General Cycling Discussion - MTBs cheaper than Road bikes?

I wasn't sure what forum to post this in...

I noticed that you can get an aluminum hardtail with 9-speed (deore,mid-range) componts for areound $650 US, but that same $650 will barely buy you the bottom of the line on road bikes (8 speed sora). Whats the deal. The only thing i can figure is that hardtail mountain bikes are less in demand then road bikes. I'm not a happy camper though, because I want a new road bike, but I keep getting disracted by these really good deals on mountain bikes. I dont ever ride the trails very much!

Do the road bikes shift THAT much better then the equivilent MTB? The deore mix i rode was pretty nice.

This phenomenon is kind of annoying to me, I would like to have a full 105 bike for $650...

Have a look at Fuji's recent offerings on road bikes. They are coming out with some good values that should be attractive to you. Nice machines at good prices.

Also check out Felt Bicycles www.felt.com good bikes, great prices!

L8R

There are some less expensive road bikes hitting the market, but you said MTB are in less demand? Where did you hear this?

Mtb are in alot higher demand, so the cost has gone down on them, while road bikes less demand so cost goes up. When you sell 100 MTB you can stand to make less profit then 50 road bikes.. those nubmers are completely off I know but, you get the idea.

i wasn't talking about MTB in general in less demand, in fact, I think that probably 5 times as many MTBs are sold than road bikes.

You got your economics wrong though. when things are in high demand, low inventory, the price rises. when things are in low demand (people don't want them) and high inventory, the price drops. If you want an exact demo of this, go to ebay. You'll find that on things that are in short supply and high demand will have auction prices sky-high.

I was saying that HARDTAIL mountain bikes are in less demand. It seems that everyone wants the latest and greatest technology, which is the ultra-complicated, million link suspension designs.

Yeah but with bikes there is no supply shortage, they can sell more so they make more and costs goes down. So costs goes down in making them, since makign 5 times as many, and can afford to make less of a profit on each one.