Originally Posted by
noglider
You guys put up with a hell of a lot of incompetence and indifference. This would be intolerable in other areas, and it's also intolerable in other industries. I don't know why NYC traditionally has so many bad bike shops. They're not all bad, but too many area.
Try Larry's on 2nd Ave. I worked for him long, long ago. He's very good and always gives a good deal. He's an absolutely brilliant mechanic, and I learned a lot from him. He first learned the trade in Jamaica in the 50's or 60's. He said a Raleigh would come in a box, and had to build the wheels by lacing the spokes.
I'll certainly check out Larry's. However, I'll say that my experience in NYC hasn't been fundamentally different from my experiences in Denver, Sacramento, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, Boston, or Berkeley. Some shops have felt bad to me, and some have treated me well. Often, the shops that treated me well weren't right for other people with other needs. And some were better on some days and worse on others. It's always hard to get attention when a shop is busy, and people everywhere make mistakes.
For what it's worth, here are some highlight experiences/ shops in some other places:
1. Fastrack Bicycles in Santa Barbara, CA. Dave Lettieri was great to deal with for me.
2. NYC Velo here in New York. Andy, the owner, and several members of his team, especially Brett, have been very helpful and patient.
3. Missing Link in Berkeley, CA. Great people when I was there back in the early 90s. I hope it's still great, but who knows?
In all these cases, I got treated well, found the staff to be attentive when I needed them to be and patient when I was being really picky. I learned from them and felt like I paid a competitive price for great products and services. They were never the cheapest, but the little extra I paid felt vastly worthwhile.
Even so, I have always felt that I'd prefer to do my wrenching myself, and all these shops and people helped me move in that direction.
I'll also say that I've found that to be true across a lot of industries. It's certainly not limited to bikes!