Originally Posted by primaryreality

This hits a bit of a sore spot with me, as I'm the owner of an old bike that I've been keeping going and intend to keep going indefinitely. That requires me to avail myself of the services of bike-shop mechanics from time to time, as I can't do all the work myself. I also expect and plan to buy two new bikes in the next several months, but the bike shop would have no way of knowing this unless I tell them. It seems to me it shouldn't matter.

Should I really assume that even though a given shop advertises its repair and maintenance services and I am willing to pay for those services, if I have an old bike and am not "apt to be able to buy a new one for the foreseeable future," my old bike will not get the very best possible work done on it?

Unless I ply the mechanics with beer and cookies? For crying out loud--I'm paying them to do the work! Why is more than that required, on an ordinary day?

And if a given shop doesn't want to work on "old bikes" or service the bikes of people who may not be in the market to buy a new one right away, or only wants to work on bikes that it's already sold, I WISH THEY'D JUST BLOODY WELL SAY SO, and save everyone a lot of grief. Post a sign or something.

Sorry. Mini-slightly-OT-rant over.

I think it's fine to recognize and reward and thank people for service that is clearly "above and beyond"--no problem with that at all, it's a lovely thing to do and sometimes well-deserved--but it seems to me there is a disturbing trend (not only here, not only about bike shops, but in our culture right now in general) of people feeling that it's somehow extraordinary to simply do the job you are being paid to do and to do it well.

I don't know. It bothers me. It's something about work ethic, and it's something about a weird sense of entitlement people seem to have.