@nols, our point is it’s nearly a £1000 premium over the Alu bike. You’ve got to want the Carbon one very much, that extra pays for a new fork and/or other bling on a alu Covert.

Nols – To be completely honest the whole ‘Santa Cruz can charge more’ concept is one I dont really get… Yep they make nice bikes, (I had a Bullet as my first Alps bike) but they’re also making far greater numbers and have a bigger market share. Transition are a far smaller company with much lower operating profits.

well said.

Quote from Kyle from an email I had earlier this year:

I hear ya on pricing. it is tough game for sure. our costs keep rising… and the made in Taiwan thing is more about what we can accomplish rather than the price we can do it for. but yah i hear ya. something we’ll be focusing on more in the next couple years is making an offering at affordable prices. We’ve gained so much experience in what we do that the natural thing is to build the best thing you can and of course that costs money. ha. from there though i see is getting more back to our roots of having killer high value product for the lower price segment. anyway, don’t count us out of that game yet cause it is still close to our hearts here!

I think part of the problem is that the the standard covert is such good value for money considering what it costs them to produce it. The carbon frames are being made at the limits of their capabilities and with a completely uncompromising approach. Its understandable that they’re going to be big money.

on the published figures of both frames it is 222g (just under half a pound) ‘heavier’ than a Nomad C.

Not sure where you got those numbers, but based on number on your site & the published number from SC is actually 310g. For what it’s worth, there are an awful lot of Nomad C’s out there that come in well under that weight too.

Price wise, well, we shall see but at that price you’re in the realm of Ibis/Santa Cruz/Yeti/Intense carbon etc which are (rightly or wrongly) perceived very much as high end boutique brands, where historically Transition has been at the cheaper end of that market.

At ~£2k I would have thought they may have been on to something. Still, if past years stock are anything to go by, there are normally a fair few Transition’s kicking around with hefty discounts to get shot of them 😉

Hob Nob – Member
Price wise, well, we shall see but at that price you’re in the realm of Ibis/Santa Cruz/Yeti/Intense carbon etc which are (rightly or wrongly) perceived very much as high end boutique brands, where historically Transition has been at the cheaper end of that market.

At ~£2k I would have thought they may have been on to something. Still, if past years stock are anything to go by, there are normally a fair few Transition’s kicking around with hefty discounts to get shot of them

It’s always a mistake for a vendor to enter the fray of a pricing discussion, but here goes..

At 2k?.. Well they are 2k, the 400 you pay to the Vatman, not much we can do about that, and in any event there are unlikely to be many more than 100 pcs made for worldwide consumption this go round I’m led to understand so, cutting the price and margin to achieve volume would be a pointless exercise.

Carbon is carbon and if the process aint done right, I for one wouldn’t want to a) Ride it or b) sell to another fellow rider, as it was personally I had my reservations about even bringing them into the UK.

So, the week the Transition guys spent riding with a few of us dispelled any doubts we might have had and I’m now head of the queue for one of these bikes, prior to this I’d just spent the winter building a boat at one of the few specialists that offer half decent carbon repairs to bike frames and we’d had a not brilliant experience with carbon race frames from that now defunct Pronghorn company, hence the doubts.

As to the comparison with what we would refer to in a banter environment as ‘yesterdays brands’, our intension with Transition is to build a community, with more uplift events and rider get togethers going forward, so as well as a bike hopefully your buying into a bit of a brand culture, with folk of like minds and rider attitude, with us at Surf Sales backing your play, so whilst we aint ever going to be the cheapest around (we wouldn’t want to ride or sell stuff that was) we won’t force a huge race team marketing budget onto the consumer price, hence the relatively reasonable value of the metal frames, we’re going very much with the ‘bro’s not pro’s’ free ride culture with an emphasis on additional skills training with the growing travel to the mountains market.
Our snow and surf background always has an emphasis on knowing enough to keep you injury free, nothing worse than down time off the hill/water/snow due to stuff that could be avoided with a little help from folk who have been there before you.

So in that way we are raising the brand profile, prior to us being around Transition was a direct to market via a shop and the service I gather wasn’t as it should be, with us in place backing our retailers as well as consumers play there will be an on cost for that sort of service, if you don’t want/need that kind of thing then that Brant chap seems to have a solution, there is nothing if not choice in life..

Hope that clears things up a bit.

The only way that could have cleared it up less is if you had Steve Jones rewrite it for you.

there are unlikely to be many more than 100 pcs made for worldwide consumption

I doubt this very much.

if you don’t want/need that kind of thing then that Brant chap seems to have a solution, there is nothing if not choice in life..

This is the problem a lot of smaller brands have. It’s a problem Titus had, which is why it’s now in our hands, and not distributed through a distributor/retailer distribution chain.

Margins are being eroded right left and centre. The deals that direct marketeers can offer are huge – I am constantly amazed at the pricing coming out of Canyon, for instance.

I think Transition is a fantastic brand, and the stuff they are doing is brilliant. The regular posters on this site are by far from a normal cross section of the buying public and I’m sure the Covert will do very very well in it’s carbon version selling to people who want a piece of that Transition brand. Which Surf Sales have done a great job to build and promote in the UK.

Canyon and Rose prices are very good value for money. But there are pros and cons. I have looked at Strive and Uncle Jimbo. Impressive spec but no demo, difficult to find any reviews.

Covert Carbon = £5k
Spicy 916 = £5K
2013 Spech Enduro = £7k-8K

If your in the AM/Enduro field then the above are very similar price wise, spec and geo. Time for a covert demo I think.

Time for a covert demo I think.

Time well spent. A friend has an alu one and it is frankly brilliant.

Thanks Brant.

Now I know I’m going to regret asking this, but wtf is Steve Jones and what does he ride?

The Standard Covert is a brilliant ride, I use nothing else, trail, climbs, park, Alps, one bike does me and I’ve got access to all of them, but….

That Yellow Carbon jobbie they bought over and kindly donated to Monmouth pikey appeal, is something else again, how to describe it? It’s just more ‘live’ gives everything an ‘edge’ wouldn’t have thought you could improve a bike any more but it does.

Steve Jones is the ditor of Dirt – well known for indecipherable articles

What’s a “ditor”

Im just hoping I can get my Yellow medium before christmas as Im off to Tenerife after Christmas and will desperately want it built for that trip.

The bike will then become the demo bike at crosstrax to sit alongside the ally one we have. Still got the old demo frame for sale 🙂

nols – Member

What’s a “ditor”

Sorry – “editor” – wish I had one for my typing.

@Sancho
From Kyle:

carbon coverts….probably late this year but still TBD. working hard to get them done as fast as we can but it’s a long process. 🙁 i want to say November….but the way i normally guess i’m probably off a bit. 😉

You might be lucky…

Ordered from Surf the day the press release was circulated, so still hopeful.
not sure how far down the list I am.

Canyon and Rose prices are very good value for money. But there are pros and cons. I have looked at Strive and Uncle Jimbo. Impressive spec but no demo

You can test Rose bikes – or at least you used to be able to. I spoke to a very helpful guy at Rose UK called Finlay Paton who was going to sort me out with one for a few days, but I ended up buying a different bike before we got round to it. (A Transition, as it happens.) I can probably dig out his email, if anyone is interested.

Andrea Bruno’s Carbon Covert… yellow bombers? Jury’s out on these

I though they were early 90’s Judy’s for a second. Ug.

And apart from that, yum.

You sure that’s not Ali G’s bike?

looks lush in that matte black

they would be extra interesting on the yellow frame! 😯

Sometimes, bikes with no thought to colour scheme look badass.

Is it just me or is there a lot of the Yeti SB-66C in those lines?

Or is it just that there is only so many ways to join up the dots?

Similar lines I guess, not quite the same though. Linkage and stuff is different and the downtube is straight on the 66. Up close the level of detail on the Covert is pretty awesome.

I want those yellow Bombers. BADLY!

They must have built that bike in the dark