glutton for punishment!!

[sideshow_bob]

At what point do you stop supporting your LBS? I regularly use 2 shops to have work done. One near where I work (in Sydney) and one out in the suburbs where I live. In a perfect world I'd probably just use the one near where I live, but there are times that it's difficult to get a bike out there during the week for pickup before say racing that weekend or picking up items like tires, tubes, pumps etc. All in all I've spent about $2k in each shop over the last 12-18 months. Both give good face to face customer service and are very friendly.

I've used the LBS near where I work (and they will remain nameless) for a couple of years. The last 6 months however some of the service they've done has been a little questionable and some have been very ordinary like lacing a set of mtb wheels with nipples and spokes of different guages. Anyway I needed some work done on my roadbike and decided that I might as well have a full service done at the same time.

On picking up the bike I was excitedly thinking about riding on the weekend after a week with a ****ling cold and didn't really go over the work done in detail. On walking out the shop I notice the headset is loose, so I go back in and giving them some slack on a Friday afternoon ask if they can look at it. A few minutes later I'm ready to go.

This morning I go to start riding an the gears are completely screwed. The front derailler is rubbing on the small chainwheel and barely gets the chain up to the large chainwheel where it rubs like crazy. My goodness I think you'd actually need to work quite hard to do an adjustement that bad!! So back to the garage and 15 minutes later I'm good to go and everything is running nice and smooth. A couple of k's into the ride, I think "gee these brake levers are way out there". The levers are campag chorus with the brake release botton in the levers. On closer inspection .... yes they are way out because they've been adjusted with the brake release pins set to out. I finished the ride and let the cables out and redid the brake adjustments.

So I guess this thread is "share your horror experiences" and also a question. At what point would you give your LBS the flick? I'm done with them now, but am in hindsight asking why I didn't do it 6 months ago!!

--brett

 

[violto]

I have a simmilar setup to you - I shop at two different bike shops. One is on the way to work and the other is near my home. Both shops sell different brands of bike - the work one selling european bikes and the other selling the Trek/klein/lemond taiwan varieties.

Despite the fact I've never bought a bike from them I've always taken my bikes to the close to home shop for all my services and wheel builds because I've been extrememly impressed by their friendly attitude and no bullsh*t advice over the years. Unfortunately, for some reason in recent months, the service has really dropped off and they have churned through the staff - two of my regular mechanics no longer work there. The final visit to that shop came about two weeks ago when I took my new 'european' bike in for a look at the rear derailer.

As soon as I had it in there, they started bagging my bike and telling me how **** it was and how I should have bought a Trek/Klein/Lemond from them. They treated me like I was a complete child and honestly, I have rarely felt more insulted in my life. I just walked out of there never to return.

My guess is that the boss has put the pressure on the sales staff to sell more bikes and this has come at the expense of their service attitude which is understandable. Let me say that this shop ONLY sells taiwanese bikes where they make heaps more per bike sale than what anyone could on a european bike. I'm not qualified to comment on the financial situation of the shop but suffice it to say that they are ALWAYS busy - do they really need to increase sales?

When I was shopping around for a new roadie a few months ago, I got a quote on a TREK 1500 from them and bargained the price down $250. Hell they're probably still making a 10-15% profit, imagine paying full price?

Cheers

Timbob

 

[Skull]

Violto/Sideshow

I read an article (6months ago) in one of the many cycling mags that I have bought, that stated that even brands such as Colnago, Bianchi, Cannondale just to mention a few are getting thier frames/bikes built in Taiwan.

I have also read a post on a different forum that while the author may of had some hidden agenda, he did make some good points about bikes built in Taiwan. From memory he had visited a factory and was impressed with the quality of employee and technology that was being used (there was more to his post than that but thats all I can remember in a nutshell). The above article did mention price of production of these bikes are lower and passed on to the buyers (we hope).

To both you and Sideshow don't be too loyal to your shop. I would mention it to the manager/owner or just don't go there again. Its your hard earned and your pride and joy. If I was you Sideshow, I would of been back to that shop that did the service in a flash, or as soon as practicable.

Me personally, never really had a bad experience with my LBS as its more of a friendly aquaintance now that I have bought 2 bikes from them. My closest shop is very average but then and again I 've never bought a bike from them.

Cheers
Skull