Mountain Bike Buying

[DaveInDenver]

$1500 buys you a lot more motorcycle than it does bicycle. That's dumb. And it's probably why I have 4 two wheeled motorized vehicles and only one human powered one

A lot more by what measure? It's not cheap to engineer and build something that weighs 25 lbs (and often a lot less, my Gunnar is about 23 lbs) but can tolerate the punishment a cyclist doles out bouncing through rock gardens for several years. Some bicycles have darn near the suspension travel of a 250 at 20% of the weight. A full-on downhill rig will have 8 to 10 inches of travel and weigh 40 lbs. A motorcycle uses mostly standard grades of steel welded together pretty basically while high end bicycles are built from lots of carbon fiber and titanium and the components are heavily machined and forged (crank arms for example are often hollow forged) and can be quite intricate. The tolerance on a 11-speed shifter is thousands of a millimeter since the gear-to-gear spacing is 1.85mm.

 

[wesintl]

The markup is pretty decent, even for the LBSs. Whenever I've been lucky enough to get a pro-deal on a bike, it is at least 25% off. Ya, that's not great margin if your the manufacturer, but it's decent for retail sales.

? A LBS makes ~30% most likely less if you sell treks and everyone sells at the lowest min price. I would not say that is decent. You have to watch what you buy and sell through. You're pro deal is generally through the manufacture so the LBS doesn't make anything and the company is choosing to take a hit on the profit of that one bike or whatever as marketing. The Mfg margins can vary, they make more than the LBS though. All thanks to schwinn. I'm suprised LBS can still survive on those magins and the competition out there. esp from big box stores. It's a real tough business. Like anything with a good following a kind service you get repeat customers.

So a kids bike that sells for $130 a LBS paid $100 and they have to put it together pay shipping, a storefront, and an employee fica and the rest and give some kind of lifetime tune up on it. Now if a bike shop has a 20% off sale (which is never) they would make $10

Now on a $5000 bike you might make a little more but you have 4000 of capital tied up in a one time sale or have to carry a couple sizes you must sell through to make it profitable. 2Or how about last years bike, You think it should be at least 20-30% OFF if not 50 because that's what the rest of the retailing world does.

As Dave notes Bike sales are a wash. An LBS might make money but it's very hard and you have to really watch your inventory and ordering. The real money is in clothing and accessories where you can keystone or more.

 

[mcgaskins]

A lot more by what measure? It's not cheap to engineer and build something that weighs 25 lbs (and often a lot less, my Gunnar is about 23 lbs) but can tolerate the punishment a cyclist doles out bouncing through rock gardens for several years. Some bicycles have darn near the suspension travel of a 250 at 20% of the weight. A full-on downhill rig will have 8 to 10 inches of travel and weigh 40 lbs. A motorcycle uses mostly standard grades of steel welded together pretty basically while high end bicycles are built from lots of carbon fiber and titanium and the components are heavily machined and forged (crank arms for example are often hollow forged) and can be quite intricate. The tolerance on a 11-speed shifter is thousands of a millimeter since the gear-to-gear spacing is 1.85mm.

Not saying it isn't expensive to engineer a high end bicycle. What I am saying is that if you have $1,500 in your pocket, you can get a decent used bicycle or a pretty nice motocross bike with 12+" of suspension travel, powerful disk brakes front and rear, a super strong lightweight aluminum frame, often times high end aftermarket exhaust and/or wheels that have titanium or magnesium or other expensive metals, a powerful motor, etc etc. The sum of parts is greater IMO on a used MX bike like a CR125R than a used bicycle. Last year I almost pulled the trigger on a mountain bike but was exhausted looking through craigslist and finding most of the ones I liked were already gone, so I casually looked in the moto section and found a nice CRF250X street legal and lowered for LESS than my budget for a mountain bike. Just sayin..