The article is kind of a biased puff piece. There were many statements the author made in that article that made the company Campagnolo, or its president Valentino Campagnolo, sound pretty suspect in both reasoning and motivation behind its decision making and I really would've like to hear more of a critical analysis of some of these statements. But like I said the author is really only interested in putting Campagnolo on a pedestal and not really writing a neutral piece of literature.
Red wine is served in the lunch room.
No wonder it took them so long to develop an electronic group.
"It was a forced decision," he told me. When he took over the company in 1983, he said, "I didn't have any special strategy. I didn't have any special management skills in how to handle the company outside of Italy."
At least he admits it.
The airplane giant Boeing recently learned this lesson the hard way.
I don't even know where to begin on how impossible it is to compare Boeing's outsourcing with Campagnolo's in house manufacturing. Completely incompatible.
In 2007, the component company FSA ran a series of ads in cycling magazines (including this one) in which it claimed to make the world's lightest crankset: 633 grams, compared with the Super Record crankset, which weighed 652 grams....And now the U.S. branch of FSA—based in Mukilteo, Washington, a sleepy town north of Seattle—was claiming its cranks were better?
So basically FSA claims that it makes a lighter crank and Campagnolo wastes a huge amount of money and other people's time on a frivolous lawsuit that they end up losing.
Last year the company introduced the Super Record groupset...But fixing the new chain required a special, $299 tool—the most expensive chain tool ever produced.
Granted the price for this tool has come down, but it's still a $150 + tool.
My main issue with Campy is serviceability. Very few techs in America are familiar with Campagnolo. Also, sometimes the parts are tough to get (although not usually). Have you ever tried to deal with a warranty issue with Campy? I haven't, but I can't imagine that it's very easy given the 5 North American employees. Why should I care if Campy lasts longer when SRAM customer service is so awesome that they immediately send me a replacement part for any issue I have? Not that I'm convinced that Campy lasts any longer, I've seen people have way more issues with Campy components (mostly shifters and cranks) than with Shimano or even SRAM, which is impressive because I know so few people that use Campy.
I could go on and on but I've already wasted too much time.