In the LBS where I bought my Stratus, the young guys that work there seem to have total distain for bents. While this LBS is where I bought my Rans Stratus and the Tailwind before that, they do not even stock 1 bent at the presesnt time. With the attitude of the sales people, they certainly wont sell many bents, unless someone comes in and specifically asks if they sell any. I guess I dont understand the attitude. With that attitude, bents will remain a 1 or 2 precent of total bike sales

Oh well all of us that ride bent know the advantages of bents, and it will be up to us to spread good news of bent ridding.

So which do you think came first: the chicken or the egg?

Bike shops are going to stock whatever they think will give them the best return on their investment.

I agree with both your points. I bought my trike at the only dedicated 'bent shop I know thats not too far away(still an hour). Most of the bike shops where I live say they don't have the room to work on it. But really they seem to be intimidated, it's only a bike, the same parts only configured differently!

I guess I'm lucky, my LBS, that I've bought MTB's and Hyrbirds from, totally went out of their way to help me get a "Recumbent" at a good price and have "busted balls" getting me the "odd accessiories" that recumbents use. No they don't "stock" Recumbent's, there mainly a "old fashion FAMILY" bicycle shop and their moto is they will "work" on ANY Bicycle (or trike). They've worked on my Wal-Mart POS's when I was "down and out" and have worked with my "finding my way" thru different types of DF bikes.

Before I bought a recumbent from my LBS, I went to the local, "Recumbent Shop", it was more like a nice "Garage", with a bunch of demo recumbents and NO accessiories in the show room. I told them I had "very limited" funds and there was only a few models of Recumbents I could afford. They kept beating on me to, "spend 2-3 hours" and ride all the types of bents, I told them for ME, it's a waste of time as if what I liked cost , several thousands, I'm NOT able to buy. I kinda felt like I was a "PILGRUM", standing infront of a "Guru or Yogi", LOL, thought I started hearing "Sittars" and "chants". I guess this is great, if you have a "unlimted budget" but for ME, it just didn't click!

Went back to the LBS and told them, which SUN recumbent's bicycle, (That's the recumbent brand they can sell), I wanted they bent over backwards, getting the bikes in and had me come in and be shown the "build up" and worked with me to make sure I got my "FIT" ok. For the wife, I had them switch out the std. cranks for "MTB" cranks as she's not a very strong rider and need the easier gears and my LBS, gave me "NO PROBLEMS", doing the switch and getting it right, quickly and we rode away VERY happy recumbent owners! So unless I decide to go to a different recumbent than SUN, I'll be buying and SPENDING at my LBS!

Oooh! B.J., you so lucked out! Here in Sweden, I cringe every time I have to go into an LBS for something and tell them I have a 'bent. You can just watch their faces twist in contempt and I get the predictable, "Get a real bike." comment. Predictably, they want me to get a 'real bike' from them.

My husband finally found a shop willing to deal CHEERFULLY with my 'bent. It's about 50 miles away and I had a good laugh when he told me it's a very high end shop that supplies professional racing teams their bikes. The shop supplying the hard-core cycle purists is most happy to work with my bent? But then, they embraced carbon fiber and other advances. Why not a different geometry?

I've found that the cyclists who are most threatened by recumbents are the Cat 4/5 racer wannabees. The more elite riders figure a bike's a bike.

You frequently get this problem, at least in the US.

Bike shops can't afford to pay much, but one thing they can offer is discounts on merchandise.
So they end up attracting younger racer-wannabe guys who want to ride on the newest equipment, at a discount, and who don't care about anything else.

There's a guy who used to run a pretty-famous recumbent company, who posts on the newsgroups.
He said after a store started carrying his bikes, he would go in and ask questions about it when he knew the owner wasn't there.
Usually all the employees present would say that they didn't know anything about it, only one guy did, and he'd have to come back when that guy was there.

He tried putting them in shops because he felt that local shops were the best place to sell--and the shop OWNERS were all for putting one or two bents on the floor and seeing how they sold.
Most of the time though, not only would the employees not try to sell it at all, but they wouldn't even answer simple questions. Their service was downright negative about it.

In Kansas City there are a few LBS that sell recumbents. My first shop owner said he wanted nothing to do with them. So I take my business to the ones that are intrigued with a recumbent.

Same attitude I got from the only LBS in town - when I bought my DF from them.... needless to say, I go to the LBS 2 towns over now. It is a family run LBS. Father and 3 sons and they don't care what you ride as long as it is pedal powered. They happily work on it and get you what ever you want to buy. I only wish I knew about them before when I rode DF and before I'd bought my 2 bents.

I might add the owner of the LBS gave me great deals on my Rans bikes. I guess the only thing I can fault him for is not stocking more bents. But part of that could be he gets no sales support from the young guys.

Fortunatly there is a LBS in town now that is mainly a bent shop, and there is one about 50 miles away that does a lot of bent sales.

Bottom line its just the attitude of the young and their inexpirence.

This is spot on. We have a shop in the area that stocks a few bents fro time to time but when they have stocked more, they sit for a year or two. Sure, bents need knowledgeable and enthusiastic sales advocates but even when they have some, interest from customers is still a small percentage of the traffic.

Anytime I go into a bike shop that is not a full time recumbent dealer, I hope for the best and expect the worst. I just don't understand the animosity/disinterest many cyclists that are not bent riders have toward bents, but it clearly exists. Even in the Touring Section of this forum (I've found that bents are the ultimate touring bike) very few want to even consider a bent. With my above stated attitude, I'm never dissapointed, and actually have been surprised a number of times when I've gone into a shop for repair/parts and the LBS person says, "Well, we don't sell bents but I'd be happy to work on yours".

+1:

My experience (and attitude on this subject) mirrors "ErictheFishs' ".

Your experience and expectations will, of course, vary.

I'm always more than a little surprised when I hear about LBS mechanics that are apprehensive about working on a bent. I can understand a greenhorn trainee but a seasoned mechanic that can not take one look and realize that other than basic geometry and a few idlers, they are just bikes with mostly standard bike parts. Any mechanic worth his salt should be able to use his basic aptitude and take care of business. I'll work on anything with pedals.

It all points to one thing 'bent owners must do; Learn to do all your own maintenance and repair work. You won't be dependent on LBS with bad attitudes, and you can save by getting parts online. You can save enough on parts and labor to pay for the tools you'll need. bk

Never Look Back

The only thing I haven't learned to do is to build wheels... I've considered it, but didn't want to make the equipment investment.

Sounds like a win-win to me.

There are a lot more Chevy or Ford or whatever dealers than Ferrari dealers. If you owned a Ferrari would you take it to the closest dealer just because they were convenient or you liked the people? Would you complain "they should know how to work on Ferraris" too?

Guess I'm different, for me it's way easier to work with the "People I Like" and want to work with ME at the LBS, than heavy GURU attitude of the local recumbent shop. Luckily, my LBS works on Ferrari's too!

The best point posted is the fact the shop guys shouldnt be afraid of bents. As pointed out except for a couple of idlers (rocket science there) all the componets are the same. In fact most of the componets are straight off the mountain bike shelf.

I suspect it has more to do with shop arrangement and set up. When I owned my own shop I'd clamp recumbents into a resistance trainer and bend over to work on them on the floor. To me it was extra money so I could work on them after everybody else left in the evening and wouldn't be in anybody else's way. For a more typical shop set up it might become a choice between tuneing up 3 conventional bikes or 1 recumbent. The economics don't work out very well and it's not something that's easy to explain to a customer.

If you work on a lot of recumbents the whole dynamic changes. You simply set up your shop for working on recumbents. One of the first things that I did after buying my own personal recumbents was to set up my home shop so that I could work on them without having to bend over constantly.

The bottom line is that a business has the right to define itself. If you don't like something that they do or choose not to do, go someplace else. They'll either learn to get along without you or they'll change their business plan to include you and customers like you.

Guess I'm really lucky my LBS is GREAT on anything. When I got back into riding I bought a couple of MTB's for my wife and I there. Pretty much buy most of my accessories there as Jeff's prices are as good or better than most of the deals I can find on the web. He's an ace mech and a young man trying to get established and succeeding. When I needed help on my sons bike He recommended the best value repalcement parts for the use and rider.
When I got to the point I couldn't ride a diamond frame ,as he didn't sell them I bought one of the tadpoles off ebay .
I did a fair job of putting it all together but it just wasn't quite right and I knew it. Hoped on the bike and down to the shop to ask a couple a questions. Next thing I knew Jeff had it on his stand making adjustments. Time he got done , he had found some parts that should have been included in te shift linkage and tuned everything up and made sure it all fit right. spent a couple of hours helping, didn't really charge enough for what he had done the bike was great now. It was his first recumbent so he was learnining and enjoying the new technology. Felt like when I was a kid and Mr wilson at the shop would take the time to teach me how to fix my bike, really is an old fashioned shop.

I've been to the bent shop that Bjjoondo is probably referring to. I can understand what he is saying, though in their defience they are VERY enthusiastic and outgoing which could possibly put off some kinds of buyers. BUT I doubt you will find more knowlegable people anywhere, or see and demo a greater selection of the wide variety of bents that are available. Or find anyone as enthusiastic to "convert" others to the Bent 'religion!'
My wife and I were through that shop once while passing through your town, and were impressed with their outgoing enthusiasm and huge knowlege of the miriad of bents available. We actually got a kick out of their enthusiasm and time willingly taken with us even though they knew we already had bents and were not in the market for any more and we laughed about it for 100 miles down the road. Something you probably won't find at a LBS. Their eagerness was unbelievable, but I suppose could put off the occasional prospective buyer! One might interpret their enthusiasm like when you go to a third world country and every street vendor runs out and tries to sell you something. That drives me nuts, and I could see someone interpreting good service and enthusiasm along the same lines.

But yes, you have to work with whomever you like and get along with and fits with your own likes and dislikes.

Up here in ND its pretty rare to find a bent for sale in any shop, and if you do see one, it sits in the shop forever and finally gets sold as a deep discount. However, all of the LBS's work on them and do a pretty good job despite the bent's few quirks with longer chains and cables, etc. As has been pointed out, most salespeople know little if nothing about the pros and cons of bents, or even know basics like the difference between LWB/SWB/MBB/CLWB so tend to avoid questions and inquiriies about them, or even worse, parrot on a lot of the nonsense that we all hear about bents.
Once in a while though, the LBS's will refer interested bent wannabees to me for demonstration and advice, and are only to happy to order a new bent for a wannabe. "Dunno much about them but if you are interested call Bob and he'll anwer all your questions and let you ride one of his!"

I do most of any work required on my bent, myself. But once when I felt I needed to take it to a non bent LBS, I did feel the puzzlement the junior staff had for my ride. No problem for me, I just felt it was their lack of experience that limited their ability handle my request smoothly. That was a quite a while ago, I still go to said LBS for DF support. People have disdain for things they do not understand. I happens that Bents are one of those things.

+1 ...and a cyclist is a cyclist.

SP
Bend, OR

I've had some poor experiences with different LBS in my area but the worst, by far, is the shop my trike was purchased from. They were happy enough to sell it to me but treat me with a range of attitudes, from complete indifference to utter contempt, if I ask them to do anything on it. When I had problems with it not shifting correctly, I was told it was my imagination. When my "imaginary" problem got worse, I was told to leave my trike and they'd look at it, but it would probably be a week or two before they had the time. They told me my warranty checkup would take two weeks too. When my husband wanted to buy a rack for my trike as a birthday present, they said it required a "special order" and charged him twice the MSRP for the product, claiming it was exclusively for recumbents. It wasn't and, in fact, was listed in their online catalogue for the regular price. They argued vehemently with him when I made him return it and only gave our money back after my husband showed the printout of their own website to a store manager, proving the model and stock numbers were the same. The shop is huge, they sell a gazillion bikes a year but they only appreciate you when you are waving your credit card over your head and hollering "sell me something expensive".