ecnewell 

I work at a university, and there are a fair number of C&V bicycles (well, V anyway) on any given bike rack that I happen to walk past. I would say around 15-20%. I see a fair number of Treks, Motobecanes, Cannondales, and early 90s mountain bikes. I can't say for sure whether their riders appreciate them as collector's items or just like that they were inexpensive, but at least they're being ridden.

Chrome Molly

By a single family, usually. By that I mean, gotta move all the dusty stuff out of the garage and basement when you move out. Rummage sale or kid that's now grown that might not want the bike back will turn the bike out into the market. Then if it's any good there's a large chance that it will get broken up into components and sold (many here do just that). Or, it will die a slow death on campus bike racks. Or, in very rare cases the bike will be purchased by someone who takes care of it and appreciates it for what it is.

But, by all means, go ahead and tear your house down.

jet sanchEz

I think the C&V bubble popped a couple of years ago.

After many ups and downs, I see cycling in general as still pretty popular and it doesn't seem to be getting any less popular. But I doubt we will ever see cycling get as mainstream as it was during the Lance Armstrong days. That was a crazy era, everyone and their uncle was out on a bike and I think C&V was just along for the ride.

gomango

Agreed.

I love my older bikes, but my Yeti SB5 has totally won my heart.

I used to spend an hour plus a day digging through CL or ebay.

Not anymore.

I put all of that time into riding the bikes I have.

If something interesting pops up, I'm always open to take a look see.

Gone are the days of driving around Minnesota to pick up bikes.......

uncle uncle

Is there really any sort of equipment connected exercise or sport (if your participation is in a competitive arena) where you go out and use old equipment? Guys don't go out and use old baseball bats, or golf clubs, or frizzbees do they? I just talked this weekend with my brother-in-law, and our conversation touched on old guns and bows... and he mentioned that they let my fathers bow sell on auction because new bows are so much easier to use for hunting. I guess bicycles are an extension of other forms of transportation, and there lies some of our connection to nostalgia and keeping them around. Certainly old cars, and where pricing and collectableness, may offer some correlative insights. Some people do have older "drivers" within the collectible automotive grouping, but many seem to be more "Sunday driver" or "show" items. As it's been noted many times before, automobiles and bicycles were never the same thing, and never will be, even in a collectible sense.

Bikerider007

This is an extremely difficult subject to pin down.

Will there be some finds, yes. I still see a good amount coming out of Italy and it's a small country (granted lots of builders). Tougher with time of course but values and cost are pretty stable so if you don't mind market or close you should be fine, though being vigilant goes a long way for a very good buy or find. The bubble was like housing, thinking all decent models will increase and buying things up, which inflates values short term. Also like the housing bubble that popped, many were buying as investment.

The group that rode in the 60s, 70's and 80's picked up or touted much of this as it's what they owned. Some are getting to an age where drop bars, harder ride (if they get on a carbon they may not come back), reaching for a shifter and not having the safest brakes are an inconvenience if they still ride. If they are collectors, or are just passionate about the history, that is another aspect. Also, starting to see more of the older generation liquidating their collection or bikes as well, so there may be some finds there as not everyone knows exactly what they have, or may offer a fair price just to get rid of. Especially for bulk buys. In addition, many do not like using Ebay and setting up and CL has it's fair share of flakes (and fn spammers!) so sellers burn out, etc. and just drop price.

FB and Instagram trend different and younger. I just got a message a couple days ago about a bike I posted. It was something like "that is a sweet whip!". And bikes that are collectible for the 90s are already starting to show a good following. Here a 90s is rarely mentioned. FB pages are still being added often for steel and the following of steel is large. Sales and finds are quite active.

The one thing that may prolong this era's life is that steel and change were abundant, so volume of available collectibility may be higher for some time. Also, the gears were sufficient to ride, as by the 70s most were at least 10 speeds so hills are fine unless you are serious about racing. This would be the aspect of which many have referenced classic cars. Muscle cars are slower than many production now, you have to roll down the windows, tune the carburetor, no A/C in the seats (what!) etc. But you get looks and status for the highly collectible ones. And some are trailer queens like wall hangers. Just a higher level and there are less of them with much more value when they are rare.

With all that said, and it potentially being off base, the nicer stuff will always be nice and has more of a chance of keeping value or increasing. In the 80s about 10m (also why it's tough to compare to cars, most people wouldn't know a dirty DeRosa from a clean Peugeot) per year were produced. Knowing what you have or want is a big part of how much you should spend, or how well you do on a purchase.

Rollfast

Hopefully forward and not downhill so much.

Rcrxjlb

Just got interested in C&V bikes 3 years ago, and now you say the supply is dwindling?

Guess i'll stick with the low end bikes (Univegas, Raleigh Records, Schwinn World Sports)

Or else i'll start collecting Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars...

Chrome Molly

I ride retro roadie steel (10 or 11sp cassette stuff) in my club rides. Most of them become pretty aggressive rides. I give up maybe 2-4 lbs on the most expensive bikes in the group, but give up very little in terms of performance in most aspects. Interestingly, many of the newest expensive bikes showing up weigh pretty much the same as my lightest bikes due to their disc brakes (which are completely unnecessary for our group rides). If I didn't consider my retro roadie dujour as fast enough I would just buy a new bike. Most of my bikes are more interesting to me than anything I could pick up for under five grand. Not faster but more interesting...

For gravel I ride vintagish steel also. There the right gearing and tires matter more than any other factor IMO.

Off road there is no doubt that modern is faster. Although there is some upside having your local trail be challenging on a rigid bike instead of a yawn on a suspended rig.

All that said the market seems off as compared to a couple years ago. Bikes with brifters are now down in price and the midrange and lower end DT shifted bikes sit for months even at very reasonable prices. For that reason I have only been upgrading the quality of my bikes very carefully, trying not to n +1 on a net basis.

noglider 

I actually think supply is increasing since it is easier to learn of a bike's location anywhere on the planet.

sdn40

I think it depends on the new bike trends as well. Seems like it's either $800 for an LBS bike or $100 for department store. Price point vs the economic times we live in.
I compare bikes to craft beer. All of the sudden brewers found out people would pay a premium for craft beer and it exploded. I don't know how much higher they can push new bike prices before people start turning their backs. With no real budget options, people will continue to use the internet to find out quality C&V can be had for prices that are easier to swallow. I know I won't be spending $800 on a new bike any time soon, out of principal if nothing else. Then again, I'm in Wisconsin and a recreational rider.

randyjawa 

The supply of vintage bicycles is dwindling! Absolutely! The supply is not and cannot increase, unless we invent a time machine, go back in time and build more bikes for us to find today. When I used to collect bicycles, this is what I would find, three times a week, just at the Dump. I salvaged all that I could, but how many did I miss...



And how many have fell prey to the metal crusher at all the other Dumps, around the world. The supply is dwindling!

Missed? One day, I saved this Raleigh Competition from the Dump...



The next day, I watched this one being crushed right before my eyes...



Noglider brings up an interesting point, but not that supply is increasing. It is availability that has increased. Vintage bicycles today, compared to before Ebay and the internet, are easy to find. Incredibly easy, if you do the correct things to find them. And, lucky for me, I found this at the Dump, years ago, and took it out for a nice chilly ride yesterday...



But how many have I, we, missed?

Schwinn me

Don't worry Schwinn's will always be available.

duane041

As far as trends in purchasing go, younger folks are all over the map. If I am to draw some sort of conclusion based on sales at our vintage goods booth we sell at over the summer, you never know WHAT the next group of buyers will like.

Big sellers for us? Pre-recorded Cassette tapes, vintage clothing with Sears, K-Mart, or JCPenney labels, "Bob Ross" style oil paintings, colorful figural ceramic planters, tacky textiles (especially table cloths and place mats).

So I guess that bikes could go anywhere.

qcpmsame 

To me its driven by what we remember from our youth, and just into the young adult years, as being things we either truly enjoyed using/riding, or we couldn't afford to purchase. No empirical evidence what so ever, purely based on observations and my own experiences. I now own examples of the type of bicycle that I wanted as a young teenager, and as newly minted "adult". My memory of bumming rides, just hanging out in the LBS in our area, or if I traveled I would seek out some shops just to look (and drool of course.)

I see some C&V riders that are seeking that one special bike that touched them somehow. Certainly there are collectors and those people that see a particular bicycle, then they are inclined to find one to satisfy the need that originated from their initial contact. If someone is looking at this as an investment means, as said multiple times previous to my reply, that is going to be a rude awakening for them. JMO.

Bill

dunrobin

Good steel, with good modern components, gives up nothing to carbon or aluminum. The stereotypical steel enthusiast might not up the cool factor for the young or pretentious hip. I guess the question is other than for those in the business how and why does it matter to us? I don't care to be fashionable..do you?
It is easily possible to build a 15lb steel racer but not with vintage, and not without funds. A perfectly serviceable vintage doesn't require real funds...but prestige does and always has.

We see trends with carbon as well. Not so long ago top end carbon frames were super stiff as well as superlight. Good for a racer but beat the cap out of a casual enthusiast. Now Im seeing seat stays lowered, a move back toward 27.2 and smaller seatposts, all for more vertical compliance..as well we have endurance bikes, gravel bikes, generally bikes with bigger tyre clearances and a more upright position with a 'supple' ride for the masses. Same with mtbs; when they were first introduced tomac raced on almost a road bike geometry...long, low and aggressive with narrow clearance so you could actually ride through a tight trail. Now trails are wide, mtbs are wide, and plush with an upright position so the masses can ride WITHOUT real skill...how many people can still do wheelies or bunnyhop? Even jumps and drops don't need any real skill other than a decent sense of balance. Why bother with skill...you can just BUY ability.
Anyway the point is bikes have evolved for the masses....just like everything else....but it does seem they've moved forward by moving back..just like mtb wheel diameters.

I like to woodwork and have put together a nice collection of OLD cast iron tools..built better, solid and reliable compared to anything at a decent price today. Even my Reno tools are the old Dewalt nicacd 18v xr stuff. It performs, and the batteries last longer than 2 years unlike the new fangled lithium stuff. New is not necessarily better...but old for olds sake seems kinda biased as well.
Take the best of both, and just ride. If you're in the market, enjoy being a contrarian.

KonAaron Snake 

Robots and plastics. In the future our robotic masters will ride us like bicycles. My age will make me "vintage", though not classic.

tiredhands 

I'd warrant a guess that I'd be considered a younger person compared to others in the C&V community, and I'm by no means a collector, rather an enthusiast who values quality design at attainable prices. I can satisfy my desire to tinker with a very nice mid-range Japanese bicycle found on Craigslist for less than $200, enjoy the ride for a while, and sell it later to fund another project. I can't do that with modern bicycles, either due to the initial investment cost or the multitude of proprietary "standards" used in modern engineering. All of my "keepers" are V, although some have modern-ish drivetrains as those parts are more affordable and backwards-compatible. I can't foresee that changing at all, unless I get something custom-made. So I guess I can speak to the persistence of interest in C&V stuff in the younger demographic.

At a recent bike swap I met a guy who was buying bicycles in a way that I would describe as "indiscriminately." He bought one of mine, an early Univega mountainbike-turned gravel tourer, and he claimed that he was a collector of bicycles on a very large scale, as in hundreds. This guy was also younger, probably around 40. He said that he was diversifying his investment porfolio, as it were, by acquiring mountain bikes and hybrids as he was afraid that the C&V market was going to collapse due to the generational passing of the baby boomers, and that their collections of vintage goods were going to flood the market. It was an interesting conversation, as he seemed to approach bicycle collecting as a real investment. My bicycle, while pretty neat, was not at all what I would consider collectible or valuable, nor were most of the others he purchased that day. I suppose that when working with such numbers as he claimed to have there might be some marginal returns on each bicycle making the investment profitable. It seems untenable, though.

KonAaron Snake 

As said by others...bicycles are not an investment. Buy what you like to own, ride, collect...etc. Your bike may appreciate down the road, but it probably won't. The really top end stuff will likely keep its value.

Some of what might be getting confused here are the different types of value/market for different bikes all being thrown under the label C and V...a Japanese 105 bike that sells for $250 isn't a collector thing...it's being bought because it's a lot of bang for the buck as transportation. I think those bikes will continue to be valued in that capacity...though they may go up or down in value. I suspect older rigid MTBs will increasingly become popular as utility transportation.

As far as the high end road stuff...I think the 80s bikes will probably take some hit, but the higher end ones will still be desirable. The older ones...pre-boom particularly...will retain value based on scarcity. It doesn't take a huge market for demand...just a small number of people for a smaller number of bikes. Compared to most collector markets, bikes are cheap.

corrado33

Unfortunately, the C&V market in my town is gone. Mainly because the interest in road biking is also gone. I talked to my friend who is a purchasing manager for a bike shop the other day and he said that last year he sold 2... that's right... 2 road bikes.

Admittedly he does work at one of the well known mountain bike shops in town, but they still stock plenty (20 or so) road bikes.

I think road biking itself is dwindling and mountain biking is taking over.

KonAaron Snake 

Road bikes are like rock n' roll...they'll never die, but they go through some lean times.

dunrobin

I live in Toronto. Bikes and cycling in general is booming. Even vintage, though mostly for commuting. I'm amazed at the quality of commuter bikes downtown.
If I were to open a bike shop it would strictly be for service. The ability to change a flat tire is a skill lost. Even basic gear tuning. Once upon my father's time a can of oil and a grease tube were standard fare in a garage...now not so much.

himespau 

I think a lot of it is either what we really wanted as a youth, what we rode as a youth, or aesthetics that were popular at some key point in our development. As demographics change, what is relevant to the new demographic's youth will change as well.

qcpmsame 

I agree with your view completely, I should have clearly said that my thoughts were solely reflecting my own motivation, in the first portion of my reply. To try and use a blanket answer for the future direction our part of cycling will take is well beyond my abilities though.

The replies here seem to all have largely viable chances to bw what we see. But, we could well experience parts of each possible path, or something entirely unexpected will happen.

Bill

CampioneDItalia

I'm from Southern Ontario. I think high end 1980s/90s bikes from prestige manufacturers (Pinarello, Colnago, Bianchi etc) will get more and more expensive. I find locally there's hardly any supply out there.

Asking prices for new listings of stuff are higher today than say, 2-3 years ago. They may not be selling through at those prices, but as more people get used to seeing these elevated prices, eventually the sell-through prices will climb as well.

I've sold a number of high end manufacturer bikes the last few years. I'd say 2/3 of the people who bought were under the age of 25, with a number of them in their teens. So there is a bit of a following among the younger generation for sure.