Seems to me that they love selling and creating (i.e the fun sexy bit of designing and selling bikes) but are just bloody awful at the graft bit (the actually getting stuff in peoples hands, dealing with issues, etc).
You look at small frame companies when they start up that don’t build their own frames, they tend to be one man bands initially, how many people have Sick got?
Cotic started with just Cy, how many people now? Still less than 5 I think.
Same goes for Stanton.
I remember when I bought my Dialled Bikes frames they were both pre-launch. Mike took a deposit, he said when they would arrive. IIRC the first batch was a couple of weeks late but Mike kept everyone informed and no one had an issue as far as I’m aware.
I’m not convinced anyone in Sick is out to rip people off but if I were them I would have a think about whether running a bike company is really for them.