this post was submitted on 16 May 2024
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I can believe that.
I hadn't bought a bike for years, and a few years ago managed to pick up a cheap second hand bike for £60. It wasn't a bad bike, but obviously nothing special. After the lockdowns, when every man and his dog seemed to take up cycling, I looked at getting a cheap new bike. The cheapest ones I could find were a few hundred pounds.
I looked at ebikes earlier this year, and the magazines and websites reviewing the cheap bikes were setting a minimum price of £1500 to avoid the cheaply made junk. Even second hand bikes were going for £800+
To put this in perspective, I can get a second hand motorbike for the same price range, and a car for around £1000. Obviously these are not going to be the best motorbikes or cars on the road, but they run, and will last for at least a few years.
They're putting out bikes that are well into nice used car territory, it's absurd. Shit, some of them are even brand new car prices. A lot of these manufacturers are smoking crack.
Cycling is still widely seen as a luxury or hobby, and hobbyists are wiling to pay top dollar so of course companies are going to exploit that.
Second hand market ftw!
I've seen this argument a lot, and I don't understand it. Few people are buying those high end bikes, and no one is forced to buy one. Using that as justification that the prices are out of control is just weird to me.
There is an argument about prices to be made. I just looked up the base model Specialized Allez with 8 speed Claris, and it retails for $1200. A few years ago that would have been an ~$800 bike, I think (albeit likely with rim brakes instead of disc). I don't know what all is driving the prices, inflation is certainly a factor.
But that conveys the issue way better than complaining about super bikes that cost $15k. The barrier to entry for a newbie has gone up that much.
Price gouging and greed are driving up the prices of everything, I think the criticism is very fair at this point.
I'm super into mountain biking, and never bought a new bike in my life. The last one i bought was the most expensive bike i ever owned by a long shot, it was practically new and it was like a third of what it would've been new. Dude who sold it said he likes it, but it was bad for climbing, because it was too heavy. He showed me his brand new bike. On the way home i thought: so the carbon bike with aluminium swing arm is too heavy? So i looked up his new bike, which was like £8000-£9000 pounds and was roughly 600 grams lighter than the bike i bought off him. Bike prices might be insane, but i often feel like it's the people's own fault. Cyclists buy absolutely everything no matter the cost it seems.
My friend told me that his boss saw my ebike when i bought some bread and had to get one himself. He's an out of shape baker, and he bought himself a 10k e-ountain bike. That's more than i paid for my ebike, my downhill bike and the enduro i ride almost daily.
You could say he had too much dough :D
I'll get my coat...
No no. That makes perfect sense... He was making more bread at his new job to afford the rising cost that is baked into a new bicycle
I paid $30 for a used mountain bike that I rode for years. The trick was that I bought it from a bike co-op that sold used bikes, so knowledgeable people had already looked it over and fixed it up and they offered cheap stands/tools/help for any work you needed to do yourself. Did many 25-mile round-trips from Northern Virginia to work in D.C. on that thing.
I wish things like that were more popular here. It's rare to hear about any sort of co-op, and they tend to be in the cities rather than out in the sticks where I am.
I wonder if ebay ebike conversion kits are still a thing. Did mine 15 years ago with an electric front wheel and it's still going today.
I did one a few years back to my mountain bike..mid drive motor driving the rear wheel. It was a nice little project.
Bafang make the kits and it had lots of power..I could cruise with throttle only at 40kph!
I sold it to fund a motorbike in the end.