So was looking at a Lapieere, asked if they had test bikes available,the kid, said NO, he almost went into shock,that somebody may actually want to ride a bike before they spend a lot of cash on it.

Also tried a few shops selling Giant bikes, same responce, and same with Cube and Genesis.

Then met a salesman from Wiggle at the Catton Park Enduro, no hard sell,buy any wiggle brand bike,we deliver it,keep the box, and up to 30 days if you dont like it we will pick it up for free and refund your money, no problems.

So why dont bike shops have test or hire bikes, most car dealers do.

Discuss.

Because if they did, they'd have to factor the cost of the test bike into their retail price for the bikes they sell, and then you'd just go to another bike shop which didn't have test bikes, but had a cheaper retail price.
Quite often the distributor has test bikes though, and can tell you where they are, or arrange them to be sent to the shop in question.
Wiggle's offer isn't that amazing as under UK law they have to offer that for the ability for the 1st 7 days anyway, so adding a few more on probably makes little difference to them.

Giant, should make a demo bike available (might not be the exact model, but normally one from each of the ranges) – though it depends on the shop and how friendly they are with the distributor… my sister got a trance for a weekend from Dave Mellor cycles (cool shop) for a weekend before buying

i tested a singular swift from a shop in Dorking £35, this was knocked of my frame purchase

I've seen a lot of bike shops doing test rides for £40-£50 hire charges, with a full refund for test rides if you buy a bike from them.

The logisitics of shipping demo bikes around the country is not as easy as you would imagine. This is why Genesis have been around the country at demo days so that folk have a chance to ride before they try. Bike Bristol do have some demo Genesis bikes at the moment though.

Yeah it would be a big overhead for most LBS but distributors should probably have more demo bike stock than most do.

The bike chain has some demo bikes I believe.

If you charge for demo bikes people kick up a fuss about paying, if you don't then they take the p1ss and the bikes tend to get absolutely trashed, then they go and buy elsewhere.

It's a big outlay when a lot of manufacturers can offer demo fleets.

My local bike shop has a demo Spesh Enduro, Stumpy & Epic (Terry Wrights Cycles). I think they also have a Fuel EX8.
Leisure Lakes have various demo bikes too – I took out there EX9 to compare with a Stumpjumper at a cost of £50 (knocked off a bike if I made a purchase).

Rutland Cycling had a Zesty in the shop, but the bloke said there were no demo's available (although I could ride the shop bike around the car park if I wanted….!). This was in December and he said that the bikes were flying off the shelf so fast that the demo fleet had been delayed.

I don't know in reality if it does cost a shop to have a demo bike. Most shops charge for a demo (which they refund against against sale). So, all the none purchasers contribute to the cost of the bike. They also buy the bikes at discount and can sell them. Yes, they have to maintain them, but that would be covered by the rental charge.

I think it's just plain old poor service. I would never part with over £2k without riding a bike first. I bought my last bike from NWMTB they took me and my mate out for a 3 hour ride on 2 different bikes for a proper ride, no fee and even offered a cuppa when we got back. We then spent that best part of £5k in the shop. In my opinion, it pays to offer good service.

An LBS in Berks, let me have a Santa Cruz on test for a weekend, fell in love with the bike, bought one, and still my favorite bike.

I've only ever test ridden a bike once and that was a Sunn with Obsyss forks, where the test ride made me very, very certain that I'd never buy one.
Never ridden anything else beforehand.
Its a bit like test driving cars – does it start, stop and go ridden corners? Check. Can I see out of it. Check. Can I afford it. Check. I'll have that one, please, in silver.

I guess it varies a lot how much use demo bikes get but it would take quite a lot to pay for one once you've factored in consumable replacements and labour for servicing/cleaning. That said I bought my Zesty straight after a test ride (from the same LBS) so it does work.

To be truthful most dealers can not afford to keep so much stock simple economics and understandable considering the amount of variation in bike ranges. A lot of dealers will have demo bikes but that is usually the ones that also hire the same bikes as well.

Try and demo a motorcycle…, only at big dealers and then there are cost/insurance considerations.

TBH my LBS will get demo's in from distributors, they charge with the usual cash-back if you buy. Shops' usually don't run demo-fleets due to cost, it takes a lot of £25 to cover a the wear-tear on a £2k bike.

If you are serious, ask them if they'll get one in, and be prepared to put some money down.

Reg Braddick in Cardiff looked at me as if I'd asked to do a poo on the shop floor when I asked for a test ride.

Skyline cycles gave me a bike, charged me £20 which I got back in shop vouchers and let me rag it around Afan.

Say I was a giant dealer, giant make…….

that cheep basic full sus whos name eludes me
anthem
anthem x
trance
trance x
reign
reign x
faith
glory
glory DH

XTC
XTC composite

various cheep hardtails (rock , boulder etc)

Now as a dealer that would be 13 bikes, giant do about 10 sizes, so that 130 bikes.

Which shops
a) only sell giant bikes
b) could fit in 130 bikes?

go to a giant demo day on the other hand and you can test any one of those 130* bikes for free

*well, a significant number of them.

The Hub at Glentress have a decent selection of demo bikes, including LaPierre and Genesis.

Wiggle's offer isn't that amazing as under UK law they have to offer that for the ability for the 1st 7 days anyway, so adding a few more on probably makes little difference to them.

I doubt the 7-day legislation applies if you've used the item – does it ?

Given the number of demo days (and manufacturer presence at other organised events) there seems to be a diminishing case for shops to bother offering them. I guess it depends a lot on the level of manufacturer backing they have.

buyabikedirect let you visit the shop and test them in their own land at the back of the shop, and will build up some bikes if you ask them. Or they did 3 years ago.

So why dont bike shops have test or hire bikes, most car dealers do

not really comparable because a car with 1000 miles on ex demo is still pretty new. and can be sold easily. bike less so. more akin to rally cars than road cars.

cars you can't test drive every colour, engine and trim level; with bikes you at least want the size less so spec.

Which shops
a) only sell giant bikes

theres one in cathays (cardiff)

but do they have 130 demo bikes?

Ok, I was being a little extream, there are shops that only sell giant, but my point was, most shops sell a variety of makes and models so to expect demo bikes is a bit daft IMO. Especialy as someone said, most big manufacturers have demo days.

but do they have 130 demo bikes?

Ok, I was being a little extream, there are shops that only sell giant, but my point was, most shops sell a variety of makes and models so to expect demo bikes is a bit daft IMO. Especialy as someone said, most big manufacturers have demo days.

but their suppliers might..

Try and demo a motorcycle…, only at big dealers and then there are cost/insurance considerations.

When the VFR750 first came out we went down to the Honda shop in Stockport for a test ride. They had two that were being rotated through the fairly lengthy queue of guys who had turned up for a go.

One chap mounts up and shoots off down the road. Comes back about ten minutes later, parks up in front of the shop, tosses the keys to the saleman and says thanks, darts off. Next guy goes out to the bike, comes back saying the salesman should see this. The whole side of the bike facing away from the shop was scratched to hell. The previous guy must have dropped it and slid around for a bit.

It's only really the more technical products which need demo-ing. Last year, I ran a Trance X5, this season, I've had a Trance X2 as a demo, but it accidently got sold. Should soon have a Kona Cadabra for the rest of the summer. It doesn't really cost to run a demo bike. We get a preferential rate and sell to cover costs at the end of the season – in the meantime, it's a tool which sells bikes.Win/win innit!

And presumably you can sell the demo bike at the end of the year anyway at a reduced price….

edit: sorry, that's what you said.

It's just not economical for shops to offer it especially when you factor in the risk of the bike being damaged, the time take to clean it after each tester etc etc and the distributor/manufacturer can't supply every dealer with a demo fleet.
What works better is a manufacturer turning up at an event like Mountain Mayhem/SITS etc or to a specific demo day at a trail centre.

Much more likely to get people trying the bikes out (and hence maybe one or two "impulse buys"), it gets people to the event as well and the guys there are the importers/distributors so they know the specs/prices/availability of the bikes rather than relying on some Saturday kid in a bike shop.

Anyone spending that kind of money shouldn't have a problem with a day out at an event or demo as well.

i have never been to a bike shop that doesn't struggle for space. If you stock two brands for example and have demo bikes for the 2 or 3 key bikes in the range thats 4 to 6 more to squeeze in with all the bikes in for repair and your display stock. Plus a shop doesn't get the level of discount from the supplier that they would then have to give when they sold it at the end of the year as it's essentially second hand.

oh and you don't actually get that many people asking for demo bikes.

Spesh/Trek/Giant dealer near me lets you ride anything for 5/10 minutes they take security until your known after which its fine just dont ride puddles. They also have a stock of demo bikes, maybe half a dozen most popular models you can take them for a weekend after leaving a CC swipe, no charge if you bring it back. They then sell the demos at the end of the year.

All the above resulted in me buying two bikes from them.

depends on the bike folk were interested in … ive sent my own personal bike out on demos in the past and my old colleagues and boss have done the same.

if you have demo bikes sat there – you get nothing but tire kickers we found (we did experiment with it) if someone asks you about demos they are usually fairly serious and in that i had no issue letting them try my own bike if it fitted. more often than not letting folk ride the bike they have their eye on does result in a sale

That surprises me, most LBS shops I know have demo bikes, usually you pay around £40-£50 and then get that knocked of the purchase price if you buy.

We do but it's because I'm STUPID. It does not make business sense but it's fun to ride loads of different bikes. We have Whytes, Pronghorns, Argon 18s, Yetis and a Transition Covert soon.

Seriously though, margins are not good enough to do this. That's why bike retailers are often miserable!!! (I'm poor but not miserable…yet!)

Oh yeah, and some Cubes too. An Xt chainset got wrecked on our Fritzz the other day. Ouch.

we run a couple,fives,p7,224 and an alpine….although i can get anything from orange with in a few weeks…it does sell bikes and we never have a problem selling them on

mondraker have demos as do felt.intense,giant (but theyre always busy at demo days) sabbath road do demos,ive got cervelos,genesis and coves as well

depends on your lbs and his relationship with his suppliers i reckon…

Ive always kept demo bikes for key bikes like the zesy, Yeti 575, and now the Transition covert, whoop whoop, been playing last night on that puppy.

But seriously, Its difficult now for a LBS to keep demo bikes as a lot of customers ride them then go browse the web for the best deal. which isnt a gripe we have sold alot of bikes through the demo fleet.

Also we have a lot of cool reps who pull strings to get us demo bikes for customers, like the transition guys getting us a blindside and a Syren.
And Lapierre have leant us Spicys and Zestys for ages.
Im hoping commencal will be nice with the new meta.
and Im going to be really nice to Stu to get me a 2011 575 before anyone else. (Stu if your reading this, Ill be really good from now on)

Where are you based Sancho? Looking to demo a Covert (if you have a large one).

The Wiggle deal is pretty amazing really as someone said above, the usual distance seller 7 day thing only applies if the goods as returning in as new condition. Normal test bikes are used and abused by everyone, whilst in theory every bike wiggle sell could back to them 2nd hand. I'm assuming they have done the maths and worked out the amount they will loose by having to sell off a load of 2nd hand bikes is worth it for the increase in sales from folk that are naturally cautious about buying a bike they have not seen.

An unscrupuluos person could for example get the bike sent to them where they were to be on holiday to save them transporting their own across the coutry, ride it for a week & send it back (FOC). If you liked it you could then look out for it being sold discounted on the site, and buy it back knowing you were the only person to have ridden it.

Normal test bike service is great and for me is about the only benefit of going to a "real" bike shop. I'd imagine they can get written against tax etc, act as a nice perk of staff/owner and generally increase the profile of the shop.