[Closed] Is Brant leaving Ragley etc?

Why don't you just turn off the internet and do something useful with your lives...

I took the news to mean that Brant had had enough of the QC and delivery problems with Ragley/CRC/Hotlines and decided to move before it got ridiculous. Can't say I blame him and think that some of the accusations on here are a bit on the fringe side to be honest. I wonder if he shot JFK and helped fake the moon landings too......

I wish him the best of luck at Titus/OnOne and hope he has some new ideas to take with him.

I'll probably get rid of my Ragley and get a Titus.

I'll probably get rid of my Ragley and get a Titus.

I have a suggestion.

If you like the bikes Brant designs (and many people on here seem to) then buy them.

If you don't, don't.

If he's a schmuck then he'll disappear very quickly.

If he happens to be quite good and makes a living in an industry that's notoriously difficult to, then good luck to him.

Me? I don't particularly like his branding but admire his ideas. I'm a shallow ****, so I'll look elsewhere for something that grabs me. But I'll never say never - he may yet do something that flicks my switch.

man, this is still going on...just finishing up my 12hr shift at work...this has been quite entertaining [tho not sure what all the fuss is about, just chill pll(not really, I may still want to read it tomorrow)]

bdab - Member

so is ragley the new superstar ? Brant the new fruit?

Well, the flaming torches are out and the internet school bullies are warming up for the easy shots, but just like with Superstar, there's an awful lot of happy owners out there too.

I don't feel particularly strongly about Ragley, On-one or Planet x. I've liked the ones I've owned/own, but have never bought into the whole personality cult thing.

Unfortunately for Brant, I think he has fallen into the trap of becoming the face of every aspect of the product. It's easy (if time consuming) to do when you're operating on a small scale, with a loyal band of followers. It becomes more problematic when you scale up and can't spread yourself thin enough to keep everyone happy. I don't suppose that On-one would have gained the following they did without Brant putting himself out there, but I hope for his sake and theirs that this time around he doesn't make himself quite so accessible. Whether the hero worship is cultivated or not, there will usually end up being a flip side to the sycophancy.

In fairness the same thing has happened to lots of other very committed, hands on internet entrepreneurs too.

be fair the defenders at all costs are out as well and fruit never got that. Like with superstar the QC issues seem very real though. I suspect in this case that has less to do with brant that it did with fruit - that is brant had little to do with slecting factories , QC methods etc.

HE bought me a curry once. Actually twice. It was weird, the curry. It was nice, but weird. Still nice though.

Bikes eh. Weird.

Lol, just signed in for the latest on 'Brantgate'
It's an epic
No sorry wrong brand

I did think that it was s bit weird to see Brant answering queries on/ apologising for CRC given that he's supposed to be a consultant designer to them an therefore not responsible for other aspects of their supply chain and customer service. I guess the relationship was actually closer than we were led to believe.

Anyway, I prefer it when CRC come on to STW themselves. Remember that rant about us all having lax internet security when they were leaking our card details? That was ace!

is Brant going to make an appearance on here to clear things up or 'shed' us some light ? 😉

My mates surname is Brant. I'm confused, should I still be his friend?

who's Brant Richards? sounds like an 80s brat pack movie star, was he in St.Elmos Fire?

No, that was Zak Tempest.

Funny thread. 😆

Nice angle to use the Robbie thing as the reaction here reminds me of the 'haters'- generally people with no talent and a lot of jealousy 😉

i got a pre-ordered one of the first mbops.
The paint flaked off ...after 2 hard winters of riding.
I got a big dent in top tube ...after being thrown 20ft into another guy buzzing the trail.

Its my 1st choice mtb ... It ain' t pretty or light. But its superb to ride.
Job welldone to Brant.

I'm still riding my Summer season from before Brant left cos it works for me. It's the 3rd Inbred frame I've owned, the fourth is a sliding dropout SS.

Didn't buy into Ragley because it wasn't doing anything really different enough.

Brant donated a Blue Pig frame to us at Singletraction as a prize giveaway so he's not all bad..

No doubt I'll still be riding my Summer Season when he's stopped designing for Titus! 🙂

Ben Richards? The Butcher of Bakersfield?

Fwiw I know how frustrating it can be when things go wrong

As others have said, he's a designer, he doesn't run the company
How on earth can he be held responsible for QC issues with Ragley?

I'm sure it's someone else's job to look after that sort of thing

I guess his problem [if it is a problem to him] is that he has put himself up as spokesman for all matters & comments on anything and everything when maybe he should have left others to do it.
Maybe a big reason for his departure is that he doesn't like the way they handle things?

I liked my inbred and didn't really want to sell it but I'm not doing the riding it's good for anymore. Only sold it last week and never really had a problem. Lasted 5 good years built up and in varying amounts of use which has got to be the best run of any of my bikes for at least the last ten.

or 'shed' us some light ?

Go and stand in the corner for that.

Back on topic: There's only one thing worse than being talked about isn't there?

There's only one thing worse than being talked about isn't there?

Ha! Good point.

Brant's work here is done. 😉

Brant rocks!
Brant sucks!

The internet hasn't changed since I first accessed usenet in 1997.

Can we expect some cheep mega's then as everyone goes to buy a titus?

I need/want some cheap (free) Carnegie's.. will there be any toys/pram/throwing action..?

if so.. throw some toys my way please.. ta

Its my 1st choice mtb ... It ain' t pretty or light. But its superb to [i]ride.
Job welldone to Brant. [/i]

Ditto: Had my Blue Pig for a couple of years now. It cost me under £400 to build up using old parts etc all in, frame included. Never had an issue with it, totally reliable, strong and a blast to ride! For the money, extremely hard to fault.

I like Brant's bikes. I've had 2 inbreds and a blue pig and they've all been great.

His guerilla marketing is aweseome, a 5 page thread from ONE twitter post. Magnificent.

Never had an issue with it, totally reliable...

A totally reliable hardtail frame?

I'm sold. 😉

Brant donated a Blue Pig frame to us at Singletraction as a prize giveaway so he's not all bad..

To be fair to him he's donated 2 frames - Mk1 Blue Pig and Piglet 😉

As for the rest of this thread, mleh.

Followed this thread all the way through and I have nothing new to really add other than a bit of support for Brant.

I’d be totally gobsmacked if he has the final say on quality control at Ragley, Nukeproof etc and wouldn’t be surprised at all if the unwillingness to act from the people who actually are responsible form part of his decision to move on.

I have never owned a "Brant Bike" only his bars but I do own a Cotic and now a Titus and I value highly the ability to talk to the guys behind them directly on here if needed (how cool is that), as said there’s very few industries where you can do this - try talking directly to mr zanusi when your washing machine goes wrong and see how far you get

I like his designs - couldn’t say they are pretty but their function over form - and willing to stray away from the norm in pursuit of moving the bar forward

Brant put me off once on the descent at the htn winter sprinter with some trailside tomfoolery. As a result, I didn't win. This led to me not being picked up by a pro team and sponsored to travel the world, thus being extremely fit and rich. Because of that, I've not bought my house in the Californian hills where me and my blonde surf babe girlfriend would live being visited by various sports professionals and the cast of friends.

Ergo, it's directly Brant's fault that I'm not invited to David schwimmer's summer bbq this year.

Damn you Richards. Damn you to hell.

My two cents worth
I have met Brant a few times and he seems a good bloke , Very enthusiastic about bikes and stuff .
He did help me out with a MMbop frame when my pace broke and a nice bike it is too with some very good features for the british climate.

It must be strange to read all this when you are the subject of the discussion and be very tempted to jump in , So big up to Brant for resisting and I wish him good luck in his new venture.

Fast forward to 2008 and 10 years of a tumultuous journey, the pair were struggling to cope with the demands and growing pains of a rapidly expanding business with inadequate systems and processes.

Well in 2011 it was no different to me, I went there to spec up a 456 Carbon SS with a £1500 budget and after three follow up phone calls they never got back to me. Prior to that I bought some Elixir CR's and it took them 1.5hrs to process the order. I went back again to look at a 29er and again was subjected to utter dismal service, left standing for ages on my own whilst they all play pass the only lap top that works and in the end went off and bought a Niner Air 9.

I've gone through a 9 month £15K spell of buying bikes (and selling the ones I didn't get on with!) and On One could have easily took £3500 of that, if they had of bothered to remotely appear like they give a dump. If they focused on customer service as much as being up their own ar5e5 then they'd have a customer for life as I actually very much like their whole ethos and product range...

I ordered a 16T Groove Armada from Brant's shoddy shed based emporium once, and he sent me a 17T instead because that's all they had at the time. bastard.

As a result I am only 16/17 as fast on my SS as I could be and as a result have conspicuously failed to trouble the scorers* at races the length and breadth of the country.

* apart from several times when I've troubled them in the sense of 'I wish that slow fat bloke would hurry up and finish, so we can pack up and go home'

I've gone through a 9 month £15K spell of buying bikes (and selling the ones I didn't get on with!)

Holy shit.

Ergo, it's directly Brant's fault that I'm not invited to David schwimmer's summer bbq this year.

Don't panic. It was shit. Although at 2am Meatloaf and Peter Andre did a 'two girls, one cup' parody that would've blown your mind...

Don't panic. It was shit. Although at 2am Meatloaf and Peter Andre did a 'two girls, one cup' parody that would've blown your mind

Yeah that was good, although the cup was ovalised before they started..

Yeah, and Keith Chegwin went off 'on one' at Gary Bushell for stealing his pork pie.

S'only 'cos he's inbred.

Maybe this whole thing is also tough on the guy at the centre of it. I should imagine alot of work has got into Ragley over the last 2 years and he probably wasnt desperate to leave it all.

My Blue Pig is great but most of the other accessories are shonky, maybe with a bit more budget and bike focussed support we will get more great bikes and bits.

Hmmm, hopefully they will be selling piglet frames off on the cheap to get over this rough patch.

Still gutted I missed it.

It appears that some people want the have there arsed kissed and rose petals placed on there bed just because they bought a bike/frame from a certain brand.

Lets be honest here how many other bike company's are there out in the bike world. Do they all kiss your arse every time you have a problem or need some inane problem sorting out? I agree with some peoples comments on this thread about just because Brant comes on all the big bike forums he is an easy target for someone to moan to about the paint on there bike getting knocked off after using it for months off road. Do the same people go moaning all the time about Cannondale frames cracking a lot or the fact that most frames are made in the far east anyway!

Just because you bought a cheap frame form someone who actually comes on the bike forums and actually takes some interest in biking and answering some customers questions and query's on the forums. why would that make you feel special enough to think he is going to kiss your arse because you bought one of his bikes? I think a lot of that is half the problem with this issue on Brant.

For what its worth I don't think a lot of his bikes are anything out of the ordinary. In fact I think some Mondeo type bikes like Specialized/Kona are a lot better hardtail frames than the On Ones he designed. I have had a few and yes a 29er Inbred I had did have issues with the brake calliper needing a million washers to space it out from the frame, something I would never have had from the above well known brand names. As said above if you have a 20inch frame the headtubes are just stupidly small at 100mm. Brant just comes across as a hubris bloke a bit above what he thinks he his. But this site is a Mecca for that sort of person anyway so he is in good company!