than a very high end plastic car.

Re-reading this, it's obvious why I live in isolation surrounded by what's effectively a moat.

 

[the tinker]

I went last week to the LBS to have my Schwinn 1950's middleweight fork stem re-threaded. I wasn't spending $270 for the Park Tool for hopefully a one time deal. Now,.. I haven't been in a bike shop in years, I'm talking decades. The staff was helpful and all. While I was waiting for my work to be done, I wandered around looking at the new bikes. BMC, Pinarello, Cannondale, Seven cycles..Very nice and pretty. Most looked not very comfortable , due to the seat so far up and the handlebars so low. My brother-in-law pointed out a Pinarello he liked. looked normal...$4199.00:eek:. There was a bike , cant remember the brand ,there for a little over $12,000.
KrAzY
Different world, not bad just different....I'll stay in my world of old steel.

What did they charge you to re-thread your fork?

 

[rhenning]

My wife who is a very good bike rider and vertically challenged had a custom Seven 24 inch wheel bike built for her. Ending up weighing 17 pounds and costing on the nort side of $5000 but she loves it and rides it a great deal. Roger

 

[SirMike1983]

Big box and online have pushed dedicated bike shops toward the higher end of the price scale. Some of the bike shops have retained a more robust lower-end on the price scale, but most of the shops I see are squarely mid-range and higher on the price scale strictly. They also have more emphasis on "lifestyle" stuff - safety gear; clothes; racing equipment; training rollers (and even rollers that attach to virtual courses on a big computer screen).

I can think of one or two small shops that are affordable for bikes near me, but most of them are quite expensive. One sells mostly "recycled" used bikes that they recondition and the other is an old guy running a basic bike shop in a single room.

The dedicated shops generally do sell a better product than big box, but it's intimidating if you're a first-time buyer thinking you can get away with a decent bike for $250.

It's good advice to buy small things at the local shop (tubes; rim tape; chains; etc.) and establish a good rapport with the mechanics and the people who work there. You often get better and more targeted service for what you are doing when they know the sorts of bikes you're into.

 

[Sven]

What did they charge you to re-thread your fork?

$15

 

[RUDY CONTRATTI]

Went to one of our local bike shops to stock up on some of Phils grease and just so happen to look at a mountain bike which I thought said 900.00 dollars,but upon further review,,it was a mere 9000.00 dollars and on any giving day when we see a pack of road riders lets say 20 of them, thats close to 35 to 40,000 dollars, in bikes ,uniforms and click in shoes blowing through stop signs here in Fairfax!!!

 

[bobcycles]

A local buddy of mine was a total animal, used to race hard core and travel
around the world racing... total character ...party animal yet somehow won
races living like a wild man. He would show me bikes he bought for 10G
or more that were practically worthless in 2 years in that realm.
nuts.

 

[Sven]

A local buddy of mine was a total animal, used to race hard core and travel
around the world racing... total character ...party animal yet somehow won
races living like a wild man. He would show me bikes he bought for 10G
or more that were practically worthless in 2 years in that realm.
nuts.

Proof is right here. 3 years old
https://annapolis.craigslist.org/bik/d/54-cm-cannondale-synapse/6630256629.html