What do you want from your LBS?

Triathlon Forum
22

We have three bike shops in the immediate area. None of them sell tri bikes, and the road bikes that they keep in stock are never in my size (I’m 5’4"). Mountain bikes and comfort bikes (a lot of people buy bikes for just riding up and down our nice rail trail system) are the most common. I would love it if they had decent road bikes in my size, but I understand that the market isn’t there. So I order the bikes that I want, and the shops guarantee that if I don’t like it, I don’t have to buy it. That works.

I don’t expect a barista or anything fancy. What I do expect is good, consistent service without a snotty attitude. When I take a bike in, unless something has to be ordered, it shouldn’t take more than a day or two to fix it. I like if the mechanic and other staff know my name. I am lucky as hell to have a room in my house that is nothing but beer, bikes, and camping gear, so if they keep my bikes in good shape, I bring them the good beer. Most of the time, my bike gets fixed while I wait.

I won’t go to a shop that is condescending. There is one shop in town where I won’t do business because of their attitude. I could go on forever with stories about snotty bike shop people, but it is something that I won’t tolerate. I did think it was funny in one of my two regular shops, they had a new guy who tried to be condescending. Before I could say anything, someone else literally ran over and told the guy that I was one of their best customers who knew a lot about bikes. I am not sure what happened, but new guy didn’t last long.

However, when I bought my tri bike, I went to a shop about 2 hours away because they had modern fitting equipment and sold enough tri bikes to know how to put them together. I had heard too many stories about the local shops, which seem to be able to do anything with the most complicated full-suspension mountain bike, not having a clue about properly setting up a tri bike.

23

I want to greet my mentor (& not disturb him), solve the problem (& learn solving) and go ahead with riding …

24

Reasonable service prices - I was in a bind because I didn’t have my cassette tool in town with me and they wanted to charge me more to swap my cassette than it cost to buy the tool from them (off the shelf). Also, I would prefer if they stop trying to convince me that disc brakes on road bikes are the best thing on earth.

25

I want a good attitude, not one of condescension. I am never buying small parts at my shop unless I am in dire need (Shimano pedals, parts, cables, tools, etc…) because the deals online are too good to pass up. Bikes costs enough as it is, I am not shelling out 75% more in shop than Wiggle. I don’t have a strong feeling about coffee/beer, I don’t live that close to a shop to make it my hang out spot. If a shop ever gave me grief about working on a direct to consumer bike, I’d just leave.

I have a strong aversion to shops as I have found them to be pretty awful, at least in the Boston area. I have finally found some great places but I went through a lot to get there. Plus, they are a drive outside the city limits, which blows.

26

I wonder if shops don’t sell a lot of used bikes due to liability.

27

I little or no use for my LBS’, they are not competitive on price, don’t have any stock, anything they have to order takes at least a week to get. For service I just do the work myself, bikes are pretty simple, the cost of a few specialized tools is way less than the cost of having a LBS do the work.

28

Good bike selection, good coffee, maybe a customer lounge with Kona race videos on flat screens…knowledgeable mechanics.

29

What I want is a bike shop that will let me trade in my old bike to buy a new bike. I have a couple old bikes that I wouldn’t mind getting rid of, but I’m too busy (and/or lazy) to deal with the hassle of selling them to get the $500 or so that they’re worth. If I could just go down to the bike shop and trade them in, I’d buy a new bike at retail price from the LBS.

30

  1. Knowledgeable staff.

  2. To stop getting screwed. I understand you have to support your family. But when you have marked up an item by >100% (I have a QBP catalog), not enough lube can make the pain any better.

31

What I want is a bike shop that will let me trade in my old bike to buy a new bike. I have a couple old bikes that I wouldn’t mind getting rid of, but I’m too busy (and/or lazy) to deal with the hassle of selling them to get the $500 or so that they’re worth. If I could just go down to the bike shop and trade them in, I’d buy a new bike at retail price from the LBS.

Check if you have a local shop that’s partnered with these guys. If not, ask them to look into it…

https://theproscloset.com/trade/

32

Sorry for being a little negative here, but I generally don’t like LBS’s. I feel no desire to want to keep them in business and no sense of loyalty. My preference is to do all of my own maintenance. The only thing I need a bike shop for is to do the things that require expensive tools that I haven’t bought yet such as bottom brackets. I hate that they charge so much, and on occasion, mechanics have actually damaged my bike or have just done a poor job.

In my mind, the perfect bike shop would just do service and have a generic machine that a customer could sit on and adjust to get their fit coordinates. After that, they could look through a catalog, order a bike, and have it ready a few days later. Zero inventory. They can’t compete on price, so why even waste their time? This would eliminate any animosity for customers bringing stuff in that they sell. The only issue would be shoes because I feel like that’s the only thing I need to try on before I buy. Maybe the only consumable they would carry would be tubes.

33

“Inventory”

i notice that a few of you have referenced:

-inventory
-price

you want inventory, but you don’t want to pay MSRP. you understand that amazon and chain wiggle don’t have inventory, right? they don’t have same-day. there isn’t same-day impulse buy. there isn’t service (as in wrenching) at all.

so, what i want are creative ways for a bike shop to offer what you want it to offer while not mandating that they do so as a charity to you. figure out ways to extract value from them while allowing them the privilege of staying in business.

i’m asking for you to imagine a new, 21st century way of retailing where you get what you need, they get what they need, you continue to buy from mail order occasionally, and everybody gets along.

attitude? some of you mentioned that. that’s great. attitude is free. you’re not asking for something that’s going to cost the shop money. so, asking for competency and attitude is not a problem. just, asking for a healthy stocking of all the inventory you’d likely want, at a price that’s 20 or 30 percent MSRP, that’s not going to help me help them help you.

put your thinking caps on. this question i’m asking, this thread, this is not simply a thought exercise on my part.

Not many folks seemed to have read this. Yes, none of us want wrong torque applied and of course we want them to inventory out the butt so that they have the exact spec crank exactly when we need it.

To address the higher level question. The LBS should be local scale HQ for every cyclist they serve, from a community perspective. I’d love to wake up Saturday and have to debate…do I make coffee at home and sit on my couch, or head to the LBS for coffee, chit chat with fellow riders, and perhaps watch something cool on tv there? The LBS’s may not be able to turn the tide vs online retailers. It’s a battle they just can’t win in terms of purely selling stuff. They have to continue to offer an experience that online can’t match, and focus on the personal/community side and of course the service end.

Let’s be real. Most people on this site, me included, are overly particular about gear and at this point with online vendors, the LBS can never compete. I’m not trying to hide the fact that I buy all my gear online bc of price and convenience. I do. My needs are very particular. But the LBS serves most all of us somehow at some point. They just need to find ways to make me walk in the door more times than to get my bottom bracket changed out. IMO the LBS needs to cling to the community aspect for dear life. After hours socials with cocktails, race viewing parties, group rides…find ways to make me walk thru that door. Any possible way. I’m not a retail specialist but I’ll be sure to buy smaller items (nutrition, lubes, bottles, etc.) there vs online bc I can swallow those smaller price differences vs online and the convenience factor is high in those categories. But high end apparel? Bikes? Components? Forget it. That’s a problem I don’t have an answer for right now but I think I got my point across.

All that was a bit of a rant to say they need to focus on the community aspect as much as possible because that’s what they can offer and online cant. Make me want to walk thru that door to hang out or say hi or talk to others, not to just drop the bike off for the 2 wrench maneuvers I can’t do at home and walk right back out.

34

The point being get me thru that door, and inevitably I’ll be buying certain things. I don’t expect it to be a free social club.

35

Organize with other local shops to have a larger ‘local’ inventory available. (This could be coordinated by a buying group or the major parts distributor. Related topic: How can the parts wholesalers better service the consumer through the LBS? Because in a direct to consumer world, there is less reason for them to exist.) In many markets, you could have product in store the next day.

Offer dual mechanical rate cards - one for parts bought in store, one for parts bought direct. (Want to buy direct? Learn to wrench yourself or pay a premium.) If it is not related to a part at time of purchase, everything should be the same price.

Work with manufacturers to ‘showroom’ products. Manufacturers (or distributors) would pay commission for orders generated through that channel. Saves the retailer needing to support inventory.

Related:

  • Dorel (Cannondale, etc) is increasingly playing in the retail space. Watch for this as a trend.
  • Online retailers are looking for local partners to facilitate same day delivery in a number of areas. In some cases, those parts may be coming from your LBS, albeit at a lower margin to them than if you walked in and bought it.
  • If the LBS network dies off, the chain retailers will simply impose vendor-managed inventory on Distributors and manufacturers. And then you’ll see another type of fragility in the industry.
36

You guys are aware that bike sales margins have diminished considerably in recent years with the emergence of online commerce. What’s more, routine maintenance, tune ups, and parts are where the brick and mortar shops survive. A good business model in my opinion is a full service shop that will offer a trade in program as well as lifetime bike tune ups…but as I discussed previously, this is very difficult to execute.

37

They do all have stock of simple things that can accidentally run out, such as inner tubes & chain oil. It is just a shame they sell them with such a ridiculous markup. I’d accept 30%, but often it is 2 or 3 times. It feels like they’re trying to take advantage of the fact that you have messed up and run out.

If it is something they’ve no experience of & don’t have in stock I can’t see what point they are achieving. For that I agree they are useless.

38

I forgot Bar Tape. I’ve seen bar tape four times the online price. It may be in a nicer box, but it is still ridiculous.

Possibly I am being cynical, but I think they have a silly price for any consumables that they may use during a service. E.g. they service the bike and charge extra silly price to use their bar tape. Same applies to cabling and brake pads. I basically avoid ever getting anything they might use in servicing. I’m not sure they really ever want to sell those things direct.

39
  1. Good selection
  2. Reasonable prices
  3. Knowledgeable staff

I feel like my shop hits all three without a doubt. I get a little love on pricing and I am happy to buy everything I can there.

40

It’s already been mentioned, but timely service. For any work it seems like its 5-7 days before we’ll be able to have a look at the bike, but you need to leave it here for those days. I only have 1 bike and I don’t want to be without it for a week.

41

here’s what i’m asking: what bugs you about your LBS, or what makes you happy about your LBS, that they either are doing or that they aren’t doing? as examples, a shop either is now doing, or doesn’t and it want it to begin doing…

  • providing good, professional bike fitting aboard modern fit bikes using modern fit methodology.
  • offering custom footbeds and effective pedal/shoe interface.
  • working on my consumer direct purchases without sneering and giving me attitude.
  • providing service on my bike in a more timely fashion (even by appt).
  • offer a coffee bar with a barista in the shop.

and so forth. what is it that turns you on about your shop or shops you’ve seen? what is it you want that you don’t now get?

What I really want? HONESTY.

Community support is awesome too.

Couple things shops I like locally do: set up a “bike check” at local farmer’s markets where they will watch yoiur commuter while you shop, and can give it a free glance and let you know what maintinence they recco (good business generator)… hold events to support good groups eg MJ’s in san diego holding parties to support local cycling group charities. Have a local team that asks it’s members to not just wear kit, but to volunteer at races like Ride Cyclery does.

List goes on.

Edited because I have fat fingers