Tom A. wrote:
One comment: Complaining that everyone thinks there's a massive conspiracy is a bit of a straw man argument. Most folks really couch it in exactly how you describe above, in that there's a MASSIVE incentive to come up with "new for the sake of new" things, because NEW sells! If anything, it's not so much an organized conspiracy to try to drive "churn", as it is just the industry all chasing trends because they are afraid of being left behind.Welcome to the world of consumer products. What you left out in this analysis was the voice of the customer. Bike companies need to respond to what their customers want....and in many cases, those customers are the dealers, not consumers. So suppliers are forced into making model year changes because their dealers demand it. Otherwise, yes, they will be left behind. Take you basic entry level MTB....not a whole lotta tech gets changed on those bikes form year to year. And most people who buy one are unaware of what Shimano components are on them and aren't buying another bike a year later. In theory, youc ould roll through a couple of years with the same model / color. But the dealers will simply stop buying the bikes because the competition, in the meantime, has come out with new colors or some minor spec variation.
Tom A. wrote:
With a bit of experience on them though, as good as they are, I have to say that SRAM didn't really put a top notch effort into their HydroR brakes. Just looking at the design of them, it's fairly obvious that they didn't take full advantage of the hyrdaulic capabilities, especially in regards to leverage.Likely a case of "best we can do at the moment" style development....either due to tight development timelines, constricted R&D resources, limited technology, etc. LIke road discs, theya re still early in the development stage. Early adapters provide the feedback on what needs to be improved.
[quoteTom A.]But, Shimano doesn't even offer a hydraulic rim caliper...so, unless that happened, one wouldn't expect the idea to really take hold anyway. They're all in on road discs...and are the 500 lb. gorilla in components still. It's pretty easy to see the way the wind is blowing...[/quote]
Agreed.
Quote:
Oh...c'mon...you have to admit that there is some thought put into how to raise sales in what is quite the flat market, no? Why all the interest in adding E-bike lines to bike shops then? ;-)</html
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