| > This is an incredibly self-serving thing for me to say, but we need to
| > get the word out that people need to put their money where their
| > priorities are, and in the past that's been with their cars, and if
| > they're going to move to cycling as a way of getting around, it may be
| > appropriate to spend a bit of money there as well. Or, to put it another
| > way, if you're going to move beyond the realm of bike-as-toy, and want
| > something functional, you might have to spend $300 or a bit more,
| > instead of $110 at *Mart.
|
| Mike,
|
| That's my point -- with so much attention being lavished on biking now,
| relatively speaking, now's the time to get your message out.
|
| As long as you're looking out for your customers' best interests, and I do
| believe you are, it's fine to serve yourself a bit too.
|
| Matt O.
Matt: There is another side to this too... which is that the high fuel
prices are going to be causing a lot of economic dislocation and suffering,
and there needs to be a certain amount of sensitivity to that as things get
worse. How much worse can things get? MUCH worse. I have yet to see any
projections for the cost of fuel oil for heating that so much of the East
Coast (your part of the world!) depends upon. Here on the left coast, aside
from gas for the car, we're pretty much separated by six degrees from most
of the direct effects of the increasing oil costs, and you're not going to
read about people dying out here because they can't afford to heat their
homes.
--Mike-- Chain Reaction Bicycles
www.ChainReactionBicycles.com
"Matt O'Toole" <
[email protected]> wrote in message
news
[email protected]...
| On Fri, 30 May 2008 15:27:10 -0700, Mike Jacoubowsky wrote:
|
| > "Matt O'Toole" <
[email protected]> wrote in message
| > news
[email protected]...
| >> Bike commuting has been featured a lot in the mainstream media lately
| >> but we know it's on everyone's radar when it hits the Today Show:
| >>
| >>
http://www.vabike.org/today-show-bike-use-soars-with-gas-prices/
| >>
| >> Now that we have everyone's attention, the time is ripe for bike
| >> advocates to deliver our message. Let's get busy, whether we're
| >> working nationally, statewide, locally, or person to person.
| >>
| >> Matt O.
| >
| > Matt: It's a double-edged sword. People are bringing junky old bikes,
| > often product that, in the industry, is referred to as a BSO (Bike
| > Shaped Object), and thinking that it has useful value as a utility
| > vehicle and, since it cost virtually nothing initially, it shouldn't run
| > much to repair it. You don't have to spend a fortune to have a decent
| > bike to commute on, but you cannot expect a 45 pound Magna
| > dual-suspension BSO to hold up to routine use, be easy to pedal, or
| > inexpensive to repair.
| >
| > There are some shops that have such low overhead (rural areas where rent
| > is cheap and the various costs of business much lower than in major
| > cities) that they can make a living repairing such bikes, but that's
| > not, unfortunately, a reasonable expectation in the very areas that are
| > most suited for bike commuting.
| >
| > This is an incredibly self-serving thing for me to say, but we need to
| > get the word out that people need to put their money where their
| > priorities are, and in the past that's been with their cars, and if
| > they're going to move to cycling as a way of getting around, it may be
| > appropriate to spend a bit of money there as well. Or, to put it another
| > way, if you're going to move beyond the realm of bike-as-toy, and want
| > something functional, you might have to spend $300 or a bit more,
| > instead of $110 at *Mart.
|
| Mike,
|
| That's my point -- with so much attention being lavished on biking now,
| relatively speaking, now's the time to get your message out.
|
| As long as you're looking out for your customers' best interests, and I do
| believe you are, it's fine to serve yourself a bit too.
|
| Matt O.
|
