According to the wise, everything they make is shit.. Is that right?
I was quite complimentary about the Prima frameset :-)
I think the thing which riles people is also a common critique of free markets. Since markets essentially price knowledge, it is possible to make profits by wilfully exploiting lack of knowledge, if you can get in fast and exploit the suckers before they wise up. Dani saw an opportunity in 2007, where fixed wheel bikes were suddenly fashionable and there was an influx of customers who knew nothing about bikes but wanted a fixed bike as a fashion accessory. It was quite a trick, as cynical exploitative marketing goes, to pitch them at about twice what they were worth but half what a proper bike shop would suggest as the proper price for a bike that's actually worth having.
To be fair, for a brief moment it does seem that he attempted to make something decent, but clearly the margins weren't there for somebody only interested in turning a fast buck, rather than investing in building a long-lived and sustainable business, so he has now started slashing costs and the quality will inevitably follow - you can't get owt for nowt, even in China.
Unless there is a radical rethink about the corporate strategy, I think Foffa is in a terminal dive to the bottom. Trying to compete at the BSO end of the market is a fool's errand, since it requires volumes which can only be had by selling through the usual BSO channels, and why would they want to pay Foffa to stick his decals on stuff they can buy direct from the same Chinese factories? He has no IP or brand cachet which makes him a necessary, or even desirable, part of the BSO market. As soon as Wiggle see any worthwhile volume in the cheap and nasty fixed sector, they will drop him and put out a better, cheaper own label bike in the same category. At the moment, they're just letting him take all the risk while they take all the profit.
I was quite complimentary about the Prima frameset :-)
I think the thing which riles people is also a common critique of free markets. Since markets essentially price knowledge, it is possible to make profits by wilfully exploiting lack of knowledge, if you can get in fast and exploit the suckers before they wise up. Dani saw an opportunity in 2007, where fixed wheel bikes were suddenly fashionable and there was an influx of customers who knew nothing about bikes but wanted a fixed bike as a fashion accessory. It was quite a trick, as cynical exploitative marketing goes, to pitch them at about twice what they were worth but half what a proper bike shop would suggest as the proper price for a bike that's actually worth having.
To be fair, for a brief moment it does seem that he attempted to make something decent, but clearly the margins weren't there for somebody only interested in turning a fast buck, rather than investing in building a long-lived and sustainable business, so he has now started slashing costs and the quality will inevitably follow - you can't get owt for nowt, even in China.
Unless there is a radical rethink about the corporate strategy, I think Foffa is in a terminal dive to the bottom. Trying to compete at the BSO end of the market is a fool's errand, since it requires volumes which can only be had by selling through the usual BSO channels, and why would they want to pay Foffa to stick his decals on stuff they can buy direct from the same Chinese factories? He has no IP or brand cachet which makes him a necessary, or even desirable, part of the BSO market. As soon as Wiggle see any worthwhile volume in the cheap and nasty fixed sector, they will drop him and put out a better, cheaper own label bike in the same category. At the moment, they're just letting him take all the risk while they take all the profit.