TheRef

Why wouldn't a customer bring a bike in February when there is nothing going on but every year they wait until the weather turns for the better and demand that their bike be serviced while they wait??

RocTurk

Found a survey from AUS dated 2010. Small sample size 261 people. Most people prefer local if price difference is less than 20%. The LBS v.s. Online Shopping | CyclingTips

Sometimes it could be urgency too. I was biking last December on a sunny day. Totally fooled by the sun and didnt bring my hat. My brain almost froze, 20 miles away from home. Threw myself into a LBS in Concord and spent 40$ on a beanie. Didnt care if it was 100$ at that point.

winston63 

My LBS did the same thing for me with the last two bikes I bought from them. Now, I don't generally get a huge price break on the bikes unless they are last year's model, but they do the fit for free and give me 15% off any additional gear/components I buy.

Actually, I've got several good bike shops in the area with only one where I felt like they weren't interested in my business at all. That's OK, they didn't get it!

Sy Reene

Face it.. when the weather is crappy, the bikes don't get used much. When the weather is warmer higher volumes of bikes are used more and more often, and this means more service is likely required.

Who asked for "while u wait" service anyway? Not me. I just don't understand why (like many "service center" operations) you can't make a scheduled in and out appointment. I probably wouldn't care if they took 2 or 3 days (even though a tune up should take only a couple hours or so), as long as I can pick the 2 or 3 day window I want to drop off and then pick up.

CafeVelo

Re: the pedal example: in full disclosure I work in a shop, and get everything I can through it because of my discount. Before I worked there, I bought things at the LBS until the price difference was 50% or $100. On the same note, I tend to buy used and ride things into the ground rather than new and ride it till its oldish, so the majority of my purchases were small items, used and NOS parts, and apparel that I wanted to be able to try on. Most of my purchases didn't total $20. The only things I don't buy through work now are things we can't get.

My main point was that people buying parts online tend to be hitting a price point pretty hard, rather than wanting the extra service and support that comes with an LBS, they'd rather buy sight unseen without support to save some coin.

roadwarrior

I don't get why you wouldn't go in, pay for the wheel, go home, take the old one off and put the new one on. Geez, it's not rocket surgery.

This place truly cracks me up.

roadwarrior

Lol...we run tune up specials, discounts on parts....and the lemmings are still lined up on the first 70 degree day wondering why it is not a 24 hour turn around.
Hit us up in December you will get it back in one to two days at a discounted price.

roadwarrior

Yeah. They forget that the on line machine built wheel can have issues. But they will bring it to us to fix, then complain about what that could cost. And we can tell the difference between handbuilt and machine built.

roadwarrior

Or they come into the shop for help and advice, then go online. Those are special moments.

Like the sign at Borders said....you want to use the bathroom, go to the internet.

2manybikes

Many customers will not know exactly how much work is required to make the bike work properly. They bring in a bike for a tune up because the chain is skipping a little on the cogs, they think it is just an adjustment. But then it turns out that they need a new chain and cassette. This happens so much that schedules don't work. Also there is no possible way to know how many customers will walk in at any given time. Between your call and your "appointment" 20 bikes might come in for service. You may not like it,but, the only honest fair way to do it is you get in line just like everyone else. The point about not bringing bikes in during the winter and all of a sudden everyone needs their bike done in the spring, is a customer created problem. My LBS carefully tells every single customer to bring their bike in during the winter if they need service, and fast turn around. Only one or two customers ever do this. All the bike shop can do about this realistically is tell customers. If they don't listen and say things like "bikes don't move in the winter". Then the customer is responsible for the problem. And no you can't find a well trained expert bike mechanic just for the spring, every single spring. If they are really good mechanics, they find a year round job. If they are part time, then they are part timers still learning.

Don't you want the bike shop to treat everyone honestly and fairly??

RJM

Borders went out of business. ^^^^

himespau 

Right, and that sign was put on the door of the Borders (at least the one near me) only after it went out of business.

indyfabz

Heh. It was in the 70s and sunny in Philly last Saturday. The first really nice Saturday all spring. That afternoon my GF went to a shop she has given a lot of business to. It's the same place that built me a custom ti frame. She said the shop was a madhouse. People (including entire families) buying bikes and wanting service. She got a frayed cable changed while she waited because of her loyalty.

We always take our bikes for tune ups "off season" to avoid the rush.

bt

same deal in the lawn mower repair business.

everyone waits till spring to get the mowers fixed when they've been sitting all winter.

Fly2High

Business is business. Online vs. storefront are just 2 different ways (and yet overlapping) to be in the cycling world. I do not believe that the LBS is not competing with the online. In fact, most of the local shops by me also have online sites and do internet sales with the option to ship or pick up locally. Little annoying when the in store price is lower than online. Then again, knowing this, it makes you want to drop by the store from time to time which probably promotes spontaneous, spur of the moment add on sales.

If the money comes from shop work, then the online guy has to sell much more to compete. That also means they need a larger warehouse to store all this stuff. That also needs more money tied up in in-stock merchandise instead of liquid. The local shop often has a smaller store.

As for scheduling appointments, they should. I understand why they do not. If they have your bike, no one else can take that shop job from them. Also, they will get you to come in 2 times - once to drop off and again to pick up. Of course, being without a bike would make one desire a second just for times like these but that is another topic.

Look, doctors, motor vehicles, car repair shops and so many other establishments do schedule appointments. There is nothing to say that bike shops couldn't try. Maybe they have had a bad experience doing this. What do you do if you do not show? Many other establishments charge a failure to cancel. Would you go to a bike shop who did this? how would you get this paid? I do not think this would be sustainable. A car is a suburban requirement. Bikes for commuting are but for the vast majority, it is a hobby or pastime. When bills are tight, they will fix the car but forgo the bike. When the doctor or car dealer falls behind, most don't love it but they understand it. Maybe the bike shop could indicate that they need 24 hours to complete all work which would be more reasonable than a week without a bike. Maybe the bike shop doesn't schedule appointments because many of the repairs they get are the more involved ones that just take longer. maybe many of their customers do the basics or the annual maintenance they are doing often turns up bigger problems that customers usually get fixed but didn't schedule initially for since they did not know they needed these things.

I do agree that the bike shop should of covered the install. They gave their word (verbal agreement) to do so. If they changed it later that makes me question their honesty and the value of their word. If you cannot trust the honesty of a shop, why would you have them work on your pride and joy? The shops that work on my bike and cars are nearly on the level of trust I have for the doctors for my family. If I cannot trust them, I would go elsewhere. I would pay more for trust and honesty for shop work. When it comes to merchandise, they need to be competitive. One time, I was ripped off by my mechanic for charging me a ridiculous price for a part. The next time I went in and I needed something fixed, I bought the part myself and dropped it off. I do not like when a shop inflated a price of parts that they do not stock that I can get cheaper. I do not find dealerships inflating part prices compared to what you can pay at the parts counter. Having the shop and some inventory and mechanics are the expenses for doing that business. If their service fees were inadequate, they should charge more. I could understand 10-15% surcharge but often it is much more and that is over the retail price. I am sure they are not paying retail so there already is a fee amortized into the retail price for them. They should not add on top of this. But this is car mechanics.

To me, LBS need to evaluate they way many similar businesses are run, the experiences their customers are getting elsewhere and run the shop separately from the retail floor. Each needs to have a proper experience and be competitive with the market they are in.

Frank

wphamilton

They're probably pretty good with bikes and mechanics but don't have the skills to run a service center. People think that you just buy some tools, hire some mechanics, and get to work.

I ran a computer service center for a few years in the 80's. We had several stores in the Dallas/FT Worth region and also Houston, actually I wound up as a regional manager of the service centers, before bailing to switch to Systems Integrator but that's another story. We might have had 50-100 units in for service at a given time, and yes it could be seasonal with fiscal year budgeting. We promised two day turnaround and delivered 24 hour in most cases. If someone called ahead for an appointment, of course it got looked at right then. It's a matter of prioritizing, and that's purely management skills and employee training.

Bikes are not more complicated, not more difficult to work on, not more time-consuming to repair, so that's not it. I suspect that small bike shops don't have the kinds of resources I had with computers, and don't have the organizational skills to anticipate and adapt. They can't afford skilled management, and their top mechanic is probably swamped with repairs instead of riding herd over the part timers. You're right, there should be 2 or 3 day turnaround, and all the rest that goes along with that, but it's probably too much to ask of the local Mom & Pop. Unless you get dropped through the cracks, I'd cut them some slack about it.

bt

lol

Fly2High

wphamilton,
family practitioners and pediactic doctors and car mechanics have been scheduling long before the computer age with a good old date book. I think it is not because they cannot. It might be due to poor organizational skills. Recently, I went to 2 bike shops I had never been to. The stores were a mess, the parts and merchandise were dusty and haphazardly tossed into display cases. Little gave me the belief their stock was current. Many of the others were neat, vacuumed and clean and the products displayed with care to make them appealing.

Which do you think I will frequent? The organized one which displays the merchandise in an appealing way or the disorganized one?

I think the same applies to repair shops for me.


It is all the little things that makes one want to trust a bike mechanic and give them return business. First impressions, quality of work and knowledge, speediness of repair. these are the things that make one bring a bike to them for repair. I recently went to a small mom and pop bike sop that I was recommended to by a coworker and told them of the problems I had with a bigger, older establishment. They were surprised since they said they had heard they did good work. For me, the fact that they did not provide quality work for me, took a week to replace a dork disk and tune the derailleurs and had me return since it was worse than when I dropped it off and had to return a second to have them do it again. For this, I would probably not bring my work to them. If their prices on merchandise are good, I might buy stuff from them but not return for service. Much like for me, it only takes one bad experience to stop a customer from returning. Shops have to live my their word and the quality of the workmanship because that is all the repair dept has to offer.

wphamilton

That's a valid observation but I was puzzled to put in into context until I realized that it probably sounded like I meant computer software systems as the resources I had access to. That was my edge personally, but it's not what I meant. We stocked enough retail and product, with fast enough inventory turnover rate, to have access to "extra" components in warranty repair. I had a daily delivery from our Houston facilities if I needed something. Vendors in that business at that time were extremely responsive and could deliver in a day or two (at a price) and warranty turnaround of components was so fast that I don't recall ever being out of stock of anything, for more than a few days. The bike industry doesn't appear to work that way. That's what I mainly meant by access to resources.

I'm like you, in that I don't give a shop a second chance after an objectively bad experience. I do try to reserve judgment when I see what looks to me like mistakes in the way they do things. Their business, maybe it works for them, but if it turns out to be a problem for me I'll go elsewhere.

RollCNY

I do not think this is a valid comparison.

1. The three you list have dedicated staff that you can schedule as full time resources. You can plan 40 hours for a given mechanic, or schedule a Nurse Practitioner 18 appointments per day. Most small LBS have a single employee during the week, at least the ones near me. They staff multiple employees on evenings and weekends, but the little guys have one person to handle every week. Output is inconsistent.

2. Auto mechanics do not stock parts for your car. They get them from NAPA, dealerships, and distributors, usually with same day pick up. A doctor's office provides what it provides, and doesn't what it doesn't, so they can table your problem in a defined window (you need to see a specialist, or have a follow up appt). Your mechanic can tell you that a part will take 3 days to get, and then your appointment was meaningless. Your bike shop is expected to fix any problem you give them, with only your often incorrect description of what is incorrect.

3. I have never seen a bike shop turn away an immediate repair when the person rides their bike to the shop. NEVER. And I spend far too much time in LBS, and have seen it in every one. This makes them an ER in some cases, where everything gets dropped. Have you ever tried to schedule an appointment with your ER?

4. Do you haggle with your Doctor's office over pricing? If they tell you that you need an $1800 test, you either schedule or don't, but you don't spend a half hour wrangling. Because many posts on BF imply that every LBS transaction should be negotiated down, and that shop rates are userous, most mechanic work is trying to get a crappy part to work before replacing something with new. I have seen twenty minute jobs become three hour jobs in a hurry.

But despite all of this, you are welcome to have any opinion you want about LBS, as I am welcome to mine. I like the small, uncoordinated shops, that smell of marine grease and have a bucket of Shimano 600 pieces by the counter. Others don't. One solution does not fit all problems.

Fly2High

RollCNY,

1. When I as young my pediatrician, my current GP, and my dentist all are one man shops. They do their own scheduling so we have had different experiences.

2. For me, mostly I tend to go to dealerships for repairs and they have pretty much all the parts available. Some mechanics have the basics - tires, belts, filters, oil, etc. I have rarely had to wait for parts over a day. 95% of all auto repairs have been same day even when on 16 year old cars.

3. If the bike shops do have parts so that would not require a long stay over. If they can do immediate repairs while they have bikes waiting then they must have more time than work available or else why did I need to drop it off for a week?

4. With my current insurance, I can ask for better pricing and they encourage me to do so. Otherwise we have company software that is suppose to show current pricing for doctors. Yeah, sucky insurance for a very big company.

we just have different experiences and as such different ideas on how it should be done. L.I. is different from central NY. Outside of Westchester and north, NY is a very different place...

I agree. we all can have our own opinions. For me, a better experience with my LBS could be improved. Maybe my suggestions are not the best but they are meant as suggestions and maybe there are other avenues they could take advantage of. For me, the shop that did poor service, had several mechanics on in Feb. and I they had me drop the bike of for 5 days in Feb and fail to get the job done correctly. I have a few shops where there are more than one mechanic so I wouldn't expect such a delay and will need to try other shops.

I am only saying things could be better. Maybe I should move to Central NY for a better experience . I do know, the hills wil be a whole lot more plentiful and better to ride than what I have on L.I.

CliffordK

SSSHHHHH!!!!
Don't tell the masses.

If it is such as simple task, why would the shop charge the customer $30 to do it?

No, it isn't rocket science. But, neither is building a wheel, truing wheels, assembling a bike, or just about anything else a bike shop does.

It just blows me away why an industry would be touting itself as a premier service industry, then tell people to just take the part home and install it themselves when the customer is obviously uncomfortable doing it.

And, what does everyone say to do when a novel rear wheel is installed on a bike... check the derailleur adjustment (stops and indexing).

Just about every bicycle I have has different rear dropout spacing. Checking, double checking, measuring... the best thing to do at the end of the day is to install the wheel on the bike and make sure it fits.

Perhaps the salesperson had gotten confused with the difference between the installation of the front wheel or the rear wheel. Or, perhaps the customer remembered the deal incorrectly. But that kind of service would send me to either a different store, or learning to do my own maintenance. Nonetheless, the bike would not come back into the shop for the lucrative tune-ups.

Sy Reene

1. This seems to be describing either poor employee management, or is due to marketplace workforce conditions. In either case, scheduling of your work/appointments would seem to help in both scenarios.

2. If, from the tuneup process, the LBS determines a part needs to be replaced and it will add a few days.. fine. That is understood, same way if a mechanic tells you that your alternator is just about shot and needs to be replaced or somesuch. However, if I find this out after day 7 of my bike sitting in the LBS's basement, and therefore bike won't be done with its tune up on day 8 as told, but now rather day 11, this is even worse. The appointment would not have been meaningless, as we're still avoiding the pointless 7-days of storage that is required just to be in the queue for service on day 8.

3. The Dr's office is a pretty good analogy. A Dr would generally never turn you away if you called up and complained of chest pains, or a 105 degree fever (aka "immediate repairs"). OTOH, if you call to schedule an annual physical (aka "regular tuneup"), there's likely no way he'll see you the same day you call to make an appointment, and forget about a walk-in for a physical. A smart LBS would take appointments, but especially on very busy walk-in days (eg. weekends) would probably limit to a large degree the number appointments (time) they book.

4. The haggling is frequently done by the insurance companies and the Dr's offices.

RollCNY

I think that is a good summary, and different environments reward different types of business models. As a teenager, I worked in a very small LBS, so my tolerance and expectations may be very different than others. I gravitate to the little shops, with one guy in the back working when you walk in, so you can walk in, check things out, and not feel accosted. Others expect a NASCAR team in the back and a sales floor in matching shirts (exaggerating of course ). When I see those things, I immediately think of too much overhead and idle time.

There are five shops in my area that I have used, and have had good experiences in all of them. I have also had some less than ideal exchanges in two of them.

Brian Ratliff

If I need the pedal tomorrow...

If I don't exactly know what I want or need...

On-line is risky; lots of chances for them to mess up your order, you don't have control over the exactly product you buy (you get to look at a pretty picture on the internet that is hopelessly out of date and might not actually be the product for sale), and you have zero control over shipping unless you pay through the nose.

There are lots of reasons to go with paying a premium for what's-in-my-hand-right-now vs. saving a few bucks buying that-which-is-not-in-my-hand-and-might-be-the-wrong-thing-that-will-arrive-next-week-or-so.