I was in Taipei earlier this year and met with a few of the manufacturers who are doing some of the better OEM carbon stuff, they were offering rim sets, no hubs or spokes, which 'appeared' very nice and 'clean' for under 150Usd a set with minimal volumes. There was a guy I met who is a buyer for 2-3 larger online retailers who was doing some serious bargaining for a complete wheels inc hubs etc for under 250Usd set built, bigger volumes obviously.

Under USD250 is not retail price. I'm talking pricing to the end consumer here, through a licensed distributor or direct from the company the way Hed sells over the 'net.

Do the math, freight, taxes, profit margin and then resale price, most retailers work minimum 30-50%.

HED sells thru retail agents and direct but at the same price, distributors get wholesale pricing to allow for thier margins.

You don't accept private messages or I'd send you one.

What about my original post wasn't clear? I don't need to be educated about how businesses work and the costs, margins and all that involved. I am asking what end users feel a reasonable price would be for a full composite wheelset that's made by a dedicated bike company, not a trading company.

For instance, Renn was a big hit with our triathlon crowd for introducing the $350 disk wheel. Having established some kind of street cred, they introduced a couple more value-added models.

So at the risk of repeating myself, I'll rephrase the question: What would the market bear as a retail price for composite wheelsets comparable in materials, workmanship, weight, reliability, performance, and graphics to something like the Zipp 303 and 404 or the Hed Alps or Stinger? In other words, if I offer a UCI-approved composite wheelset tomorrow and call it the Kooky Mookie and sell it for US$700 would you be interested? If not, then what price point would pique your interest? How about $600?

I bought a Renn closeout last fall and a used Hed 3 from the slowtwitch classifieds. I'm very price concious (cheap). Under $500 for the set. I don't expect to be buying race wheels at any price any time soon.

I'd have to guess you'd have to be at least 25 to 30 % under the name brands just starting out.

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"It doesn't get any easier, you just go faster"

It all depends on peoples' value on name brand for both presige and reputation. I don't really care about impressing so I don't pay for prestige in a name, but I'm very risk averse when it comes to the reliability of product I'm paying that much money for. For me to buy a no-name wheel with no track record it would have to be 50% less than a comparable product with an established reputation of quality. Once it's been out for several years and there is community endorsement of the product's quality that would drop to 25% for me (like Renn).

I think this is a good tac to take. Introducing a "competitive" wheel from an unknown company at the same price ain't gonna work. I think everyone has their own version of you 25-50% price break.

Me personally I would like to see a very inexpensive set of "Race" wheels that offers 80% or so of the advantage of the really expensive stuff. IOW A sub 500$ per pair for a deep dish front and disk back or duel deep dish combo.

Kinda like bike frames I can't see me paying 1500-2000$ more for a frameset that *might* save me 2-3 minutes over a 1500$ full bike.

~Matt

How'd you like the Hed 3 / Renn combo? Did you race on that this year? I was thinking about the same setup for next year (focus is on HIM & IM). I'm pretty light though (~145) and am a bit worried about getting pushed around in windy conditions. Any advice from your experience?

Meanwhile... that's sick what you paid for the set! Guess I'll keep my eyes out for offseason sales or good deals on eBay.

Aren't Zipps more like $2000 per set? But, per your question, I would be interested in 45 to 55 mm front wheel at say $275. I'm not in the market for used carbon wheels, don't like possibiilty of hairline cracks, etc. My current choice for the front is the Hed Alps at $450. As to a rear wheel, I considered the Renn at $400, and may go back to it. But, out of curiosity, I've ordered a Wheelsmith disk cover for my Velocity Deep V 28 spoke rear. At $65, it's worth finding out if the raves are true. Hope this answers your question.

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Jim

I think that if you could demonstrate that the wheels were on par with Zipp 404's I would still only buy them if they were several hundred cheaper than I could buy a year or two old pair of Zipps.

Wheels are expensive and I don't know that I would take a risk on a new brand unless they were about half the cost.

or looked REALLY cool!

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This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. - Fight Club
Industry Brat.

There is a company with a 43mm deep wheelset that sells at $450 U.S. I'd be curious to hear reviews. they can be found at bikesoul.com 43 isn't super deep but hell its got some advantage. I'm guessing shipping would be about $50 because they are in Australia but still something to look into.

If you were to manufacture a wheel exactly like one of the "big names" people would still pay more (in general) for the zipps and the heds b/c they're buying a name and it's perceived value. Think about it: if you put two identical tissue boxes on the store shelf, with two identical products, but one was made by Kleenex, and the other was called...say, Softex, peole are going to go with the "brand" more often than not. At least until the price of Softex drops so low it's an impossible deal to refuse.

What I'm assuming your asking is what's our Softex price, correct? Well, for me...it'd have to be pretty low. I got my Heds (new) H3/Alps combo for $500 (skewers, tires, cassette...all inclusive). I got them from a major retailer. I bought my 404s with fewer than 200 miles on them for $400. Also all-inclusive.

My point is, with deals out there like that on the Kleenexes of race wheels, there's no need to pay full retail...so your quoted figure is inflated. And again, with deals like that on Kleenex, your Softex is going to have to be next to nothing for a while in order to compete.

People (i.e. consumers) like brand-name shit. They may TOTALLY understand that Sofetx and Kleenex are equal. But they're gonna pay more for a "name."

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mmm-mmm-Momo Charms
Handmade beverage charms, jewelry, and miscellanea
http://momocharms.wordpress.com

why not just license the stuff from Zipp, have them make it, stick your labels on it then sell for $300 or so less than Zipp retail. I can think of at least one set of race wheels using older Zipp technology (pre dimples) that arrived at my house in a Zipp box, with Zipp instructions inside, dropped shipped from the Zipp factory but with stickers that said B-------L.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Please don't take this the wrong way but you will never generate usable pricing information by asking a consumer "what they would be willing to pay" for a product. Purchase decisions involve many variables of which price is just one. Basically, it just isn't that simple.

What you need it to do is employ a technique called "Conjoint Analysis". This will allow you to quantify the benefits that the consumer gets from the various attributes of your proposed product. ONE of the important attributes is price.

Here is an article in plan English that explains conjoint analysis.

www.surveysite.com/conjoint_tutorial.html

If your friend in serious about launching his wheels this type of research is money well spent. BTW: I do this sort of work on a consulting basis :)

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Didn't get a lot of use out of them this year, injuries. One try em out ride, 2 sprints and one olympic before my season fell apart. I'm 170 and the olympic was windy enough that I took both sets of wheels just in case it was too wendy on race day. Turned out fine.

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"It doesn't get any easier, you just go faster"