Not the LA party band famous for Blackout in the Red Room.

Tell us all about one brand you love, and on that you hate. But, most importantly – Why you love/hate them.

For me –
Love = Hope. Many years ago, I wanted a new hub. I rang them. They didn’t make what I wanted. They then offered to make what I wanted. Asked if I wanted any custom logos on it. What colour would I like? etc. Superb customer service, simply superb.

Hate = Cannondale. Irrational, maybe. Many years ago, when I was in the trade, their customer service was the most pitiful in the world. Maybe it’s changed, and I hope it has, but then it was essentially, “Meh”. That a brand like that allowed its European operation to be so poor reflected really badly on the brand overall for me.

Love: Vans shoes even though I’ve not bought a new pair in years and none of the new styles appeal to me, I still feel “affiliated” to the brand.

Hate: Vauxhall cars. Some are fine, some are terrible, no way of knowing which is which! I’d quite like a zafira CDTI 150. We have some at work which are quite nice, but every vauxhall my mat has bought new has been crap, do they have special “half arsed at work” fridays or something?

Love – Hope and SRAM
Hate – loud clicky hubs WHY and now it is near impossibel to get aquite one even a HOPE XC seems loud to me

Flashy, you know Love/Hate are plain Camden Underworld in Feb?

Anyway
Love – Hope, just nice desirable stuff (but when o when will the Vision R8 actually ship?)

Hate – tricky this one, but think I may have to go with the glove division of Giro. Nice fitting things. But have the strength and longevity of tissue paper. Can’t really think of a brand I just outright hate

Love/Hate are plain [playing?] Camden Underworld in Feb?

*Hits teh webz for tickets…!*

*Realises that they’re not on the gig list, but Gilbey is…. Ponders buying anyway!*

Love: stuff that is designed to be great, then sold. (Castelli…)
Hate: stuff that is designed to be sold, then sold. (Rapha….)

Surely still not jizzy? Thought he would of popped his clogs long ago. The amount of drugs that lad must of taken beggars belief.

anyway – back to op – cant think what I love, but I know I hate Fiat.

bye

hate: superdry and the morons that wear it. a brand that means nothing, no heritage just ripping off bits of other brands but with the logo more conspicuously placed to say “look at me, i’m a style sheep and a nob too”

love: apple. makes my work a lot easier and really gets up the noses of I.T. types so a double win.

Yep, Jizzy is a) still alive and b) in the line up!

Already got my tix!

Love Maico, Caterham

Hate Ferarri

(Cheezy, they’re not on the Underworld website. Am I missing something?)

Hmm…

Bikey:

Love: Again, Hope. Fantastic quality products, simple as.

Hate: Anything to do with Brant Richards, cos he was rude to me for daring to criticise the aesthetics of one of his ‘designs’. 😆 Woon’t ride one of his ‘designs’ if you paid me.

Non Bikey:

Apple: Computers and stuff the way they should be.

Miscrosoft: For making something as shit as it can possibly be, then having the audacity to sell it to people!

Hmmm, I have a ticket in my kitchen for 6th feb for Gilby Clarke and Love/Hate. Gonna be disappointed if they are no longer on the bill 😕

Love: Transition = just really like their bikes and they seem to suit the riding i like to do.
Hate: Not many really, not a fan of Urge helmets but that’s just because they’re ugly. Altura shorts are atrocious too.

Cheezemeister – http://www.theunderworldcamden.co.uk/gigs/eventdetails/6-feb-12-gilby-clarke-underworld/

Gilby Clarke
+ Badmouth + Guns 2 Roses

Love Shimano for shifting me for 25 years for all the boring reasons.

Hate my irrational bike lust, its like a constant annoying semi that wont ever go away.

Flashy, yep, saw that. Disappointed now. Still Gilby will be good

I think Underworld was where I once almost bottled some bloke; he waved a bottle in me face and was abusing me something ‘orrible (nasty racist and all sorts), so I grabbed the bottle off him and wooduv done him had me mates not grabbed hold of me in time.

Not a very nice moment at all. Fortunately the bouncers threw him out, but let me stay as long as I behaved meself. 🙂

Cooduv had extremely serious consequences that. Just goes to show that alcohol and aggression don’t mix well, kids…

Remember that joke in Kerrang? Usually they’d do a “where are they now” feature but for Gilby they had to do a “Where am I now” feature.

love, surly stuff, cheap and very tough.
hate, orange, for a few reasons.

Love: intense, and santa cruz. Fantastic frames and truly a joy to ride.

Hate: industry nine, because im still waiting for my wheels to be sorted after 7 months and still no news :-\

Love: On-One. I can email brant or dave. I can find out why and what. As to when, well Im never in any rush. And more to the point I genuinely enjoy riding their products.

Hate: Santa Cruz, cant stand the dishonesty of controlled distribution of products. Im sure some of their bikes are fine, but the US;UK pricing is shite.

Love- Salsa ace bike products that just feel right

Hate- Orange, ridden exclusively by Charlie Uniform November Tangos

Love: Cotic. You can take a 120mm trailbike, break it on an uplift day at fort william, tell them so and mention that it’s both out of warranty and second hand and that it breaking might be connected to it falling off the chairlift earlier in the day… and they still express courier you a replacement part for free the next day. The most time consuming part was the mandatory conversation about how ace Scotland is Brilliant bikes, backed by brilliant people.

Hate: Nothing really. Don’t like the cloud of fanboys that surround Orange but the bikes are good, just too expensive… Can’t hate that.

Bike stuff:

Love – my tiny Titus: will always be all the bike I’ll ever need.
Moots bikes: ti loveliness
minx-girl.com: for the best collection of girls biking stuff that actually looks good
(Plus I have a t-shirt with ‘minx’ written across the *ahem* chest!)

Hate – all the products which are available for ‘average sized guys’ which means if you’re a petite girl you’ve got really limited options

Love – my tiny Titus: will always be all the bike I’ll ever need.

You don’t actually need it Sue, to be perfectly honest. 😐

Best give it to me then…

(Did your postie come today?)

Elfin – the chances of you (or anyone else) getting my Titus off me are about zero 🙂 That bike and I have a lot of shared history.

(no postie didn’t come today – suspect they’re a bit busy at the moment)

Things Bike

LOVE: Gary Fisher. Because he was there at the beginning, and I like the whole West Coast mountain bike thing. I know the bikes themselves were made by Trek (not that this is necessarily a bad thing), and that they now no longer exist, but they worked well.

HATE: Orange. Because my personal bigotry runs the way of not being able to stand the whole Northern industry thing. That, and the image that has built up around their bikes, as referred to above.

Things Not Bike

LOVE: Volvo. Enough said.

HATE: Anything that General Motors has ever even been in contact with. Devil’s spawn that company is. FACT.

love….oh so many things…..turner, for being turner….Mavrick bikes for making maverick bikes both of these have the best customeer service …singletrack mag for being singletrack mag infurating and brilliant…Mike ferrentino for being a great writer and for two stories catching trains across europe and the memories fo his latley deceased dog they really touched a spot ….. shimano hope magura all keep ing me going

hate…..the fan boys and girls…my desire for the neext best shiny thing…my fond memories of the bikes i have sold and think i should get that again….sram avid for not keeping me going and stopping

LOVE: Hope, a few years ago I somehow lost the pin from my seat clamp when stripping a d cleaning my bike. Phoned them up to order a replacement and they sent me a whole new seat clamp free via next day delivery. I’ve stuck with their products were I can ever since and I’ve not had a dud yet.

I’m also becoming a Cotic fan boy after the great service I got from Paul this week, even though my frame is pre-owned.

HATE: Hate is a strong word, but I steer clear of FSA after underperforming products and non-existent after sales.

MrSmith, hit the superdry nail on the head. But I envy the founder and his faux heritage idea, it’s like those beers that seem like they’ve been around forever and imported by cleaver packaging and marketing.

What exactly is a “Northern Industry” thing???? 🙄

Are bikes not allowed to be designed in the North of England then?

And no, i’ve never owned or ridden any Orange product in my life (apart from my bright orange Marin!)

Love – the Northern Industry Thing

Hate – the Southern Stereotype thing (and their sh#t beer and rubbish pies)

Love – Mojo for their brilliant service & new free lowers when they upgraded me to kashima, & the 3 days it took them to sort my rear shock when it blew up. Also hope for replacing a seat qr that I snapped.

Hate – nothing comes to mind, guess I’m a lover not a hater…

Hope are doing very well here. My good customer service (see above) doesn’t seem to be a one off.

Love: Apple computers, Maverick bikes , Ford cars.

Hate: Orange email not bikes and getting older and less bendy 😐

Love-hope, fox forks, turner..and my out of control poodles,staffie and lab…
Hate-avid brakes and salad with my fish n chips…

love – pies
hate- orange haters (never had an orange, but most of the reasons given suck)

Love: Good solid kit that works
Hate: when the above stuff gets discontinued for a crap new model.

Love: Maverick American, best customer service ever, anywhere. Keep Pedalling in Manchester – no BS, lots of nice bikes and responsible for my Soma Double Cross DC, which is ace.

Mildly Bemused By: Crank Brothers – a brand seemingly dedicated to things that don’t work. It says everything that they bought the rights to the Maverick Speedball adjustable seatpost – the one Mav thing that was truly, deeply, flawed – and re-branded it as the Joplin.