Unhappy Sick Bicycles Customers. BEWARE!

Well, they don’t give to the Eden Reforestation Project (at least not formally).
They aren’t listed on any of their partnerhsip pages;
> Forest Partners – $100,000 +
> Grove Partners – $50,000 – $99,999
> Sapling Partners – $10,000-$49,999
> Seedling Partners – $5,000-$9,999
> Seed Partners – $250-$4,999

I’m stunned no-one is standing outside their HQ (assuming people know where it is) and screaming for their frames.

Ummm, maybe that’s because ‘they’ don’t have one. Their registered business address is just round the corner from me.

I’ve just tweeted Eden Reforestation to ask…

For every shirt we sell in 2018 we plant a tree

sounds like a real ponzi bonsai scheme to me

Ummm, maybe that’s because ‘they’ don’t have one. Their registered business address is just round the corner from me.

Then i’d have been at the Show they were at recently etc. Surely in this day and age of social media etc they can’t be that hard to track down ?

Who on earth wants three socks?

It’s basic errors of judgement like that that make me think they’re going to have problems running a business in the future.

Good work that man 🙂

I was all set to head down there with my mate but then my van fired a con rod through the sump 🙁
Ive asked for a refund (which they said they would do) but not received it so I’ve opened a paypal dispute.
Cant wait to see what the next chapter in the soap opera is

where’s the hard-hitting piece from the mag anyways?

“Mr. S!CK, your silence will only incriminate you further. No,… Mr. S!CK don’t take your anger out on me–Get back–Get back! Mr. S!CK NoooooOOOO!

where’s the hard-hitting piece from the mag anyways?

With almost delicious irony, it’s coming soon. Apparently.

😁

where’s the hard-hitting piece from the mag anyways?

It’s been left too long. It was news 2 months ago, now though…
The story won’t fit in with anyone’s desires. May as well forget it.
2 months ago it was news and valid, now it would be either a look at a dead company or one with a company with new investors saying “it wasn’t our fault and we’ve changed and we’re nice guys now”.

The claims about charity donations if false are quite significant.

A new focus could be a look at (and review of) Ubyk’s Oxford shop on their website. I’ll pop in tomorrow if they want…

Our riders demand performance and trust us to build frames that last not years, but decades. From their website.

Cant even trust them to deliver a frame in the first place. Bunch of chancers.

I hope everyone they have done over gets a refund asap.

where’s the hard-hitting piece from the mag anyways?

No advertorial ready yet?

Our riders demand performance and trust us to build frames that last not years, but decades. From their website.

That’s probably true as the frames are a theoretical concept and therefore not bound by the rules of time and decay. This, in turn, means they will last forever.

“For every shirt we sell in 2018 we plant a tree and provide 1 meal for a child. We don’t shout about it because its just something we do.

I do a bit of charideee, but I don’t like to take about it, mayte…

It’s a shame the mtb magazines didn’t run a proper story on this some time ago and saved their readers the hassle of buying a frame that may not arrive.

Is this now not moving towards a trading standards, companies House and even police for fraud…?

It may seem extreme, but they are taking money when then haven’t seemingly fulfilled orders for months…

Is this now not moving towards a trading standards, companies House and even police for fraud…?

IANAL but I think that because everything is done through crowd funding or on ‘preorder’, that gets them out of the ‘not supplying’ issue.

Not sure on the law on timescales for refunds though.

wonder if this is why they stopped using paypal

PayPal’s preselling requirements.
If you’d like to presell items in an online store, keep in mind you’ll need to guarantee delivery within 20 days from the date of purchase and also let your customers know they’re buying a presale item.

doesnt explain the difficulty people are having getting refunds though. Looking at indiegogo for anyone who crowdfunded and it gets muddy and confusing

where’s the hard-hitting piece from the mag anyways?

MTB mags rarely seem to do proper journalism so I wouldn’t hold your breath. Why bite the hand that feeds?

I find it best to look upon MTB mags as being ‘independently’ produced sales brochures, bulked out with actual adverts and occasional aspirational articles.

Cynical? Perhaps. But I’d wager the MTB press industry is far more reliant on the good graces of suppliers than the other way around.

Looking at indiegogo for anyone who crowdfunded and it gets muddy and confusing

IANAexpert but as far as I know, that’s the difference between Kickstarter and Indiegogo. On Kickstarter everyone backs a project in exchange for publicised rewards at certain backer costs, but if the project doesn’t reach its required target by the set date then the backers’ money isn’t taken and Kickstarter closes the project. When you back a project you commit to pay a certain amount on a certain date if the target is met.

On Indiegogo, everyone effectively donates to a project and the money goes to åthe project whether it reaches its target or not. I’d guess Indiegogo take their cut but the remaining funds then just go to the project more or less straight away, and if it’s not legit then it’s down to the funders to take it up with the project direct. As far as I know…

(in other words, if you want to run a scam, use Indiegogo not Kickstarter 😉

Here you go. There goes that ad revenue and my yacht.

https://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/sick-bicycles-are-things-as-bad-as-they-sound/

just crowd fund a yacht?

(in other words, if you want to run a scam, use Indiegogo not Kickstarter

I believe Indiegogo state in their terms that they will pursue the company on your behalf if the “perks” or whatever they’re called are not delivered, don’t know if they’ve ever actually done that or how far they’d go though.

The delay was annoying at first but when the crew at Sick reached out explaining why, I decided fair enough

Reached out? Whatever happened to “contacted me”.

someone knock up a Sick bullshit-bingo card!! 😂 Include “onshore” as a verb too (as used earlier!)

Thanks, Hannah.

In summary, then – even the happy customers didn’t get a good service, and things are still where they were before in terms of ‘we’re sorting it’, apart from Jordan’s own bike being FUBARed.
We all want new bike companies to succeed, but Sick really do seem to be trying to fail.

Hannah’s article seems good and comprehensive.
Let’s see what sick/Jordan say.

Well written and balanced piece that wasn’t the hatchet job that many wanted. Nice one Hannah.
How about a follow up on their charity donation claims? 😉

Let’s see what sick/Jordan say.

I think that’s what Hannah was hoping to hear, no response to her, can’t see it getting any better on the back of this thread..

I’m curious how many frames/bikes have been ‘sold’.

Hannah talks about them ” They went from being relatively small to suddenly fielding orders for hundreds of bikes…”

Is this really true?

orders for hundreds of bikes

Orders, maybe…

Deliveries?

Erm: https://www.pinkbike.com/news/sick-bicycle-co-there-are-so-many-people-that-couldnt-wait-to-see-us-fail.html

As a counter point, it could be interesting to read about one of the smaller UK companies like Cotic or Bird for example, who despite being less edgy, seem to be making a success of it and keeping their customers happy.

As a counter point, it could be interesting to read about one of the smaller UK companies like Cotic or Bird for example, who despite being less edgy, seem to be making a success of it and keeping their customers happy.

Or Starling or Curtis… Sick seem to be very much in the minority.

Is their story on PB supposed to be the ‘wait-for-it-we’ll-be-back’ big news..

Yep, as above – Curtis, Cotic, Stanton, Bird, Airdrop, Starling and more.

As a counter point, it could be interesting to read about one of the smaller UK companies like Cotic or Bird for example, who despite being less edgy, seem to be making a success of it and keeping their customers happy.

Simple, they didn’t over promise and under deliver. Probably thought long term about providing good products for people who want to buy them on time. Did a bit of RnD and proved the product before opening the books to orders, then subsequently built a process around mitigation and failings of said product and dealt with them quickly whilst bearing in mind that a happy customer (and returning customer) is best served a fair and equitable solution.

AmIright?

I am aren’t I..

Simple business model that. A Level Business Studies page 1, book 1 just after the introduction.

Some people in this world set out to complicate what is essentially a simple money for goods transaction process.

💁‍♂️

How interesting that both articles were published on the same day…

From PinkBike:

PB: “So your business model is to take pre-orders…”
Jordan: “Not anymore. Was.”

PB: “When did you decide not to do any more pre-orders?”
Jordan: “Quite quickly.”
Tim: “No-one likes a pre-order.”

Which is odd, because I looked at the Sick site this morning. If you go to the frame pages there’s text in italics saying “Please note, this is a pre-order“.

How does anyone retain even the slightest whiff of faith in this outfit?

stwhannah

Here you go. There goes that ad revenue and my yacht.

https://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/sick-bicycles-are-things-as-bad-as-they-sound/

Nice job. You’ve gone out of your way to be fair to them but the article is still damning.

So in the pinkbike interview they say they’re not doing preorders anymore, but on their website you can only preorder frames. Hmmmmm