Bike snobbery - or is it?

[highlandsflyer]

The bikes I have experience of in Asia would take whatever you threw at them here.

I guess LGF's friend must have had bad samples.

There is a lot more mud and rain than any of our bikes ever see, even our mountain bikes I should imagine!

 

[hydorah]

Again

This is a frequent topic in many threads usually where some dewy eyed hopeful has bought a Townsend Detonator off EBay for £30

I sympathise with the point of view here. I agree advising somebody of the multiple and manifest shortcomings of a typical BSO is not snobbery

But it is often delivered really badly by some guys and comes across as a slap in the face and then new guy gets his backup and shouts about snobbery etc etc... kaboom

 

[novekili]

I'd say bike snobbery relates more with a "I prefer my 500 euro 1990 Merlin titanium that I got on the bay to your 8000 Euros 2011 crapbon fiber rig" kind of attitude.

In this, I consider myself to be a bike snob

 

[nathanman]

but also isn't it the point that companys that provide the finer examples that some in here consider art...only exists by mass multiple cheaper object sales?

those that survive on the top end ..seem to be fast going under

Back in the day when Klein started making bikes aimed at the mountain biking fraternity, I think they were motivated by excellence.

That is what we need more of, regardless of how big the manufacturer.

IMHO the mountain biking fraternity (by which i mean the bike building companies) have had a complete change in ethos from a collaborative group to a mostly fratricidal bunch who don't really care about the community as a whole. Their sole purpose is now to make as much money as possible by catering to as many parts of the market as they can. There are very few companies building frames that solely stick to the high (and consequently price prohibitive)end of the market.

BSO's are a necessity of the market as the normal consumer doesn't expect their bike to last them for more than a year or two and really doesn't care if it doesn't. They get two years of admittedly poor riding enjoyment for about 60 quid (I spent more than that on a set of tyres last month for my kula deluxe) and don't know the difference as they have only ever ridden a BSO.

 

[hydorah]

Flawed assumption

There's a balance

Muddy Fox and Saracen got it wrong

Stoop too far - Make BSOs and you kill your brand allure

Specialized have been walking the tightrope the longest and with the greatest degree of success

But none of their bikes are BSOs

There is a distinction between commodity bikes and BSOs

 

[Rich Aitch]

Seems to me that there are two definitions of B.S.O and I wonder if it relates to which side of the bike shop window you are/ were on?
I suspect that if you had your nose pressed against the shop window admiring what was inside then you tended to think that there is a definite B.S.O cut off point- bikes costing less than X or made by Y. I'm as guilty as this as anybody in t'day I'd have said about £200 and Emmelle/Townsend. But I never challenged my assumptions by riding any, so I could have been wrong.
People posting about this who have worked or do work in bike shops seem to be looking at qualities- or lack of them to identify B.S.O's. Typical plumage been low end or never heard of groupsets, poor quality fasteners, eccentric pedals and p*£s poor set up. When I used to cycle into work there was often a woman's bike parked in the bike rack and I could never fathom why it's forks were on back to front... No I know, that is how they come out of the box, so that "Must be how they are meant to be"!

 

[brocklanders023]

but also isn't it the point that companys that provide the finer examples that some in here consider art...only exists by mass multiple cheaper object sales?

those that survive on the top end ..seem to be fast going under

There are some examples of this, but there are plenty of examples of companies still in existence that only produce top end stuff. Pace.

After hearing about how they've sold out I have lost all desire for one of their tidy steel frames. Really is a sad story and typical of what seems to happen.

 

[We_are_Stevo]

There have been some cracking additions to this thread in the last couple of pages - and from members I haven't seen posting for a while?

Excellent...

The other aspect to add to this though is rather than just 'snobbery' there is the 'pomposity' that goes hand in hand with it...

 

[cornholio's RC200]

There's lots of "BS" about regarding BSOs

This is a "Smart Price" BSO. Good stuff eh?

I'm of the mind that a lot of the "bigger" companies like Trek, Specialized - even Carrera - use reasonable kit and that they would at least attempt to recreate some sort of riding experience.

I personally like bling on some bikes but there's a time and place for that. I do however insist that stuff works perfectly and that's where BSOs fall over to me because the equipment can't even be set up properly in my experience.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm not. I think I do know shite when I see it though. Does that make me (and most of us here) a snob?

 

[Rich Aitch]

This is a "Smart Price" BSO. Good stuff eh?

Looks alright if you woke up and thought "Today I must buy a bike with negative rake and trail so that it handles like a shopping trolley!"
Maybe that's where the staff at Asda went wrong, they saw the caster front wheels of all their shopping trolleys pointing backworks and fluttering when they moved along, looked at their bike and thought, "Yep, that must be how they're meant to go".