Another one bites the dust – Mercian Cycles

Announced liquidation today.

Lots of history and heritage. Maybe they didn’t move with the times (lots of long reach rim brake touring type bikes etc), but still very sad.

I had thought that the handmade steel renaissance was strong, but maybe not…..

The shop itself was always a bit old fashioned, but the frames were lovely, rode well, had real style and differentiation and it’s hard to see something else taking its place.

No!!!

Classic clubman’s cycle.

I always lusted after a Mercian but never bought one – always thought the top tube too long and the front end too low. Sob.

I saw the heading of the thread and thought that @StirlingCrispin would be commenting quickly.

Not good news, a lot of history and made some very nice bikes…as a teenager and riding out with the local CTC group, many were either on Mercian bikes or wanting to be on one.

That’s sad – as a Derbyshire lad they were everywhere in the 70s/80s. A locals dream bike back then.

As you say though, trends change and they’re probably stuck with the old farts Audax image.

I always lusted after a Mercian but never bought one

Isnt that always that always the problem though? We lust after and comment how great these types of bike look and the look at our modern geometry, electric shifting (and powered) machines and realised that the old bike would only get used once in a blue moon if at all and don’t buy one.

Maybe they last too long?  I have two steel tourers and a steel road bike. Youngest is around 12 years old.  Not enough changing in the basic design to drive users to upgrade every few years.

Plus many people who might have bought them now ride carbon.

Very sad. My Dad has had Mercian frames for the last forty years but

Maybe they didn’t move with the times

they were simply making frames that nobody wants anymore.

Noooo, they were one of my Local-ish bike shops growing up,

I agree with the sentiment though, they didn’t move with technology.  I can’t see any reason why they couldn’t build all the same bikes with thru axles, disk brakes and electric shifting.

And like IRC said maybe there’s a saturated market of frames like that with decades of 2nd hand frames.  If I wanted one I could probably find one on ebay to refurbish.  I wonder if someone will buy up the name.

Sad… but I must say, the times I went in their shop in Alveston, they didn’t do themselves any favours.

And when I came to buy a ‘once in a lifetime’ level of spendy  hand built steel framed disc braked gravel bike, their options were not there.   Its the 2020s, I’m not buying a rim braked bike !  (I got a Shand with a Rohloff hub instead).

I liked the junk shop/workshop vibe of the bricks and mortar shop, but I don’t bemoan the loss of the frames really – they’re a nice historical artefact now but nothing more to all but a vanishingly small subset of cyclists.

They had modernised frames but obviously too late. The old shop was an experience. Went in a few times but they never tried to sell me anything till I turned 40.

Loads of their bikes still going round here in Derbyshire.  Even saw a couple in Copenhagen back at Easter.

I had a one as an 18th birthday present (1984). To replace a gas pipe frame I’d damaged inventing gravel riding. It was a standard geometry 531 bike from free wheel. I remember reading that the tubes were held in the lugs with nails during brazing. I was so amazed to see the ends of the nails the next time i had the bottom bracket out.

It’s sad that are going, but if they are basically selling the same bikes today perhaps not surprising

I was actually in the market for a steel gravel bike frameset with rim brakes, can’t remember what put me off Mercian, might have been cost or just the ‘traditional’ construction, I’m not really a fan of lugs.

I went to Rourke instead, I think they had a similar custom offering.

Maybe the business just ran its course if people were retiring/their particular niche was dying out?

they were simply making frames that nobody wants anymore.

People assume that the product is the issue but there’s people buying trad road bikes still. There’s often other reasons for things like this.

Didnt they go bust, and were bought out around 20 years ago? Then they moved out of the shop on the A6 at Alvaston.
An employee buy out if I’m remembering it right. They were big Campag dealers at one time, then just stopped selling Campag.

I enjoyed nipping into their shop on London Road when I lived in Alvaston and admire the lug work and paint jobs of the bikes on display. I could never afford one but they were really really beautiful. Once the store shut you felt things were on the slide a bit. A fantastic framebuilder and a real shame for Derby and the wider cycling community. <!–more–>

That is a great shame. They made a really good job of stripping and then respaying my steel Kilauea 10 or 11 years ago. Although their paint range didn’t include anything approaching the original 1997 Mustard Yellow, once I’d settled on a plain black, it’s proved to be very hard wearing since. What to do in another 10 years when it needs done again?

Maybe they didn’t move with the times

You think.  Ignoring the lugged steel frames that nobody wants (at £1500-£2200) the ‘modern’ Lugless steel frame is £3,000.

Not saying they are not worth it as probably beautifully made but the market for them must be tiny and that market is going to be fussy/know exactly what they want for their £2-3,000 frame.

Ignoring the lugged steel frames that nobody wants

IF I was to buy one I’d be aesthetically attracted to the lugged version….provided the lugs were cast for modern geometry and discs which I’m not sure is a thing.

A great shame that they couldn’t find a way to make it work financially possible. In the modern niche world of low volume hipster frame building I’m not sure a heritage brand name helps or hinders.

I always hated working on them.

Their owners usually had unrealistic expectations of how their massively obscure ,pretty much unobtainable massively over worn ancient campag should operate.

I remember more than one* conversation about how Mercian (who we were not dealers for) should warranty their hub or bottom bracket because it cost a fortune….. Ok speak to Mercian then thanks.

* Given I worked on about 10 Mercians over the years to have that conversation more than once is notable.

Didnt they go bust, and were bought out around 20 years ago? Then they moved out of the shop on the A6 at Alvaston.

An employee buy out if I’m remembering it right. They were big Campag dealers at one time, then just stopped selling Campag.

Yes, think it was the shop or workshop manager, couple of the guys i rode with when i lived in the area worked there (one FT and one saturday lad) but that was late 90’s. Last time i was in there, maybe 10 years ago, they were still selling the same stuff that they’d had 20 years previously. Some of it was possibly the same stock!

IF I was to buy one I’d be aesthetically attracted to the lugged version

Good, they have made a sale.  They can put you down on the list with the other 4 people who want one.

I actually like them too and have a thing for old bikes but if I was spending £3,000 on a frame my options open up quite a bit and don’t think I would end up with a Mercian.

My steel tourer is coming up for 30 years old and still going strong.  I keep looking at replacing but i ve many happy memories so it’s a keeper.  For touring stuff it looks like spa and sjs are the go to places.

In this case it was probably isolated enough from t’interwebz that it has gone under on it’s own, so to speak.

But I reckon the Chiggle fire sale will have put a hole in some other medium-large retailers’ bank balances too. How many of us are now sat on 6-12 months of spares and won’t be spending for a while?

People I know, who are spending £2000-3000 on this type of bike, are dropping that cash on period correct 80s Raleigh Bananas, Pinarellos etc. Not on the modern equivalent.

Pity to see them go though – being fairly local its one of those bikes I thought I would always buy at some point when I got older. Having said that though, the old boys in our club are on Scotts Addicts, Trek Madones etc…

Their owners usually had unrealistic expectations of how their massively obscure ,pretty much unobtainable massively over worn ancient campag should operate.

That was more just a thing with ancient Campag. Back in the 90’s/early 00’s, Campag was very desirable and still sold reasonably widely – we’d often get older blokes in with knackered Campag and they’d use phrases like “Shimano wears out, Campag wears in” and then try to order the little grommit screw for the widget which had broken but it didn’t matter because “you can rebuild any part of Campag!” (often followed by a dig that you couldn’t do that with Shimano). It was apparently some sort of law with owners of Campag, to wax lyrical about it to anyone who’d listen while making subtle digs at Shimano too.

This was technically true except it took 6 weeks to order the part, get it delivered and then do the work. Meanwhile they’d be phoning every week to ask about the work and tell us how wonderful Campag was…

Shame about Mercian but I agree with comments above; there’s only so far a heritage name will get you.

Having said that though, the old boys in our club are on Scotts Addicts, Trek Madones etc…

I think this is starting to happen in the more experienced age groups.

My dad’s a regular on Cycling UK club rides and as his riding group advances into their 70s there’s more e bikes and carbon as they’re not lugging three weeks worth of luggage through Europe anymore, they’re doing 30-50 miles with a saddlebag and a couple of tea stops and they’re liking the light bikes and engineered compliance.

From my experience of seeing them ridden, 90% of their potential customers have probably passed away by now…

Had a couple of frames(not Mercians)resprayed by them,they did a very nice job .

So many  good frame builders to choose from these days,I imagine it’s a tough market.

when did custom steel frames get so expensive? I did a Dave Yates framebuilding course around a decade ago and at the time he was building custom reynolds frames for just over a grand – £2500 for a frame is crazy

I think it’s sad to see a UK frame building business like this gone. Genuinely, every time I read something like this it feels like the bike industry is losing something important. Yes classic style bikes are a niche now, no they don’t score as highly on pure performance scales as modern bikes, I get why the demand is low. You can spend anywhere between £1.5k and £5k on a carbon frameset so the price itself isn’t really what’s going on.

I think partly what’s sad (well, sad is the wrong word but anyway) is that road riding is still so pro-race influenced at club and culture level that people buy that last ounce of performance or efficiency via carbon bikes out of molds on the other side of the world, for riding that’s mostly social. And I get that speed is what many people like, not saying that’s wrong.

I suppose where I’m going with this is something about what the bike is beyond weight and stiffness and other measurables and something about how it came to be. Which means little to most people, I know. That’s the bit I find .. not sad, maybe disappointing? I’m not saying one is better than the other, just that I’d be happier to see a general culture in cycling and consumer habits where more riders wanting to buy a UK made frameset where other things than pure performance are the reasons for buying?

From experience of having a lugged Reynolds tubed frameset made to my spec, it’s a beautiful thing. I like the fact that all but the lugs were made relatively locally by small companies. I really like the ride – it was made to be a benchmark for an older frame spec to compare the ride qualities to newer, stiffer bikes – it’s not as quick in some situations as more a modern steel road frame and carbon fork I have but in many ways it has a nicer ride feel. It’s just different. I ride it a lot because I like the way it feels and handles, not because it’s making me any faster. But marketing ‘a nice ride feel’ is to try to sell a subjective claim, it’s much harder than ‘this bike is effectively 10W faster’. And isn’t marketing is what keeps a brand going?

Maybe it’s simply marketing and image missing the mark. I mean, just look at this bike.. It’s beautiful. £1800 with 853 tubes. Only £1400 with 631. No way is that overpriced. I’d say it’s excellent value.

benmanFree Member
People I know, who are spending £2000-3000 on this type of bike, are dropping that cash on period correct 80s Raleigh Bananas, Pinarellos etc. Not on the modern equivalent.

I’m not so sure.

If I’d had the market for a nice bike (I sort of am, but at a “Fairlight is a stretch” sort of budget) then I’d have loved a Mercian.  The frames really are gorgeous in the flesh and there’s a LOT of work put into them.

A Superlight in 835, but with thru axles, an internal rear brake, no other braze on’s (electric only) would have been 👌

Sad… but I must say, the times I went in their shop in Alveston, they didn’t do themselves any favours.

I always got great service in the old there as a skint teenager 😂

I never had Camapg but  you could turn up with a knickered shimano hub in bits and ask for the spares to rebuild it and someone would disappear into the workshop and come back ten minutes later with a ziplock bag of balls, cones seals etc which would cost about 50p and definitely wasn’t worth their time to serve up!

Probably why:

a) I’d still like one of their frames.

b) they had to close the shop

Good, they have made a sale.  They can put you down on the list with the other 4 people who want one.

It’s not like Fairlight, Singular  and others aren’t managing to sell Far East made frames for ~£1500.  Fairlight obviously went down the high performance route with custom tube shapes, and Singular are a bit cheaper with plain lugs. But like Jameso said, £1800 is not out of the ballpark and that is with beautiful hand cut lugs (the even more expensive frame, the lugs looked more like something you might see in a bespoke jewelry shop, not on a bike.  Obviously £1800 is the starting price before you start weeping at the options list, but that’s the nature of custom frames.

I actually like them too and have a thing for old bikes but if I was spending £3,000 on a frame my options open up quite a bit and don’t think I would end up with a Mercian.

It’s a contradiction though. If you wanted something like that then what else out there is actually better for the price?

The trouble is I just don’t think enough people want a classic rim braked bike made in the UK.  It’s a niche in a niche in a niche.  I know Rouke could build one, but (and no disrespect to Rouke) it’d be functional.

Mercians USP was fettling the plain luggs until they looked like this.

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when did custom steel frames get so expensive?

When the arse dropped out of the market for steel frames.

I’ve (still) got custom steel from the 90’s floating about. When i bought my first custom frame as a teenager, i could get custom geo for an extra 50 quid on a nice 653 lugged frame. (about 950 quid, inc headset and seatpin IIRC). I also had 15-20 custom builders to choose from, all offering widely similar frames at slightly different price points, all within easy striking distance of home. The same shops were also churning out standard geo frames by the dozen, standard lugs, standard tubes, *almost* production line style. The change to make it custom was relatively simple. Added an hour or two to the build time. Even when we went lugless, slightly more involved to do custom, but not hugely difficult.

Now those hundreds of stock geo frame are coming from china and made out of carbon, every single frame becomes custom, you’ve only got a dozen custom/steel builders in the whole country, those churning out hundreds don’t exist any more. So there is no facility or capacity for simple, custom geo, steel frames.

I did a Dave Yates framebuilding course around a decade ago and at the time he was building custom reynolds frames for just over a grand – £2500 for a frame is crazy

Yup, my last custom retailed at £1250 and built up to a *very* light race bike that i raced for years. When i looked at replacing it in the late 00’s, a *worse* frame would have been around 1900-2000.

I think it’s sad to see a UK frame building business like this gone. Genuinely, every time I read something like this it feels like the bike industry is losing something important.

Agreed, but there do seem to also be an increasing number of UK-based framebuilders making more modern bikes, so does it balance out?

Starling making (the front of) their full sus frames in Bristol spring to mind, as I owned one recently. Probably the most-respected steel FS maker globally.

And I assume there are still plenty enough old-school builders to meet the needs of the CTC crowd. I believe Steve Goff is still operating in a little unit near me in Skem, for example.

Also – without my glasses I thought for the second the thread title said “Merlin Cycles” and I was devastated.

Sad to see another one go but it’s not entirely unexpected. Bob Jackson doesn’t seem to have particularly done much since being bought from a similar predicament.

When I went to the first Bespoked it was full of super traditional “ain’t broke, don’t fix” old men bikes. A decade or so later the whole custom market is totally different.

I think there’s a lot going on, covid, bike boom, bike bust etc but there’s also a huge echo of the UK car market from the 70s… We lead the world, we dismiss foreign imports, we stubbornly refuse to modernise, we get swamped by cheaper and better products, the mass industry dies leaving a few mavericks doing their own thing.

There’s lots of reasons why I should buy a fairly traditional steel bike if I think about it but if I had that kind of money to drop I’d probably go with a custom titanium or Ti Carbon mix for similar cash because I’d be buying with my heart not my head and dubious statistics on then back of wonder materials wins hands down.

And I assume there are still plenty enough old-school builders to meet the needs of the CTC crowd.

Heritage Craft put cycle frame making on their ‘endangered list’. I think there was a singletrack article ’bout it.

Found it

Article 

FFS, image embedding is broken

http://www.classiclightweights.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/merciandk3-250.jpg

http://www.merciancycles.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/bi-lam-seat-lug-2-scaled.jpg

live.staticflickr.com/1766/41932000565_10ed32e292_b.jpg

I think there’s a lot going on, covid, bike boom, bike bust etc but there’s also a huge echo of the UK car market from the 70s… We lead the world, we dismiss foreign imports, we stubbornly refuse to modernise, we get swamped by cheaper and better products, the mass industry dies leaving a few mavericks doing their own thing.

There’s lots of reasons why I should buy a fairly traditional steel bike if I think about it but if I had that kind of money to drop I’d probably go with a custom titanium or Ti Carbon mix for similar cash because I’d be buying with my heart not my head and dubious statistics on then back of wonder materials wins hands down.

Interesting analogy but BMH still make roughly the same number of MG and Mini shells as Ariel make Atoms 😂

@nickc that report was largely a load of rubbish.