has anyone come across bikeSwanky? Seems they offer good payment options to take the sting out of buying high-end bikes. good range too

1) You smell spammy
2) You capitalised the wrong letter, it should be the W.

What sting ? The sting of paying a heap abd having no tangible thing at the end of it ?

Sounds worse than running the bike for 5 + years.

I’ve heard they are shit. I wouldn’t recommend anyone use them.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjB6r-HDDI0[/video]

Hmm, Trustpilot reviews r good. still option to own but spread cost and bikes properly set up n delivered

My local bike shop does interest free also.

They also set up correctly and i can pop in with any issues i have.

Dont see what you bring to the table spampilot.

Well, if I had ever been tempted to use them, seeing their dishonest promotion tactics have ensured that I never will.

which tactics are those?

It looks to me like they have reasonable support and an avenue to chop/change bikes every year or so without too much of a hit.

Well, if I had ever been tempted to use them, seeing their dishonest promotion tactics have ensured that I never will.

You never know, this could be a double bluff switcheroo from a rival shop. Trying to make Bikewanky look bad, with such an amateurish astroturfing compaign?

I don’t think there’s anything dishonest about a bit of self promotion as such; just that the OP should fess up to it.
And if there’s an award for the worst company name ever, BikesWanky should get it! 🙂

I like the name! nothing wrong with a bit of tongue-in-cheek..

Local to me, they sponsor a few charity rides and also support/sponsor a local cycling club.
Doesn’t mean they’re good value etc but they are certainly known in the local community and seem a legitimate business.

This thread is no worse than “Has anyone tried the On One sperfantasticlatest bike/tyres/whatever” spam but they seem to get by unabused

Except buttbuster has joined specifically to astroturf bikesWanky? Everyone knows brant is tied up with OnOne; Mike@dialled, Sy@Cotic, Loco, Jedi etc all above board in their professional interests and contribute more widely to the forum?

Apart from that its exactly the same…..

And where is Mr Fruit these days?

OP, registered 9th Sept, one post (this one) – really?

The bikeswanky guy, Paul, is local to me and sponsors the woking CC so their jersey all have the company logo on.

The annual bikeathon that the cricketers pub in Horsell do is this year being sponsored by them.

I have been out the last two Wednesdays on night rides in the surrey hills with Paul leading the rides, and he seems a nice and genuine guy.

One of the other guys on the night ride was riding a Felt 29er hard tail supplied by him and he was showing a lot of interest in how the bike was working and any issues with it – it had pretty basic hydro brakes on and they were giving some issues so he was scheduling to look at it in its first service.

I think that maybe some of his efforts to get the brand noticed haven’t worked so well, but he is just trying to get established.

It is another one of those companies setup it seems to hopefully tap into the bike leasing market, which I think possibly makes more sense for mountain bikes which take a lot of wear over their life, whereas to me it seems less sensible for road bikes which don’t wear out so fast. And it also seems like a good idea for kids bikes.

I obviously have nothing to do financially with them, I have just joined Woking CC so this is where I met him.

bigyinn – Member

And where is Mr Fruit these days?

He seems to write for Dirt.

I think that maybe some of his efforts to get the brand noticed haven’t worked so well, but he is just trying to get established

If he’s relying on astroturfing forums things aren’t looking good. What exposure he gets is likely to go hand in hand with ill-will.

If he’s relying on astroturfing forums things aren’t looking good. What exposure he gets is likely to go hand in hand with ill-will.

well I asked him if this was him (via facebook) and he said no.

In fact I posted on here recently as he was selling off some covert bandits, and several people took the p1ss of the company name, so why would he want to risk that again by posting as a troll?

(It is a slightly unfortunate name if seen without the company logo).

Here he is on facebook and you can see where he was starting the company up and his association with Woking CC

https://www.facebook.com/paul.manderobeirne

and here you can see a mail from this year from the guy starting Woking CC and Pauls early involvement:

http://road.cc/content/forum/77027-starting-cycle-club-woking

Thought the name sounded familiar – it’s the Bike Leasing Company, and in fact it says so on the footer of the Bikeswanky web site. Looks like the company has a Credit Consumer License, too: 644098

You can check this on the FCA’s website here: http://www2.crw.gov.uk/pr/default.aspx – just pop the license number in.

Previous stories:

http://road.cc/tags/bike-leasing-company

http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/bike-leasing-company-offer-cycle-loan-schemes-36157/

http://road.cc/content/news/47576-it-had-happen-leasing-company-launches-24-month-contracts-bikes-over-%C2%A31250

http://www.bikebiz.com/news/read/bike-leasing-company-teams-up-with-felt-eddy-merckx-bh-and-forme/014616

http://road.cc/content/news/71477-bike-leasing-company-turns-crowdsourcing-finance-invest-little-%C2%A310

Hello All,

I’m Paul, the MD of bikeSwanky.

So it looks like a little ruckus has been caused here by someone’s post.

This vid hopefully sets the record straight:

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTbgsoHDc24[/video]

I guess the post was started by someone trying to help us out, or they could just be asking a legit question.

It is definitely pushing what we offer though so I perfectly understand the cynicism.

I’ll answer some of the questions raised and comments posted separately.

Northwind:

1) You smell spammy
2) You capitalised the wrong letter, it should be the W.

1. It does smell spammy, but as mentioned above not by us. Probably posted by someone we work with or someone we’ve helped out recently.

2. If it makes you happy, feel free to write our name bikeSWanky. It’s still pronounced Bike Swanky. Be careful though, you’re school teachers might give you a detention if they see you writing **** in your school books.

you’re school teachers

Might get a bit of the old red pen yourself fella 😀

trail_rat:

What sting ? The sting of paying a heap abd having no tangible thing at the end of it ?

Sounds worse than running the bike for 5 + years.

Looks like your missing the fact that we offer 3 payment options:
Cash offers
2 years 0% finance
2 year leases.

Customers can choose whichever option suits them best.

Clearly our explanation about leasing is not getting through still to some quarters.

Leasing only makes sense on more expensive bikes (over £1.5-2k), or if someone is self employed, or if they want to easily change their bikes regularly and don’t want the hassle of selling their old ones.

The lease is 65% of the RRP. The option to buy at the end is 35%. In other words the same as a 0% finance deal but with better cash flow.
We add insurance and servicing onto the lease. The insurance is nearly half the price as doing it yourself and the servicing is less expensive too.

Whichever option is chosen, we send every bike out with a mechanic to set it up to the customer’s requirements, even if it’s a £100 balance bike. Any issues, and the mechanic comes back to fix it.

I think Mr Swanky’s business model is fine.

It’s a practice that the motor industry have been doing for years and it suits some people to have a known monthly outgoing and get a new car or bike very few years. For other people it’s a bit of a mystery why you’d do it.

It’s a shame that the misguided OP has caused a bit of a kerfuffle but it’s not a reason to start having a go about the leasing thing?

Jamie:

I’ve heard they are shit. I wouldn’t recommend anyone use them.

You are welcome to your opinion. It would definitely help your argument if you actually substantiated your comments.

One thing I can tell you for certain is that we are far from perfect. We do make mistakes and we work like people possessed to solve them.

More often than not we get it absolutely right though. We have a lot of happy customers who are riding on some seriously Swanky bikes. Our main issue at the moment is having to rely on couriers to deliver bikes undamaged to us from our suppliers, and the bikes themselves coming with all the right parts on them.

Either way, we put it right for our customers and as far as they’re concerned they get a shiny Swanky bike hand delivered by a mechanic who adjusts everything to be just right for them.

We must be doing something right because we’ve seen orders increase 109% month on month.

For the record, Jamie, I am 100% per cent comfortable with you not becoming one of our customers. I hope that you continue to be perfectly content with the people you currently get your bikes from and I sincerely hope that they enjoy you purchasing from them.

Everyone here at bikeSwanky is looking forward to you putting some substance to your assertion that we are sh1t. Reading many of your other posts on Singletrack World’s forum it is obvious to everyone here at bikeSwanky that you are blessed with a bountiful supply of wit and humour. It must be such a burden on you to be such a funny man. People surely find it very difficult indeed to take you seriously.

zilog6128

Might get a bit of the old red pen yourself fella

I must stop trying to type so fast!
Feel free to break out the red pen.
I’ve messed up the your and you’re a few times by the looks of it:)
Thanks for pointing it out to me. I’ll be more careful in future.

don’t take them too seriously on here Mr Swanky, it’s known for being a little.. critical.

Thanks for taking time to make your points though! More bikes to the masses is a good thing in my book

Well put swanky.
Good luck with your sales.

People surely find it very difficult indeed to take you seriously.

…and yet, you appeared to have made that mistake.

Anyway.

I’m not sure that coming on here to rectify what has been seen as a misfiring publicity campaign, by yourself or others, in some of the most impressive passive aggressive posting I have seen on here in some time, was the best route to take, but you do what you feel you have to.

For the record, I was not being serious, and I do not think you, or your company, are shit. My post was meant as a diametrically opposed counterpoint to what struck myself, and others, as a blatant attempt at astro-turfing. So calm down*, and I wish you well with your endeavours.

*Does telling someone to calm down, ever actually calm them down?

*Does telling someone to calm down, ever actually calm them down?

Maybe, but is it also passive aggresive?

I just like the term.

Enjoyed this thread. Quite the bunfight.
First things first, I’m a BikeSwanky customer (in their Bike Leasing Company name) and have been very happy with the service. It’s an expensive bike provided with a decent cashflow and the option to keep or surrender it at the end of a couple of years. Nothing more or less: it’s pretty much like the lease or buy decision for a car.
My bike arrived in good condition, was set up by a great mechanic and has given me just under 2 years of good fun. I’d say it’s worth a look IF you’re a candidate for a slightly different way to get a nice bike into the shed.

p.s. No, I’m not financially connected to the company. I may have sounded too positive to be taken seriously. 😉