Lapierre frame spares only available to original owner?!

Has anyone else had experience of this?

Someone I know has recently cracked the rear swingarm on his Spicy and he needs a replacement. He bought the bike 2nd hand so accepts that he has no warranty.

It seems he cannot get one at all though as Lapierre/Hotlines will only supply them to the original owner. They won’t even sell one!

Lapierre’s policy is surely destroying the residual value of their bikes which can’t be good for business.

Anyone got a spare Spicy swingarm in their garage?

I’m sure I’ve seen this post before?

http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=16158524

there was a thread on here about it too.

I had a vague recollection of reading something before but couldn’t find the thread.

That sucks 🙁

If there’s only a limited number of spares*, I could sorta understand. I mean, need to keep enough back to honour any warranties that may still apply.

But yeah, otherwise crazy. And it does suck.

* assuming that swing arms for new models are different to those of older models.

That’s me never considering a 2nd hand lappy then.

Yeah I really like my Zesty but I’d never buy one second hand.

Surely however, a good relationship with a LBS would help here? I know if I asked my LBS who sell Lapierre to source me a spare part they would without hesitation.

Does sort of help that I’ve bought 2 Lapierre’s from them mind you.

FuzzyWuzzy – Member

Yeah I really like my Zesty but I’d never buy one second hand.

…and no spares for 2nd hand owners means you will never sell yours for anything like the money you’d get for a frame made by anyone else still in business. 🙁

True but mine’s an 09 model so it’s had a good life (only thing original on the bike now is the frame and seat post collar), ofc I wouldn’t be happy if it snapped just out of warranty but can’t see me wanting to sell it

Neil_Bolton – this is not a problem with a dealer. The dealer was told in no uncertain terms that they could not be supplied with a swingarm unless the original invoice/receipt is provided.

Try a different dealer 😉

neninja; really? By Hotlines or Lapierre themselves?

From my personal point of view, that’s not an issue as I’m the original owner of all my bikes and can provide receipts for all of them (including for the next owner).

Does sound odd if they’re refusing paid for requests however.

Happened to me too. I got it written off by insurance and bought an SB-66 frame with the proceeds. One lost customer, but nevermind eh Lapierre!

I’m not sure that this is even legal under european law?

it would be a bit like buying a s/h car and then the manufacturer refusing to sell you some brake discs for it would it not??

That sound you just heard is the 2nd hand value of Lapierres hitting the floor…and continuing through it.

Might be worth giving We Love Lapierre[/url] a ring.. I seem to remember last year they had some swing-arms available where they’d broken bikes to replace front triangles..

Try a different dealer

Can you recommend one who might get a different result?

neninja; really? By Hotlines or Lapierre themselves?

Hotlines have told the dealer that it is Lapierre policy and they have to see a copy of the purchase receipt. I know the dealer in question personally and have no reason to doubt them.

Can the original owner be tracked down / contacted on the off chance they still have the original receipt?

it would be a bit like buying a s/h car and then the manufacturer refusing to sell you some brake discs for it would it not??

Sadly, nobody has to sell anything to anyone they don’t want to.
There is no right to spare parts. You rely purely on the grace of the manufacturer to be sensible and support users.

How they do this is really up to them BUT most reasonable companies who respect customers will not have such unfair policies.

There is no right to spare parts. You rely purely on the grace of the manufacturer to be sensible and support users.

Yes but Lapierre are French!

lesson there make sure before you agreed to buy a 2nd hand Lapierre get the original receipt.

Yes but Lapierre are French!

lesson there make sure before you agreed to buy a 2nd hand Lapierre get the original receipt.

the op said they would only sell to the original owner, so would not matter if he had the receipt or not

The dealer was told in no uncertain terms that they could not be supplied with a swingarm unless the original invoice/receipt is provided.

Hotlines will be supplying the shop not the bikes owner, how would they know it’s been sold on?

If you have a decent relationship with the dealer, surely they would sort it?

That sound you just heard is the 2nd hand value of Lapierres hitting the floor…and continuing through it.

Well, that’s me never buying a new lappy either then. Odd, they don’t have a large demo fleet as far as I can tell so if you buy one having not ridden one and don’t like it; it’ll be worth buttons. May as well use fivers instead of andrex whilst you’re at it.
Shame, they’re nice looking bikes.

If you have a decent relationship with the dealer, surely they would sort it?

It wasn’t originally bought from the dealer and Hotlines/Lapierre want a copy of the receipt. You can hardly expect the dealer to ‘create’ one.

How about ‘edlong’s suggestion?

Had the same issue with Santa Cruz – they refused to sell me a swing arm for a Bullit as I wasn’t the original owner (and the original owner no longer had the receipt).

They were kind enough to tell me they had one in stock though.

Blimey – this sounds shit

I’m not likely to buy one unless I hear cheery news from the distributor/manufacturer about this issue

I had my front triangle replaced last summer on my Zesty (it was 4 years old at the time and not a warranty job) and I was never asked by the LBS if I was the original owner or not.

Yep, similar experience to one of my mates with Jungle/SC.

Cracked the front end of a Nomad C (which was a known fault on the earlier ones) but he bought it as an ex demo bike. The dealer went pop not long after & Jungle didn’t want to know.

They said they couldn’t/wouldn’t do anything. You can buy any other spares apart from either the front or rear sections.

They were kind enough to tell me they had one in stock though.

Nothing like kicking you when you’re down, is there?

Looks like my love affair with santa cruz was short lived…..
I wonder if Santa Cruz know just how poor their distributor is?
I wonder why manufacturers aren’t demanding better distributors. Silverfish manage to provide good service.

It wasn’t originally bought from the dealer and Hotlines/Lapierre want a copy of the receipt. You can hardly expect the dealer to ‘create’ one.

I meant if you (the 2nd hand purchaser) had the original receipt from the original owner.

Yeah it’s not just Lapierre that have this stance, it’s one of the reasons I won’t have an SC (or Lapierre) on my short-list come new bike time.

I can actually see why they have this policy though, relatively small companies that sell a large proportion of their total volume as high-end bikes can’t reasonably be expected to keep large stocks of swing-arms and front-ends (or to be able to make new ones after they’ve revised the design and re-tooled). The have an obligation to be able to support genuine warranty claims though so if they sell off their limited stock they’re going to have to take the hit and supply new frames for warranty claims which will hurt their bottom line.
Ofc it sucks for the consumer and I might be imagining the cost to the manufacturer to support warranty claims with new bikes is more than it actually is but presumably they’re not stupid enough to implement such a policy if there wasn’t a good reason to do it.

relatively small companies that sell a large proportion of their total volume as high-end bikes can’t reasonably be expected to keep large stocks of swing-arms and front-ends

At the prices Santa Cruz ask for their frames, I beg to differ.

🙂

I find this a bit odd, I’ve worked in the bike industry for coming up to ten years now, last summer I got a crash replacement front end for a friend when I worked in a shop who didn’t even stock lapierre we had a hotlines account for other things but never stocked lapierre. I could also order spares for lapierre too. He wasn’t the original owner and also didn’t have proof of purchase. Whether it was because I know several people at hotlines I don’t know but I never had the reason to believe that they wouldn’t help a customer out. I’d try another shop if it was myself.

relatively small companies that sell a large proportion of their total volume as high-end bikes can’t reasonably be expected to keep large stocks of swing-arms and front-ends

Hmmmmm. Yeti, turner, intense, cove, ellsworth, transition (to name a few) all seem to sell predominantly high end full suspension frames in similar or smaller volumes than lapierre and santa cruz (certainly even smaller volumes than Lapierre and SC in the UK!) and all seem to be able to supply/sell replacement fron/rear ends to whoever asks and either has a warranty or no warranty but the money instead. (I leave orange out of this simply because the fs bikes are made over here and so i imagine they can get away with much holding a smaller stock of spares at any one time than imported ones because they can just make up few more locally if they have unexpected runs of snappages).

[edit] plectstomus, the OP is not the only person on here to have come up against this with a s/h lapierre: there was a thread about the same things a few months ago. I tried a search for it but iirc the thread title didn’t have ‘lapierre’ in it so having trouble locating it.)

The things is, no one buys spares for a bike that doesn’t exist. I.e. the number of spare parts that is required to be held in stock is directly proportional to the number of bikes you sell. To date, i have never ordered a part for a bike i don’t actually have “just for fun”!

If LP are running out of parts, then it suggests to me that they made an error estimating how reliable there bikes are…………….