Is anyone completely done with these absurd prices?

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guyc
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by guyc

smartyiak wrote:
Sat Dec 03, 2022 3:12 pm
guyc wrote:
Sat Dec 03, 2022 1:42 pm
I've just bought my first mountain bike for about 25 years. Just an Alu hardtail but new it cost me less than £1500 and has a pretty decent spec. I came away from the entire exercise thinking that the road scene is just taking the piss now. Especially when I looked at the Madone in the shop which was £14500. A top spec e-MTB was less than £9k.
I always get a chuckle out of this. I think "that MTB sure has as much "design" and "engineering" involved...plus: it has suspension! How can it be $XXXX cheaper????"

I feel the same about Sidi shoes. Top cycling shoes ~$550-600. Top moto boots: ~$550-600. There's gotta be as much tech in motorcycle boots and there's certainly more material. And I'd also question whether there's an "economy of scale" argument when talking these two niche products.
Sidi's are a good one - when I rode fast bikes I had Sidi boots and those seemed way more designed and tested.

octav
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by octav

smartyiak wrote:
Sat Dec 03, 2022 3:12 pm
guyc wrote:
Sat Dec 03, 2022 1:42 pm
I've just bought my first mountain bike for about 25 years. Just an Alu hardtail but new it cost me less than £1500 and has a pretty decent spec. I came away from the entire exercise thinking that the road scene is just taking the piss now. Especially when I looked at the Madone in the shop which was £14500. A top spec e-MTB was less than £9k.
I always get a chuckle out of this. I think "that MTB sure has as much "design" and "engineering" involved...plus: it has suspension! How can it be $XXXX cheaper????"

I feel the same about Sidi shoes. Top cycling shoes ~$550-600. Top moto boots: ~$550-600. There's gotta be as much tech in motorcycle boots and there's certainly more material. And I'd also question whether there's an "economy of scale" argument when talking these two niche products.
The same, you can buy a new Suzuki Vstrom moto 1000cmc with 10000 euros... cheaper than a Pinarello Dogma F with Ultegra Di2....

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flying
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by flying

Berzin1 wrote:
Sat Dec 03, 2022 1:04 pm
We need to collectively think outside the box. Start looking at smaller, boutique frame builders and release thyselves from this relentlessly obnoxious carbon aero fixation and consider other materials such as titanium, aluminum and even (dare I say) steel, which last I checked was still "real".
I personally love aluminum as a fair in between material.

But as to steel check this Isen 5.4kg climber (I have no idea about prices & they may be as pricey as the big boys but...)

When I consider going back to steel I always think I would like a smaller diameter tube like this.
These days they went do oversized to make up for thin walls.
But older smaller diameter steel had a great feel to it IMHO...

Image

jadedaid
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by jadedaid

flying wrote:
Sun Dec 04, 2022 3:14 am

But older smaller diameter steel had a great feel to it IMHO...
Agreed - there was something special about those small diameter frames. :)

inertianinja
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by inertianinja

I'm not sure where I land on this.

All the frustration with prices (including used market) is spot-on, however I don't think I'm going to just wait until prices come down, if they ever do.

On one hand, I know the "nice" bikes cost too much, and it's possible to build a good bike for less. In 2018 I built a FM-066 ($500 on AliExpress) with Red eTap and it was an amazingly fun bike to ride. Unfortunately I have to retire that frame and I'm not sure I want to do open mold for my next build.

On the other hand - cycling is what keeps me fit and sane. I have a high-stress job, 2 young kids, very little time...Nice bikes are fun to ride, they make the ride feel special, and help keep me motivated. I don't own cars, we don't (can't) really take vacations until the kids are older, etc. So if I'm getting something out of it -mental and physical health- I'm ok with it.

Also just in general - even before bike prices were nuts, people still scoffed at the prices of high end road bikes. The concept of spending even ONE thousand on a bicycle is crazy to many, but someone who spends all their disposable income on cars, watches, speakers - oh they're just passionate about their hobby. I mean is it really any weirder for us to spend $10k on a bike for training than a guy who spends $100k on a Porsche to sit in traffic on his commute?

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Kayrehn
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by Kayrehn

Well youtubers are forecasting a drop in price this and/or next year due to falling demand so perhaps the sticker price will be more 'realistic' rather than outrageous.

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fa63
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by fa63

I am not sure if the sticker prices will change a whole lot, but actual prices people are paying will certainly be a lot lower. You couldn't ask for any discounts at the height of the shortages; now 15-25% discounts will go back to being the norm.

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tymon_tm
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by tymon_tm

IMHO prices will need to get re-evaluated as some for instance seem to include kinda "shortage margin" - take Madone SLR 9; MSRP on that one is higher than prices of all components combined!
kkibbler wrote: WW remembers.

Maddie
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by Maddie

tymon_tm wrote:IMHO prices will need to get re-evaluated as some for instance seem to include kinda "shortage margin" - take Madone SLR 9; MSRP on that one is higher than prices of all components combined!
That's the case for almost all highend road bikes. And it's nothing new

AJS914
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by AJS914

This dawned on me over the last few years. In the past, full bikes from major manufacturers were always cheaper than the sum of the parts bought separately.

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tymon_tm
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by tymon_tm

Maddie wrote:
Sat Feb 18, 2023 5:14 pm
tymon_tm wrote:IMHO prices will need to get re-evaluated as some for instance seem to include kinda "shortage margin" - take Madone SLR 9; MSRP on that one is higher than prices of all components combined!
That's the case for almost all highend road bikes. And it's nothing new
uhm.. yes it is something very new, and disturbingly evil when you think about it. and I don't know about "most" either, because some don't sell framesets alone
kkibbler wrote: WW remembers.

wooger
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by wooger

inertianinja wrote:
Sat Feb 18, 2023 12:24 pm
Also just in general - even before bike prices were nuts, people still scoffed at the prices of high end road bikes. The concept of spending even ONE thousand on a bicycle is crazy to many, but someone who spends all their disposable income on cars, watches, speakers - oh they're just passionate about their hobby. I mean is it really any weirder for us to spend $10k on a bike for training than a guy who spends $100k on a Porsche to sit in traffic on his commute?
A modern car, especially a sporty one is thousands of times more complex than a bike engineering wise, and the raw materials alone are worth many times more.

The sports motorbike comparison is very valid - A bike with electronics, suspension, a high performance motor, farings, disc brakes and complying with a huge number of safety standards is a similar price to what Trek or Specialized are selling at the high end, let alone the more boutique brands.

Groupsets are kind of a fixed cost out of the manufacturer's hands, but Shimano are taking the piss with direct to consumer Di2 pricing vs mechanical - it should be cheaper, electronics are far easier to mass produce - and Di2 is laughably simple compared to all the other bluetooth wireless electronics available today - look at the drone market. We can but hope that Sensah put pressure on them in the near future, along with demand dropping.

Framesets seem to be the worst value component on a high end brand name bike - functional value vs. added cost in going from a $1000 alloy frame to the highest end $6/8/10k carbon frame is really minimal. Specialised selling the Allez Sprint for ~$3k is completely laughable. If Winspace et al need competent distribution with warranties in US/Europe + some bigger frame sizes and this will rapidly go away.

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tymon_tm
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by tymon_tm

that's true but we need to include the scale of producton - R&D costs per one car are probably far smaller than in case of a racing bike. car's life cycle is also longer - with a facelift in the middle it's ~5-7 years
kkibbler wrote: WW remembers.

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guyc
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by guyc

"R&D costs per one car are probably far smaller than in case of a racing bike'

I find that very, very hard to believe when you start to take into account just global differing safety standards, let alone anything else.

I'd love to see how the R&D for a new Tarmac is more than a new Mercedes C-Class....

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guyc
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by guyc

This is from 2010:

https://www.autoblog.com/2010/07/27/why ... ew-models/

"The price tag to develop a new vehicle starts around $1 billion. According to John Wolkonowicz, Senior Auto Analyst for North America at IHS Global, "It can be as much as $6 billion if it's an all-new car on all-new platform with an all-new engine and an all-new transmission and nothing carrying over from the old model." "

And in 2015 Mercedes were spending £10m a day on R&D.

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