Cycle Response Unit bikes- why are they so expensive?

In a typical "I wonder" sort of mood, I decided to find out whether Joe Public could buy one of those hi-vis ambulance bikes you often see. The answer is yes, you can. If you have at least £1500 to throw away on it, that is.
Apparently, they're all provided by a single supplier, and the prices are:
£300-600 for a small list of "Carrera" brand mountain bikes, with a free decal service.
£940 for the rear panniers
£310 for the front panniers
£150 (approx) for lights, hi-viz helmet, basic toolkit.

With a setup of pretty much the bare minimum needed, it's £1700.
Now, the bikes are terrible, and the choice is limited, but at least they're the same price as they are in store, and that includes decals for whatever emergency service related wording takes your fancy, and the accessories turn out to be pretty reasonable too, when you break it down.

What I don't understand is how those panniers can possibly cost £1250. Even if they are handmade to order, that seems insane. Am I missing something, or is it a blatant rip-off?

Might want to post a picture or two in case some of us have no idea which bikes you're talking about...
My first guess though would be that whenever a local/gov authority opens its wallet to commission an independent contractor to make something for them, the contractor doubles/triples their usual rate.
That is, unless, the panniers come filled with everything an EMT needs to respond to a call.

That's what I couldn't work out. As far as I can tell, the panniers arrive empty.
Here's a picture from Wikipedia of such a bike:

(They do other emergency services too, like the more common Police bikes).

And yes, it's truly hideous, and probably weighs a ton.

Where did you find your figures?

A couple of things there pointing to the higher cost.

Start with the Ortleib Back Roller Classic which retails at around £80 for a pair.
These are larger so there is more material cost.
These are sling over panniers so there's a set of construction needs there to make sure that they maintain their form and have the sort of longevity for frequent use on those areas subject to loading strains.
These appear to have panelled bases.
The colour is fairly unique, I've not seen that outside of emergency service use when it's not on clothing or vehicles. I do know the fabric is comparable to Ortleibs so it's probably a special order.
The same also applies to the retroreflective stripping.
Unlike the Ortliebs, these are a multipanel design which will carry high construction costs.
That additional pouch attaching to the seatpost is also unique.
Looking at it, I suspect that whole top panel flips up and is a velcro down which means it will need a heavy service fastening.

The big kicker that really bumps up the price is the economies of scale. I would suspect that there aren't more than 2000 of these in service across the country. The manufacturers probably churn out no more than 30-40 a year if that. £80 for a pair of Ortleibs is possible because they knock out thousands, ship in bulk and and operate on a scale that makes warranty support of limited impact.

To the untrained eye, I would suspect that a cost of around £600 might turn a reasonable profit though.

If you apply some of the economies of scale to the bikes, I suspect that the price is a little on the low side. I'm guessing that the prices you quote come from a package breakdown of costs. It maybe that the quoted costs of the panniers is where the company has shoehorned the profit.

Yes, all of this will be supplied by a single supplier. That's fairly standard practice for the public sector for something like this. It takes a cost burden off of the sector to no have to source multiple items with a variety of lead times and having to issue unified specifications to multiple suppliers. A single supplier can adopt these costs with less impact because they'll be doing the same sort of work for multiple local authority areas. I would imagine that local authorities are offering 3-5 year supply tenders and should be considering conducting specification reviews at the end of each cycle (not a pun).

What did the costs source say about the per supplied unit cost after delivery? Are there any scheduled service or maintenance work commitments included in that? Call out options? RTB Warranty coverage etc?

£1700 for all that seems like a bargain if it's been sourced for/priced by a local/Govt authority.

The figures are taken straight from the supplier's website.

I'm impressed by the replies!
I mean, I would expect made-to-order panniers with customisation options (a huge range of colours, different options for the chequering, logos and wording to customer specification) to be expensive, but just not £900 expensive.
I'm certain that they're brilliant quality, unbelievably rugged panniers, and they are pretty much the biggest panniers I've seen. (which is why I was looking for information about them in the first place).
I just can't work out though, why spending £1250 on a full set of these is cost-effective.

Cycle Response Unit bikes- why are they so expensive?

Because

they're all provided by a single supplier

NHS wants bikes, Govt. procurement puts out tender, provider is given complete monopoly and churns out low-cost, high-price crap to a captive purchaser.

Worth noting that those don't look like standard racks. The rear one looks like a Tubus , which is probably no bad thing given the likely weight of the panniers. If the front is of similar quality then you're probably looking at £150 for just the racks. That cost might be lumped in with the panniers.

Still not £1700 though.

Edit: also on that picture: spds and schwalbe marathon pluses will also add a bit of cash. Also, the London Ambulance page on cycle response units say that they use Specialized Rockhoppers so £500+ for the bike

£150 (approx) for lights

Blue lights?

My friend is an cycle paramedic and I don't know the details about the bikes, but she told me they haul around 60kg worth of stuff along with them, so I imagine some of the cost involved is in making them super robust.

Those sus forks though :(

FUN FACT: The whole Medic bike thing was the brainchild of Tom Lynch, ex-BMX pro racer turned Paramedic.

Anyone know anything about the COL cops getting stiffed on their maintenance contract? Can't remember who told me, those clunky Smith and Wessons made out of scaffolding tubes they ride had an annual service contract of something stupid like 12k or something.

if im correct @|³|MA3k knows a fair bit about them.
Paging John

Did the pannier cost include the cost of the kit they carry?
It is conceivable that the panniers are supplied with certain medical kit already in.

It takes a cost burden off of the sector to no have to source multiple items with a variety of lead times and having to issue unified specifications to multiple suppliers. A single supplier can adopt these costs with less impact because they'll be doing the same sort of work for multiple local authority areas

This hits the nail on the head. The client is paying, ultimately, for the removal of the trouble of sourcing the product and managing its supply, as much as for the product itself.

Not that it couldnt have been done better - nearly all public sector procurements could.

The annual service cost thing is totally wrong, but I can't talk about that.

The Smith & Wesson thing goes like this:

Someone found the 'S&W' name wasn't protected in the UK and along the lines of 'Caterpillar' and 'Hummer' got a bulk batch of them knocked up in the far east.

Same guy convinced the MET to buy them (no comment on cost) and the Police cycle teams have been living with it ever since.

Build quality was horrendous (favourite - bottom bracket shells separating from frames).

These bikes have been mainly phased-out now, I don't think they will make this type of mistake in future.

Nope, empty.

Among the many things that these pannier carry are defibrillators and oxy tanks. No hope for getting those included for the £900 tag.

The figures are taken straight from the supplier's website.

Bit of a mistake here. This is the price to you for ordering a one off. The price to a local authority might be lower on the basis that they will supply a fixed number of units across a set amount of time. The supplier then gets to reap some cost benefit by being able to schedule their build work efficiently which is passed on in part to the LA. I wouldn't be surprised if authorities are subsequently selling historic models and accessories on to organisations like St Johns and overseas orgs and collect on the associated tax write off to boot.

Of course if you really are interested in this stuff, you could always lob a Request for Information to some LAs asking about their tendered specifications for the work and historic expenditure. Some of the information might be redactable under Commercial in Confidence exemptions but most of it would pass a public interest test. Ask the questions in the right way and you might well be able to get a full release.

Someone found the 'S&W' name wasn't protected in the UK and along the lines of 'Caterpillar' and 'Hummer' got a bulk batch of them knocked up in the far east.

Same guy convinced the MET to buy them (no comment on cost) and the Police cycle teams have been living with it ever since.>

Why am I not surprised that, despite police not being routinely armed in this country, the MET would happily trample a group of primary school children in the rush to buy a Smith & Wesson branded bike, without even cursory examination of the supplier or the product?

Oh, ta, I had no idea about the service charge but just heard it was sky high.

Yes, they do say that if you order in bulk, there is a discount. Looking at it, it's about 30% reduction in that price if you order more than a few, which, given that they are literally made to order, does make sense.
I hadn't considered the idea of them selling on the older models, although I assumed that it would be just as cost effective for them to keep using them until they wore out, given that there's no further costs incurred at all that way.

I may well send an FOI request the way of one of the larger LAs who uses these bikes, it would probably be quite interesting to find out whether they actually offer value for money.

Honestly, the biggest surprise for me is that given that they're made to order, the choice is actually quite limited, especially regarding the bizarrely similar choice of bicycles- I wouldn't imagine riding a bike with front suspension and the weight of an oxy cylinder over the back wheel to be very fun. In some places, I imagine the off-road capability would be a godsend, but it seems to be a very one-size-fits-all approach to an otherwise quite open ended service. I know it's a partnership where Halfords provide the bikes, but even so, they sell a few hybrids and even tourers that, certainly in the places I've lived, would be far more appropriate!

(Plus, paramedics on proper touring bikes would just be an awesome sight... also potentially useful in rural areas as a very low cost way of getting to places in non-emergency situations, just like posties used to!)

They need fatbikes, obvs.