New bike brand from Halfords

I enjoyed the product designers take on the new brand on Road.cc,

“In the end I started with a concept that comes from my riding. I’m a slightly overweight middle age guy and I ride because I enjoy it; I’ve got lots of friends who are the same”, he said, and certainly that’s a very active part of the market right now. “I wanted an aero bike but whenever I’ve ridden an aero bike I’ve always found that the deep section wheels can be uncomfortable and the frames are too, and they often carry a weight penalty. So the idea of the 13 road range was for the bikes to be aero and comfortable, with no weight penalty.

😀

jameso – Member I’m not even convinced it’s a bad thing overall.

You can’t have it both ways.
🙂

Nope, and new stuff is almost always fun.

I don’t think it is anymore James.

I think people are more pissed of at yet more pointless standards than they are excited about a ‘improvement’ so incrementally small that no one can notice it.

We/Evans have bikes that won’t change for 2 years but they tend to not be mid-higher range road/cx/mtb bikes, it’s rare to be able to carry a range over and still feel confident it’s up to scratch but sometimes it works out. Halfords also have a 2 year cycle as far as I’m aware.

CFH will approve 8)

RS, in the context that this forum can be more about product than riding and that’s pretty representative. I think market freedom and us all being magpies to some extent means that’s how it is re standards, new kit etc, there’s no way to have one without the other right? New standards are part of progress, good or bad. Or, there’s always Communism. But that’s all getting OT.

Actually there’s always a rigid, steel, SS 29er too.. ie it’s only how easy it is to think new product invigorates the riding experience that gets in the way. Riding isn’t about that once you find a bike that works for you in most situations. Get there then turn off the media.
Even more OT. Sorry.

Snowdonia really is pretty isn’t it? Been too long.

jameso – Member

RS, in the context that this forum can be more about product than riding and that’s pretty representative.

Agreed.
🙂

I think market freedom and us all being magpies to some extent means that’s how it is re standards, new kit etc, there’s no way to have one without the other right? New standards are part of progress, good or bad.

Hmmmm.
Not necessarily.

Technological progress can occur without feeding rampant, unnecessary and often counter productive acquisitive greed.
The rush for the new is not without consequences.

And acknowledging that the acquisitive nature of humanity is not always a positive thing is not Communism.
It’s an acceptance of human nature.

It depends on the ethos the major manufacturers.
They currently seem to be focused on short term greed to the detriment of cycling as a whole.

Actually there’s always a rigid, steel, SS 29er too.. ie it’s only how easy it is to think new product invigorates the riding experience that gets in the way. Riding isn’t about that once you find a bike that works for you in most situations. Get there then turn off the media.
Even more OT. Sorry.

Once again, we agree.

b45her – Member

try repairing the things, odd sized cheapy headsets, crappy hubs, BB’s that went out of production in 2007 (on a 2012 bike)
basically parts bin bikes.

Mine has- a totally normal semi-integrated FSA headset, reasonable OE quality. Formula cartridge hubs- not light, becuase of the steel freehub, but reliable. And a square taper BB on an FSA crankset,unglamorous but practical and better than you normally find on a £500 bike. All perfectly good stuff.

Since i lack the ability to judge a frame from a picture on a website, unlike some folks, I guess I’ll reserve judgement on how good these bikes are 😉

This is surely the same for most bike shops or indeed lots of other sellers of consumer goods….selling this years models and then being able to discount them so heavily at the year end? Or the fact that a lot can offer 0% finance.

The EoY sale is a bit different. Each party drops their margin in the chain, the brand, the distributer and the shop. Its not just that the shop had a huge margin to start, plus if bike companies insist on model years, then they’ve got to go… of course lots of companies do nicely without model years, you do wonder what the price of a Trek/Giant/Specialized would actually be if they didn’t have to sell them off cheap at the end of the year.

Thats different of course to the Halfords model – They are pricing a bike at X with no intent of keeping it there. Its actual price is 75% of X, they just keep it at full price long enough to put a ‘Sale’ sign on it.

Lol at ‘seize the city’. Wonder if that was when the silver bollards out the back of the Travelodge got dented? They could have made much better use of Sheffield from a commuter video point of view although they’d probably get in trouble for it (I cane an X around Sheffield on a daily basis)

Not sure I see the point of the hate here unless it’s sour grapes or bike snobbery.

Boardman bikes regularly come in for a bashing which is probably unjustified, 13 looks set to follow.

The main valid criticism I see of Halfords bikes is the quality of store assembly work which seemingly can be very variable. I understand modern business likes to shove frontline staff between teams as ‘resource’ but when some skill is needed that doesn’t work, and being charitable I’d guess that’s where most of their spannering woes come from – and that’s a management quality problem, not a problem with staff or product although it can soon be a brand problem also.

If I needed a CXy do it all I’d be taking a look, even if I walked away after.

Good luck to them, I say. If they sell bikes that get ridden, it’s only good.

Halfords are getting better at bikes all the time, I go in a lot of their stores and the staff are getting better at service and knowledge and skills.
They are building up some nice brands with good bikes that people want to ride and will ENJOY riding.

The other shops better watch out for them. I’d certainly buy a bike there now if one suited me.

I like the designers honest ethos on the frame and spec – very refreshing – yeah that’s what I want, a bike I love to ride, not necessarily the latest look or fashion.

So where do think they are going with their current staffing policy?…. mate of mine has just started working for them(as a stop gap)..Cytech 2 qualified at £6.81 p/h!..he says the place is a joke,contracts for 16/20 hrs with flexibility demanded,i.e the next step up from zero hours contracts,and no fulltime customer facing staff being hired …is that going to attract good staff who want to take the brand forward?.The answer to that is clearly no…so much for the much vaunted relaunch.

So where do think they are going with their current staffing policy?…. mate of mine has just started working for them(as a stop gap)..Cytech 2 qualified at £6.81 p/h!..he says the place is a joke,contracts for 16/20 hrs with flexibility demanded,i.e the next step up from zero hours contracts,and no fulltime customer facing staff being hired …is that going to attract good staff who want to take the brand forward?.The answer to that is clearly no…so much for the much vaunted relaunch.

That’s been the case for a long time. My son worked part time at Halfords when he was at Uni, six or seven years ago. Just after he left the local branch got rid of a mechanic who was both an excellent mechanic and well qualified. I’m not sure what that says about their staffing policy, but then I know nothing about the staff in Evans or for that matter any number of other bike shops.

I do like this new range of bikes and were I to buy one, which I would happily do if it fitted my needs, then the first thing I would do on getting it home would be a bottom to top check, the same as I did when I bought a KTM from the nearest dealer to me.

Maybe I shouldn’t have to, but for the sake of half an hour with a spanner and a couple of allen keys, it’s not really a hardship.

When I bought my Boardman road bike I insisted that I took it away as an unopened box, having seen the scarred carbon seatpost on another on display. I signed a form and lost my free 6 week service. 😉 Hardly anything needed doing to assemble it so God knows how they can foul it up.

Intutition has Giant Defy seatstays, Propel top tube and TCR geometry (aside from a 0.5 cm shorter TT). Should be a very good ride for the money, and undercuts the . I quite like the 13, personally.

The TCR Advanced Pro is £300 cheaper (alloy steerer), and the Advanced Pro a little more – so I can see their pricing strategy.

Robbo if the place is that much of a joke why doesn’t he quit? They are trying to change the staffing policy and have infact increased their minimum contract to engage msn re colleagues, flexibility of overtime I’m guessing your mate means, are two very different things and are not demanded. Your mate is on a contract, if he can’t or won’t work then he just needs to say I can’t work. Simples!

When I bought my Boardman road bike I insisted that I took it away as an unopened box, having seen the scarred carbon seatpost on another on display. I signed a form and lost my free 6 week service. Hardly anything needed doing to assemble it so God knows how they can foul it up.

Yours was easy so it must mean the other tens of thousands sold are the same.?

The Boardman’s and the Carrera’s are really good bikes out of the box and 99% of the time they are a doddle. We get the odd one that is a pain in the ass to set up but that’s mainly down to a component issue ect… The Apollo’s/ Trax on the other hand are a whole different kettle of fish. Some are good out of the box but some require a good mechanic to get them up to standard. Wheels need truing, headsets adjusting, bottom brackets adjusting, V-brake arms re-installing and gears setting up from scratch, some even need re-cabling out of the box. They are built to a very low price point and sometimes it shows. If an inexperienced employee gets one of these then it can be an issue.