Frame builder boom

[Shinomaster]

shino,

you will be shocked by what Bianchi is bringing back next year...................... :thrasher:

lugs of chrome, celeste

Oh! I'll get my dad one!

[jim d]

here you go Shino. a quick google search and............

http://bikehugger.com/2008/07/2009_b...e_retro_at.htm

jim

[agilismerlin]

here you go Shino. a quick google search and............

http://bikehugger.com/2008/07/2009_b...e_retro_at.htm

jim

that's what i am talking about...............boooooyah

[Shinomaster]

Made in Taiwan? wtf? Reparto Corse?

[agilismerlin]

pinarello and coppi were doing those stays along with others during the mid nineties........

so maybe you could call them retro

[Shinomaster]

pinarello and coppi were doing those stays along with others during the mid nineties........

so maybe you could call them retro

I just heard Eduardo roll over.

[doofus]

carbon fork?


what a turd

[captstash]

I wonder if this isn't also a partial spinoff of the Home Depot phenomenom? "You can do it, we can help" and all of that. To be truthful, I built much of my own home and even welded a Mission style steel fence (MIG not TIG -- basically hot melt glue gun, but that's another story).

I have been around welding and fabrication on ships most of my adult life, so I can envision (sort of) how a frame gets built. I can also imagine building one, and will probably build myself some sort of a two wheeled contraption at some point in my life. For me, it's about the process.

The thing is, there are lots of guys like me who are relatively mechanically inclined and manage to staple a bike frame together and call it good. Calling it "art" is foolishness. Art has no function. A bicycle most certainly does. Bike building is a craft and those at the top of the game are what they used to call "master craftsmen." The Johnny come lately's aren't any such thing and as has been mentioned earlier, will be taken care of by market forces.

Dang! That was quite a rambling rant. sorry 'bout that. Maybe I better go ride my bike.

CaptStash....

[cny rider]

In the late nineties everyone and their great aunt was an Internet day trading stock genius. As long as stocks went up every day it all went great. CNBC would do fawning pieces over the housewives and grandmas who got together and formed investing clubs. They would show how they had effortlessly but with great brilliance decided that Ciso and Intel were great investments and they buying those stocks and were beating the pants off so-called professional investors. The message was "Anyone can do it." Remember how that ended in 2001?

Notice the last 5 years we have entire networks devoted to shows like "Flip this house"?
Same deal. Everyone can do it; if you're not getting in on the action in real estate you're some kind of dullard or a total mope. See the happy ending taking place now for all those suddenly inspired real estate gurus who learned by taking a weekend course?

Frame building, although microscopic on a relative economic scale, is going through the same sort of phase. It's hot, people are throwing money at product even of dubious quality, and just about *anyone* can do it, right? I mean buy the tools, set up a cool website and you're in!
Guess how this too shall end?

Bueller, anyone, anyone?

[rphetteplace]

building the website is the easy part.
designing a great bike is much harder.
Producing a quality product is harder still.
Running a profitable small business is by far the hardest.

I'd bet my bottom dollar that beyond the select few framebuilding isn't something you can make a living at. The numbers just don't lie. There was a really nice article in Mountain Flyer that accompanied the NAHBS catalog. I'll bet there aren't 40-50 guys doing this in the whole of the US that make more than minimum wage. I'll bet there's a bunch of maxed out credit cards and dudes eating microwave burritos chasing the dream of framebuilding.

ps. Carl Strong is the smartest man in framebuilding.

[Dave Kirk]

ps. Carl Strong is the smartest man in framebuilding.

Yep.

dave

[Chris]

I think that part of this is the internet's fault. Too much access to too much information gives us all the impression that we are capable of doing things that are out of our league. So many people diagnose themselves and come to horrible conclusions about their health, etc. because of something they read on the internet. Want to be frame builder? Read enough about it, give it a shot, then if the thing holds together, put out your cyber shingle.

I also think that the lack of opportunity to grow properly as a builder doesn't exist like it used to. It's not like Trek is turning out 531 frames out of Waterloo or Schwinn is building Paramounts, etc. So, there aren't too many places to go and work your way up under someone. Now, you just go out on your own, or if you are really prudent, maybe you go to UBI first. How many of you guys have a kid knocking on your door wanting to learn the trade? Cycling is in large part a masters sport now and the guys who think it would be cool to be a "framebuilder" are in their 30s or older like me. To me, the idea of being the craftsman alone with his trade each day is as enticing as hell, but fortunately for any of my potential customers I am using some restraint in my avoidance of learning the craft via the internet or spending a week at a build your own frame course... :)

Finally, I think someone covered this earlier, but right now, a big part of having a framebuilding business is to get a good painter. I did a tour of the Eddy Merckx factory and after being wholly unimpressed by all of the naked frames in front of my untrained eye, I realized that I basically couldn't tell you one thing about whether a bike was well built, but they sure looked nice after the paint...

[Catulle]

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontl.../rapaille.html


I'm with Clotaire:

{When asked by Folgers} "Coffee is a commodity. How can we own something that the others do not own?" My experience is that when there is a code, it's more complex than that. There is a code and a consistency checklist. Everything has to be on code. Everything you do should reinforce the code; not just the packaging or the communication should be on code. The leaflet, the brochures, everything should be on code. And if you are the first one to position yourself like that, knowing all the different aspects, you have a competitive edge. They might try to copy, but they don't know the formula; they don't know the code behind it.

For example, aroma is number one. Why? Because we imprint the aroma first, not the taste. Aroma is imprinted at a very early age, when you are around 2. Ah, and it means home, mother, feeding you, love and so on. A large majority, 90-something percent of Americans, love the aroma of coffee. Only 47 percent like the taste.

I don't know if you remember this commercial, but it was really on code. You have a young guy coming from the Army in a uniform. Mother is upstairs asleep. He goes directly to the kitchen, "Psssst," open the coffee, and the smell -- you know, because we designed the packaging to make sure that you smelled it right away. He prepares coffee; coffee goes up; the smell goes upstairs; the mother is asleep; she wakes up; she smiles. And we know the word she is going to say, because the code for aroma is "home." So she is going to say, "Oh, he is home." She rushed down the stairs, hugged the boy. I mean, we tested it. At P&G they test everything 400 times. People were crying. Why? Because we got the logic of emotion right."




atmo's shop, his frames smell like spumante. North Jersey, Asbury Park, brings me back. That's why I am a repeat customer.

Great read, Roman. Reminds me of Ernest Dichter. Also a shrink that left the healing for the selling. Interesting, though.

[happycampyer]

You'll know it's a bubble when... Martha Stewart does a segment on framebuilding ("I learned to weld in prison, it's so much fun!")... Oprah has a guest whose life was transformed by becoming a framebuilder... a new reality show called Project Lugwork or, So You Think You can Build a Frame? debuts...

But seriously, as a consumer, I can't imagine riding a bike unless I had supreme confidence that the builder knew what he/she was doing, and for this I would want some kind of proof--an apprenticeship with a master builder is a bare minimum, and not just a diploma (if that, even) or a fancy website. Who wants to be a guinea pig at 40+ mph?

[swoop]

Your first paragraph sums it up well for me. My original post might have sounded like I was complaining about my own business. I should have been more clear. I'm happy with my business and it's growing nicely. I guess I should just keep my head down and concern myself with what I'm doing. I think that's a paraphrase of Swoop's advice. I do that most of the time and will try to do it more.

hey you.. i wasn't admonishing you... i love you, man. i was feeling your pain! its the head down as self-preservation!

[Bike Rider]

Do you really think there are more of these over night frame builders now than in the past or does the internet just give them greater exposure?

The market has always supported them and the good ones will thrive while the bad ones will flounder.

(Forgive me if I have my history wrong on any of these guys)

Of todays most respected builders Mike Barry, John Slawta and Sacha White all started out in this manner.

[Frankwurst]

If you don't know how to swim don't get in the pool. There always have been and always will be people who just don't understand that. No matter the nature of the business.:beerglass:

[swoop]

Do you really think there are more of these over night frame builders now than in the past or does the internet just give them greater exposure?

The market has always supported them and the good ones will thrive while the bad ones will flounder.

(Forgive me if I have my history wrong on any of these guys)

Of todays most respected builders Mike Barry, John Slawta and Sacha White all started out in this manner.

all started out in what manner?

[rphetteplace]

I'm pretty sure both Slawta and Sacha are self taught

[happycampyer]

I'm pretty sure both Slawta and Sacha are self taught

That seems to be pretty much true of Sacha White, as he describes in this interview and a couple of others that I have read. He didn't exactly apprentice under Tim Paterek, but be obviously learned a lot from that experience and figured things out afterwards, to say the least.

Btw, a while ago I bought my wife a Vanilla--a used Gentle Lovers road bike--and the first time she rode it she couldn't believe that a bike could be so comfortable to ride. Before that, she couldn't figure out why I cared so much about bikes and how they ride. Thank you, Sacha.