Driving past this morning, noticed The Bike Shop (sister shop to Will’s Wheels) in Marple is closing down. Not been there very long.

Shame. Have shopped there several times & will shortly have some workshop stuff lined up to book them to do.

Real shame bcos the young lad behind the counter has probably lost his job otherwise thank ****. Absolute crock of shit shop, good for stem spacers & chainring bolts, nothing else. Curly behind the counter had never come across powerlinks or disk brakes.

P.s everyone should use sett valley cycles or freeride cycles 😀

Shame – however as a local I could never find what I needed.

We’ve got 2 new ones opening in Sheffield. I cant see us supporting so many for too long, I just hope the good independent ones can fight it out with the rubbish chain ones

We use Jon at ‘The bicycle Smithy’, Hazel Grove.

Who’s opening in Sheffield?

Who’s opening in Sheffield?

+1

It’s not the end of the world guys around marple area.
I do bike servicing and repairs from home in Romiley.
All contact info is on my website mtbtours.co.uk
No shop overheads, so lower repair prices .
I was in the Marple shop today , everything I. The shop has 50% off ,
except for bikes and wheels , which have a third off.
The lad who works there is going to work for British cycling .

Who’s opening in Sheffield?

Evans Cycles are opening a branch there in February.

Podge says there’s a lapierre shop opening too

I didn’t even know a bike shop in Marple existed.

Evans opposite B&Q & Cycle Tech down Shalesmoor

For repairs & spares you can’t beat Alex at Bike rehab opposite the Dev Cat. He even used spares he’d bought for his own Reverb on Pook’s so he could have it back as soon as possible.

The bloke has a new job. Apparently business was fine but was offered something better!

We felt pretty bad nearly cleaning him out of anything useful that was left in the shop, he’s got a vat of muc off left!

Evans opposite B&Q & Cycle Tech down Shalesmoor

Blimey.

They were on about opening an Evans a while back but it all went quiet when Edinburgh & the bike tree launched.

Scaled – I walked down early this morning and the shop was closed, maybe Wednesday closing (some shops still do this in Marple, so not unusual). I shall shake my fist at you if there’s nothing left tomorrow 😉

richpips – the shop was on the main Stockport road, a few shops away from the post office.

I didn’t even know a bike shop in Marple existed.

I didn’t even know Marple existed. 😕

richpips – the shop was on the main Stockport road, a few shops away from the post office.

Odd I hadn’t seen it then.

Underneath all the scaffold, looks like they have loads of sports powder crap and muc off stuff for half-price, making it almost good value.

Good to hear the lad behind the counter is going to better places.

Now – what will happen to shop now, odds on for another cake or furniture shop cos marple is short of those 😕

I like cake 🙂

This is what Marple needs.

Private Shop on Mill Lane by DJLeekee, on Flickr

A Starbucks hopefully. I can never get a seat in the Costa up the road.

What Richpips said.

I get all the cakes/biscuits which don’t get sold on the day or are missing edge’s from costa for free 😀

OOH Matron !

richpips – Member

This is what Marple needs.

Don’t mention costa to me.

richpips – there you are, a business opportunity.

I’ll have to ask now, what’s up with Costa?

When costa opened in Poynton it forced a cafe owner out. She moved to Marple, where they’ve opened up and she’s started to struggle again. ‘Toast cafe’closed since costa opened.
I prefer to support local shops and businesses.

When costa opened in Poynton it forced a cafe owner out. She moved to Marple, where they’ve opened up and she’s started to struggle again. ‘Toast cafe’closed since costa opened.
I prefer to support local shops and businesses.

Just to be a Capitalist PigDog for a second – she wasn’t forced out, she was out-competed. If she could beat Costa on enough (note, doesn’t have to be all) of price, service, quality of produce, friendliness of staff, variation of menu, opening hours, etc etc, she could have kept her customers and her business.

You capitalist pigdog you

I know

*burp*

This grilled kitten is delicious.

Evans opposite B&Q? Former Hancock & Lant showroom? Heck, I wondered who was developing that.
You could throw some Bombers from there and hit J E James, Decathlon, CCC, Edinburgh, Butterworth’s and Halfords!

do you mean “if she’d tempted enough sheep to go to the name brand store and been able to subsidise a loss making business using other branches then funelling any future profits out of the area” there, nettlks?

do you mean “if she’d tempted enough sheep to go to the name brand store and been able to subsidise a loss making business using other branches then funelling any future profits out of the area” there, nettlks?

Yeah, I can appreciate that Costa is a bigger brand than Mrs Miggins Coffeeshop, so the name recognition factor is a big one. But she did, I assume, have a headstart on them and therefore her ‘brand’ would have had some kind of foothold (especially if her combination of service, price etc etc etc was good).

And you can’t subsidise a loss-making business and funnel it’s profits…

The point is that ‘local businesses’ can’t expect a free ride just because they’re ‘local’. They can get (and maybe should get) a bit of ‘goodwill’ leeway, but if the product/service they offer is sufficiently inferior to the competition, they won’t last and shouldn’t expect to.

And – how many people does the Costa employ, and how many does/did Mrs Miggins employ?

You mean Costa’s isn’t a local shop? There’s more than one of them? My god, you will be telling me there’s a KFC outside of Southampton next.

I kind of support IHN on this one though. The coffee chains have improved the quality of coffee available on the high street . They will not force all other coffee shops out of business, they will force other businesses to be better, different or in some way more appealing.

To quote CFH, the local coffee shops will need to ring fence their unicorns

And you can’t subsidise a loss-making business and funnel it’s profits…

you can subsidise it till the competitors go, then take the increased profits elsewhere

I see what you are getting at, but I don’t necessarily agree with your viewpoint.

Nettles – there is always more to it than meets the eye.
When they built John Lewis (Cheadle Royal) in the late 1990s, I had a thriving business, with accounts with some well known designer fabric companies. With these a/cs are strict rules. One being that you have to be at least 10 miles away from the next a/c holder. Wham! John Lewis comes along (only 2 miles way) and get preferential treatment (being the big boys). My successful business almost folded overnight, as all my customers couldn’t overcome the lure of the John Lewis brand. I survived by lowering my prices (at least 20%-30% lower than the store) and went and started working for the store by making John Lewis re-makes (curtains) on my own premises, charging them a nominal fee.
I finally got my customers back and many more new ones, who were happy to buy the fabric from JL and have me make it up.
In my business selling the fabric is where the profit is, I never recovered that side of things and had to close those fabric A/Cs down, as you have to sell a certain percentage every year.
There are thousands of businesses like mine, who have been run out of town by various big names, whether it be JL, Tesco or costa.

I think it has been proven that self employed people end up employing more people overall than the big boys.
This isn’t the thread to go into that though.

Anyway I didn’t get down to the local bike shop, so didn’t get to see if anything was left before the grand closing on Saturday.