Rock Shox – This weeks’ price hike :

30% – Yikes !!!

Why are bike prices the only prices going up. Was in a bike shop yesterday asked why a Trek had gone up £400 in a month was told exchange rate mate which is a load of crap the pound hasnt fallen that far against the dollar it was $1.80 to the pound last summer its now $1.50 to the pound. Also the price of fuel has fallen recently. Fee Fi Fo Fum I smell the blood of an englishman getting stitched up once again.

I wonder how long they have had the forks in stock!

Its mainly exchange rates 1 year ago the dollar was $2.10 and in December it nearly dropped below $1.40. Price of fuel has very little effect on buying a product such as a bike. They dont only buy in $ but in that lovely Ä too which has suffered the same fate. Its hard work for companies that buy imported goods at the moment…..

I thought making aluminium was pretty energy intensive

And I’ve just ordered a £1400 Pitch Pro (with RS Pikes) for £998 delivered. At this rate the forks will be worth more than that!
😉

it isn’t just the GBP USD rate it is the GBP JPY rate. The yen has gone through the roof and with it the price of anything made it Japan, ie Shimano components.

Commodity prices are actually falling now,

mrmo – your right the pound has tanked against every major currency, especially the Yen.

Pray tell though why I can buy a Sony television, a Toyota car and a Samsung phone (all products made by Japanese owned companies) for less today than I would have paid for it this time last year?

I’m no expert but I presume it’s a simple supply and demand curve. Less credit = fewer potential customers = less demand for products = lower prices to encourage sales.

We as cyclists are being penalised because unlike the rest of the high street the bike trade did well last year. Don’t quote me on this but I’m sure that I read on bike biz that the bike trade had a better 08 than 07 which they attributed partially to in increase in commuter cycling and ‘cycle to work’ programs. Therefore the way I see it a 30% price hike is disproportionate to an increase in costs but is instead an increase due to a rise in demand.

As long as everybody wants a Rock Shox fork they can do it. Service your old (2008) forks, ignore the hype of new being better. I can bet Peat on a rigid Kona would still be faster and smoother than I ever will no matter what bike I ride.

Jim, Samsung is Korean IIRC.

The prices have gone up because of the exchange rate, whereas electrical goods will be priced out on 12 month contracts, sporting goods will not be.

Importers have to pass on cost rises and this happens quite quickly. In this case they’ve actually delayed on price hikes for quite a while. However the level of the price increases is extortionate. I work for a US sporting goods manufacturer and we’ve gone up 12% lately in the UK, but 30% is ridiculous. Transportation costs have fallen 30% over the last 6 months, and trust me, that’s a good 10% of the final product price in this case.

They are screwing us, no question about it.

It makes you consider the function of the importer at all. Bike companies are big enough to be able to do all their sales and warranty themselves for less cost than distributors do, so why stick with the outmoded 3 tier supply model, it’s crazy.

The same thing happened a few years ago with european motorcycle trials bikes, the importers were wanting £4000 for their top end machines, however, you could nip across the channel & pick them up for £2800.
Soon, people started importing them themselves and selling them for a swift profit.
The official importers started to get a panic on and eventually dropped their prices by about a thousand pounds, thus ending the “grey” import industry.

Works for me.

It doesnt matter if the its 10 dollars to the pound or 10 cents to the pound in britain we always get shafted on prices. A mate was telling me he saw some Hope brakes in a shop in the US a year ago that were about half the price of ones in a shop in lancashire. So the brakes are made about 12 miles from where he lives put on a ship to the US then driven in a lorry 2,000 miles and they come in half price. That price was when the exchange rate was against the US importer I bet its a hell of a lot better for the US importer now.

So basically some one is screwing us dont know who but somewhere in the supply chain there is a lot of profit being made.

i was planning to buy some pike 454 air u-turns to replace the 07 menjas on my intense, but when i saw that i could get the latest menjas for 80quid less than the cheapest pikes i could find, plus they are nearly 400g lighter, thought i’d stick with the german stuff. besides which, i had the menjas apart before xmas and was seriously impressed with the build quality of the internals.

What Trek are you looking at??

The £4k Fuel EX 9.9 has gone up like £200 from last year to this year. Thats just a 5% price rise given that the $ has dropped 25% since this time last year.

Thats a 20% hole that some one some where (Trek) have to swallow.

J