Would you buy a Retro bike shop or a Sports car....?

[Ollie]

Would rather have the shop, The car is gorgeous but at the end of the day, More passionate about bikes and if it had to be a car it would have to be an Escort Mexico MK1 .

 

[The History Man]

Neither.



Trout lake.

 

[jjwood]

Re:

If you buy a retrobike shop you inevitably become a shop keeper looking out the window waiting to go riding

Buy a ferrari 458 speciale and it makes you a driving legend even if your crap behind the wheel

 

[Bollox64]

Well now I'm stuck in the Retro MTB world, I am selling my Retro sports car, in part to fund my new addiction - will probably regret it :facepalm:

http://www.blocket.se/sodermanland/Lanc ... 7.htm?aw=1

I'm keeping the Reg plate - that's now sitting on my GT86

 

[al-onestare]

A bike shop or a car?

Car, I don't want the bollocks associated with a shop, particularly in this era when it's all online.

I'll take this thanks:

Or if I have to have a retro "sports" car, this:

Ta.

 

[Vinevo]

Re:

Car, I love retro bikes but from experience when I've got it right on track the adrenalin nearly kills me and the buzz can last for days, I just can't imagine the shop option doing that.

 

[longun]

shop, all day long. (only because my retro hot hatch fills the "sports car" buzz )

 

[ultrazenith]

Re: Re:

If you had an equivalent ~ £150k budget, buying the right retro Ferrari/s is a much better investment than a retro bike shop. Being in the bicycle business can be a lot of fun in the right circumstances. Everybody and their dog wants to own/open a bike shop and sadly most shops are pretty crap. The ones that make big money leverage huge economies of scale and are well established. Cyclists in general are better educated than most and very deal savvy. The cycling market 'pie' needs to increase massively imo, to make it really worth it as a start up indie.

Love those wheels HREs ?

Of course the clever open a coffee shop hang some retro bikes up in a "lifestyle" inducing environment, with a minimal bike stock holding level, a bit of a workshop with some airtools and charge us £10.00 for coffee and cake,

give it a cool name and the trendies pour in.

Its nice coffee and cake, and staring at a classic yeti hung on the wall is nice, from my experience bullshit does baffle the brain in the business, but lets face it, the margin is better than 35points on coffee and cake.

Is it a real bikeshop...? who knows, do they make profit and stand outside the big chains and survive.....Of course they do.

This sounds a lot like Rockets And Rascals on Plymouth Barbican. It took me ages of walking around the building trying to find the entrance to the bike shop, before I realised the cafe and the bike shop were the same thing. I must have looked a complete tit to the trendy customers and the owners.

 

[sho220]

I'm keeping the Reg plate - that's now sitting on my GT86

Even a "budget" sports car like the 86 sounds so much better than dealing with the headaches of owning a shop...

 

[sinnerman]

Re: Re:

If you had an equivalent ~ £150k budget, buying the right retro Ferrari/s is a much better investment than a retro bike shop. Being in the bicycle business can be a lot of fun in the right circumstances. Everybody and their dog wants to own/open a bike shop and sadly most shops are pretty crap. The ones that make big money leverage huge economies of scale and are well established. Cyclists in general are better educated than most and very deal savvy. The cycling market 'pie' needs to increase massively imo, to make it really worth it as a start up indie.

Love those wheels HREs ?

Of course the clever open a coffee shop hang some retro bikes up in a "lifestyle" inducing environment, with a minimal bike stock holding level, a bit of a workshop with some airtools and charge us £10.00 for coffee and cake,

give it a cool name and the trendies pour in.

Its nice coffee and cake, and staring at a classic yeti hung on the wall is nice, from my experience bullshit does baffle the brain in the business, but lets face it, the margin is better than 35points on coffee and cake.

Is it a real bikeshop...? who knows, do they make profit and stand outside the big chains and survive.....Of course they do.

This sounds a lot like Rockets And Rascals on Plymouth Barbican. It took me ages of walking around the building trying to find the entrance to the bike shop, before I realised the cafe and the bike shop were the same thing. I must have looked a complete tit to the trendy customers and the owners.

wasn't thinking specifically of that store, I was generalizing, along with "look Mum NO Hands", "Mud Dock" and so on.

To be Fair to R and R, I know exactly what the rent and rates are on that particular building, and cost to staff and shop fit etc is far from cheap, given the market and the volume of shops that have amassed, and with national chains and Concept stores locally, serving coffee and cake in a nice setting at least adds some level of separation to the chains and other independents. It is a shame its a little like a sparse boutique, but they know what they are doing it seems, this might change over time, and I do love coffee and cake. And Trendies do spend, better there than Costa I say.