Foffa Bikes

I am seriously curious to know how people will be able to justify the additional £100

Although your frameset is supposedly 100% cromo, the quality is terrible and they are really not that light. Since you moved production of your frames from Taiwan to China*, the quality of the welds has become very poor and the tube profiles on the fork and stays are horrible. The only particularly good thing about the frameset is the cast track ends and instead of using the built in chain tensioners, you've opted for 1 really cheap and nasty lollipop tensioner, on the drive side only, which I'm guessing has saved you about 2p per bike. The Charge does have cheaper track ends but otherwise the quality of the frame, especially the tube set, is of a significantly higher standard.

As for componentry, you did not mention the saddle. The Charge comes with their Spoon saddle and while by the nature of bicycle saddles, it will not be a perfect fit for everyone, it is probably the best middle ground saddle I know of in it's price range and it is a country mile ahead of the retro styled cheapo you have chosen for your bikes. The seatpost albeit a budget alloy affair is still significantly better that yours, which is fitted with a pressed steel clamp I might add.

The headset you use is one of the worst components on your bikes and like all cheap threaded headsets, the tab washer is made of cheese, making it an absolute nightmare to adjust. Charge have seen the error of their ways and gone back to a threadless setup this year. It's half decent quality, easy to adjust and it will stay tight!!!

You mentioned the sealed hubs and I'm glad to hear you will be speccing sealed bearings in future. These are a big plus, especially as a lot of people buying these kind of bikes are not always that hot on maintenance. Otherwise, apart from the aesthetics, I wouldn't say there's much in it between the two wheel sets.

Finally there's the little details, like the quality of the bar tape and the chrome cable clips that the charge comes with.

This may sound harsh, although I'm sure you will agree, no harsher than your criticism of the Plug but it is my honest opinion. If you go back a few pages, you will find that about this time last year, I was singing the praises of your bikes over the Charge Plug. They really were very good but unfortunately, just as you were starting to get it right, you have slashed costs, on every component and now they are very cheap.

So I guess in summary, that's where I think the extra hundred pounds goes and personally I think it's worth it.

*I am quite aware that there are many products made in China of as good or better quality than many made in Taiwan, you get what you pay for etc. but I believe this is the case in this particular situation.

I love informed opinion. Rep.

Racist.

(kidding)

(lol)

Since this thread is still in the first page on Google and keeps misdirecting people that don’t know enough about bikes to make the right judgement call, I think it is only fair that I raise a few important points.

Fibblesnork, it is amazing how brand perception makes people look at products in one way even if the facts show the opposite way. A few people keep referring to the Charge Plug as an alternative but clearly these people didn’t even bother checking the spec of the Plug compared to our new Single Speed range, otherwise they would probably realise they have very little idea as to what they are talking about. To demonstrate:

• Charge Plug frame made of Cromoly with Hi-ten forks, while the Foffa has a full Cromoly frame set
  
• Wheelset, basic branded double wall rims, while ours are triple wall and deeper
  
• Crankset, a standard track one, as good as the one we use
  
• Tyres, their branded Coaster which are not even puncture protection while ours are
  
• Bottom bracket, a Tange sealed unit which is not much difference than the sealed unit we use.
  
• Above all, price point, Charge Plug £450 VS Foffa Single speed £350.
  
  

The only thing that some of you might have a few objections about is the sealed bearings which we dont use on our hubs but will introduce in our next year’s range. Other than this the brakes are exactly the same, all parts (stem, bars, seat post, etc..) are alloy just like on the Charge Plug, so I am seriously curious to know how people will be able to justify the additional £100 on a bike which is heavier than ours, is specced just about the same (with the difference that some of the parts we use are actually better) and simply comes from a brand which has a lot more budget to spend on marketing than us so some of you can believe that they are actually selling a better bike when this is not the case.

This thread has been going on since our early beginnings where we clearly made some mistakes (which we have fully acknowledged a number of times), and the comment ‘Because they're over priced and shit’ refers to the custom bikes we have been building up to last year. I appreciate that nobody should be expected to go through 60 pages of posts to shed some light on everything that happened since 2009, so to sum up:

• we stopped doing vintage bikes 4 years ago because they were not 100% reliable
  
• we sacked one of our previous mechanics that caused some issues to us (which we always fully rectified) and made some of the people in the forum believe that we dont know how to build bikes properly
  
• we now even stopped doing our ‘non pre-built’ bikes (I am not allowed to use the word ‘bespoke’ here because this implies that you can also customise the frame and apparently choosing your bars, tape, wheelset, tyres, saddle, crankset and other parts (and not just colours but actually different brands and types) is not enough:)
  
• we even closed our London shop as that was the only way to cut down our overheads and start to make decent quality bikes at affordable prices.
  
  

And some people here on the Foffa thread still advise you to go for a Charge Plug? I think you can appreciate how someone like myself could feel about this.

The fact is that we have worked very hard to get our bikes right (also thanks to a lot of good feedback we got as a result of this thread), so if some of the people here are not able to start being fair to a brand that has clearly always listened and taken on board what the community had to say about our bikes in 6 years, then I will only assume that these people have simply decided that, no matter what, Foffa will always be the brand to slag off, and since this attitude is of a defamatory nature, if this carries on, even after all the transformations the company has gone through, I will need to request Velocio to remove this thread, something that I probably should have done years ago, but always decided not to thanks to a lot of the reasonable people reading this forum which have been very supportive and valuable to making Foffa what it is today.

In fact Fibblesnork, I would be tempted to offer you a £100 discount on one of our new single speed bikes, so you can ride it heavily and give it your honest review on this forum so that people know whether Foffa are actually worth buying or not. Let me know if you would like to take advantage of this offer.

All the best for now,

Dani

Oh dear - another futile attempt to rescue a brand which has long since established itself as being notoriously unreliable...

I'm assuming that you understand how important brand development is because apparently you've attempted it with yours. Small quantity manufacturing brands require many years of repeat business in order to bring long term success and encourage loyalty. The usual method is to manufacture the best possible product you can (in many cases without profit for years) and over a period of time, as your brand grows, slowly reduce costs by increasing manufacturing quantities without compromising on the quality of the end product. Your ramble claims that you've done it the other way around - not exactly the best of tried and tested business practices for a low-volume manufacturer.

Bespoke is an often misused expression - generally by people who're trying to sell a made to order service as opposed to bespoke which is a stage further than a made to measure service. If you need me to explain the differences then I happily will, but don't ever be under the impression that your product was ever bespoke.

You closed your store for much the same reasons as many other people who didn't make enough money in the face of rising rents. And if your brand is harbouring a tragic reputation for shoddy workmanship and Mickey Mouse manufacturing, then it really was only a matter of time. The irreparable damage that those initial years have done is something that will haunt any future plans you may have.

Whilst I haven't owned either a Charge Plug or any Foffa offering, I have ridden both. People on here who know me well will attest to the bikes I've owned over the years. I get bored very easily and have worked my way through a variety of manufactured frames and components over the years. My experience with the Charge was that it felt significantly more solid and generally sharper - I felt a lot more confident when I was flicking in and out of traffic. The Foffa (forgive me, I can't remember which model it was), wasn't particularly well built and didn't feel as "safe".

Lastly, there's just a different kind of feeling you get when you look at both companies - Charge gives me the impression that their staff actually like bikes and like riding them. Foffa makes me think that the owners couldn't give a toss about bikes and only considered the bottom line and their margins. Funny what a brand can achieve with some clever marketing...

For the record - I'd always go with a Charge. I don't have a lot of money, but if something is cheap then there has to be a reason. Also, I know that if I had an issue that I couldn't deal with I could take it to ANY bike shop in the known solar system and not have the mechanics look at me like I'd been smoking my socks.

Although your frameset is supposedly 100% cromo, the quality is terrible and they are really not that light. Since you moved production of your frames from Taiwan to China*, the quality of the welds has become very poor and the tube profiles on the fork and stays are horrible. The only particularly good thing about the frameset is the cast track ends and instead of using the built in chain tensioners, you've opted for 1 really cheap and nasty lollipop tensioner, on the drive side only, which I'm guessing has saved you about 2p per bike. The Charge does have cheaper track ends but otherwise the quality of the frame, especially the tube set, is of a significantly higher standard.

As for componentry, you did not mention the saddle. The Charge comes with their Spoon saddle and while by the nature of bicycle saddles, it will not be a perfect fit for everyone, it is probably the best middle ground saddle I know of in it's price range and it is a country mile ahead of the retro styled cheapo you have chosen for your bikes. The seatpost albeit a budget alloy affair is still significantly better that yours, which is fitted with a pressed steel clamp I might add.

The headset you use is one of the worst components on your bikes and like all cheap threaded headsets, the tab washer is made of cheese, making it an absolute nightmare to adjust. Charge have seen the error of their ways and gone back to a threadless setup this year. It's half decent quality, easy to adjust and it will stay tight!!!

You mentioned the sealed hubs and I'm glad to hear you will be speccing sealed bearings in future. These are a big plus, especially as a lot of people buying these kind of bikes are not always that hot on maintenance. Otherwise, apart from the aesthetics, I wouldn't say there's much in it between the two wheel sets.

Finally there's the little details, like the quality of the bar tape and the chrome cable clips that the charge comes with.

This may sound harsh, although I'm sure you will agree, no harsher than your criticism of the Plug but it is my honest opinion. If you go back a few pages, you will find that about this time last year, I was singing the praises of your bikes over the Charge Plug. They really were very good but unfortunately, just as you were starting to get it right, you have slashed costs, on every component and now they are very cheap.

So I guess in summary, that's where I think the extra hundred pounds goes and personally I think it's worth it.

*I am quite aware that there are many products made in China of as good or better quality than many made in Taiwan, you get what you pay for etc. but I believe this is the case in this particular situation.

This is an excellent review of Foffa bikes, and underpins why the business ethic of the Foffa bikes deserves derision

I predict Danni will be asking for this thread to be flushed away pretty soon.

I could take it to ANY bike shop in the known solar system and not have the mechanics look at me like I'd been smoking my socks.

I lolled

Chris Borneo repped. Dani keeps saying he wants someone to ride his bikes and give an informed opinion, sound like this is what Chris has done.

BoyleAndDoyle, I am not sure why mine should be as you put it 'another futile attempt to rescue a brand which (not to everyones opinion) is notoriously unreliable' while we built over 4000 bikes and had very few issues with them (except the vintage bikes which I already said we stopped doing many years ago for exactly that reason).

Some people keep making a lot of false accusations based on facts that happened over 5 years ago, and I appreciate that initial errors haunt brands for the rest of their lives, but if you had a brand and saw some people that keep being utterly unfair to you, you would certainly do the same as we do, especially since you would have rectified EVERY single issue that was raised as part of this thread.

And it s a big shame that you get the feeling from our brand that our staff doesn't like riding bikes since it is far from accurate, and if you actually even came to our shop or talked to any of us you would have a different opinion.

And Chris Borneo, I appreciate you taking your time to justify the price difference between the Charge and our bikes, while some of the things you said might sound sensible, unfortunately I am not sure why you would say some of the other things, since you wouldn't be in a position to be able to state them:

• How would you have checked the welding of our frame sets if our bikes haven't arrived in the UK yet?
  
• How would you know whether they are not that light if you wouldn't have had the chance to pick one up and be able to tell?
  
  

To be fair the new frames won't be the same quality as our previous Maxway frames (which clearly used to cost considerably more) but we showed samples to the new range to many mechanics and potential resellers which checked it thoroughly and have all confirmed that these are some of the best Chinese frames they have seen (unless you were one of them in which case I am surprised you didn't tell us your thoughts directly when you had the chance) and the fact that we spoke to over 100 established Far East suppliers, got samples from the top 5 ones and picked the very best one, should give people the peace of mind that the quality at the £350 price point is much higher than many of the brands selling at the same price point.

As for componentry, the only points I might agree with you is on the Charge saddle which might be more comfortable than ours and the headset (which will also be improved on the new range) since I am well aware that Ahead won't need to be adjusted as often, but we have on purpose sticked to threaded (while most other brands go for thread less these days, which actually has a lower cost price) to offer more adjustability on the stem height and give that retro look (which are personal preferences of course).

As for the rest: the seat post is the exact same model, the chrome cable clips we frankly find them aesthetically unappealing (which is why we went for inner routed brake cables) but again that is personal preferences, and if you want to talk about little details then I certainly prefer the metal front badge we use as opposed to a stickered logo.

So overall it is pretty obvious that better welding (if this is even the case), sealed bearing hubs and a more comfortable saddle doesn't cost a brand an extra £100 (considering they also save money on other very important parts like non puncture protection tyres), and I am sure I don't need to tell you that for the £100 you would save on one of our bikes you could grab yourself a Brooks saddle and brooks tape if you so wish, making our SS model a far superior bike than the Charge.

That last bit, right after the comma, is the boldest statement EVER made on this forum.

Do the rims still come from the same factory as H+Son?

Oops, sorry. My mistake-they don't. Didn't. Ever.

Why did I think that?

How do you get false accusations based on facts?

Seriously - are you ok?

I blame the 6 large bottles of Effes I washed down with half a cheap wine box. I get confused, not to mention day after shits that could sink the bismark.

Saying that-Danni, send me a bespoke road bike with Boras and Super Record fitted and I'll let you know what I think.

I promise I'll send the frame back after in exactly the same condition as I got it.

Actually über_grüber, after speaking to James from the Hackney Peddler (who worked as a manager for BLB for many years) who bought some of the last deep Vs we had, he confirmed our rims are EXACTLY the same as the H+Son. So our previous supplier was right afterall.

That last bit, right after the comma, is the boldest statement EVER made on this forum.

Yeah, he kind of shot himself in the foot with that one. I want him to stop shooting himself in the foot so people will stop laying into him so he will stop shooting himself in the foot so people will

you get the picture

Actually über_grüber, after speaking to James from the Hackney Peddler (who worked as a manager for BLB for many years) who bought some of the last Foffa deep Vs we had, he confirmed our rims are EXACTLY the same as the H+Son. So our previous supplier was right afterall.

You should put that on a billboard and see what H+Son have to say about that.

Volkswagen Golf "Sounds Like a Golf" TV Advert (2012) | Ridgeway Volkswagen - YouTube

@william1984,I wouldnt hold your breath in trying to get Dani Foffa to stop shooting himself in the foot,hes got Acute Yosemite Sam /Entertainment value syndrome and sadly theres no known cure for it

Actually über_grüber, after speaking to James from the Hackney Peddler (who worked as a manager for BLB for many years) who bought some of the last Foffa deep Vs we had, he confirmed our rims are EXACTLY the same as the H+Son. So our previous supplier was right afterall.

Citation please.

James from the Hackney Peddler (who worked as a manager for BLB for many years)

Sounds like the kind of chap who knows his stuff about bike components then.

• How would you have checked the welding of our frame sets if our bikes haven't arrived in the UK yet?
  
• How would you know whether they are not that light if you wouldn't have had the chance to pick one up and be able to tell?
  
  
  

So people should judge your brand on the completely intangible products you plan to release in the future? Rather than the years of shit bikes and argumentative dross you've posted on here?

Good luck with that.

I come from the same factory as Brian Blessed.