On Apr 24, 9:54 am, stratrider <
[email protected]> wrote:
> Within the last 10 years, we have seen big boys like BikeE, Vision,
> and Burley ultimately fail to stay afloat with recumbents.
From what I've read, each of them failed for different reasons and the
main "fault" wasn't really specific to being in the recumbent bike
businesses, though obviously if they were just yet another DF bike
maker, they'd probably do things differently.
> Within the
> same period, we have seen the birth of Bacchetta, Volae, Barcroft, and
> others as well as the endurance of Easy Racers and RANS. So how do
> they do it? Are these companies making a profit after they pay their
> bills?
Don't forget Catrike and Wizwheelz. I think Catrike made some of
their financial results public last year, didn't they (and if I
recall, they were in the black)?
> How do they get their products in the dealers store? RBR in
> State College, PA (great store by the way) stocks no dual 26 LWB
> RANS. Jays in Philly (also nice store) stocks only RANS but is also a
> dealer for Easy Racers and Bacchetta. I just don't get it.
I guess those of us *currently* in the recumbent market have different
needs and expectations than those in the DF market.
We need more hands on experience with the products since there's so
much more variation, but we also realize we're not going to be able to
walk to the LBS, try everything and get what we want. This obviously
contributes to the market remaining smaller than it might otherwise be
since some folks who'd like a recumbent don't even know they exist.
When we shop around different places, it's not so much to find the
best price and/or service on basically the same product, it's to find
the product, period. We're used to doing it. It's not a good thing
to have to do it, but we've done it, and I suppose we find it
worthwhile to do it.
We probably also do more (and more substantive) research ahead of time
and have been used to buying blind sometimes, then selling if
dissatisfied. So while I might not be able to try a dual 26 LWB RANS
in the local shop, if I've ridden a 26/20 Stratus, and know that I
hated it (just personal preference for me), and if the consensus is
that the dual 26 RANS bikes are more of the same, but bigger, then I
know not to bother. If I love the 26/20 Stratus and want something
like it, but dual 26, then I'd feel pretty comfortable having the
local RANS dealer with just a Stratus and Rocket on the sales floor
order the dual 26 for me, without feeling like it's a risk for either
of us.
In the case of Volae and later Bacchetta and Easy Racers, they've made
buying "blind" less risky by offering pretty generous return policies
when buying from them direct at MSRP (though at least in the case of
Bacchetta, bypassing the bike shop is a last resort). If they do a
good job in getting the bike sized and setup properly to minimize the
likelihood of returns (and from what I've read, they do a great job
with it), then more of their product gets out into customers' hands
and stay there even if there's no local bike shop available to handle
it.