This is a sad thing. I have always boughten mine and my kids bikes at bike stores. Not for any particular reason, I just never thought of going to a big store for a bike. Since checking in on this site though I have really started to understand how crappy those big store bikes can be.
Sadley while walking out of Target one day I saw this elderly woman sitting and gleaming at the two brand new "mountain bikes" her and her husband had just purchased as the husband pulled the car around to load them up. These people appeared to have $$ but just didn't know any better. Hopefully they never ride them and just hang them off the back of their motor home for decoration. All I could do was imagine all the pain they will have trying to keep those things working well enough for them to enjoy and hope that nothing serious ever fails when the elderly couple are out on a ride together one day.
Then just the other day at Toys-R-Us. I saw a dad struggeling to load up 2 brand new, dual suspension mountain bikes into his BWM X5. Again all I could think was that I hoped the guy had a set of tools at home. Once he got all packaging off the damn things, he was sure to have to spend some time fixing them. I doubt they even survived the ride home, stacked on their sides in the back of his SUV.
Anyway