London bike shops closing

Cycling through London today I can’t believe how many bike shops had a massive queue of people probably asking for a new bike or get their old bikes repaired. Really put a massive smile on my face to see so many LBS doing so well during this period.

LBS's doing really well. Everyone is; there is a monumental uptake in cycling. We're not an LBS, but I've been in workshop building/boxing bikes up for the past three weeks. I'm really hoping for this to be a permanent fixture in peoples mentality towards cycling.

I think purely because people are worried about getting back to work (especially in London) and don’t want to travel by tube and are looking at alternatives to protect themselves when they are summon back into work.

Nevertheless a lot of my mates have been asking what bike they should get and what size/option they should be looking for which is very encouraging

Take the money, breath, share the experience with the team, move on... Repeat!

Sorry for the dredge and I never worked in a bike shop, but this is the retail workers' mantra right there!

but I've been in workshop building/boxing bikes up for the past three weeks.

It is so busy that bicycles come poorly build in boxes now

My favourite phone conversation at the moment is “hiiiii erm do you guys build bikes? Like I bought a bike online and it came in a box and I just don’t know how to put it together?! (Giggles being cute)”

Yes we build bikes, it’s £60 and there’s a 4-6 week wait.

“WHAT?!”

Followed by “bought a bike online and it’s fully built, just needs a quick fettle, I’ve indexed the gears but they’re just not quite right”

Yeah that’ll be a case of leaving it with us for 4-6 weeks...

“But it’s just a quick fettle can’t you just do it when I come in?”

😂

Alot of people have been buying cheap bikes and also digging old ones out of sheds. Mainly as a way to exercise and get out, whilst gyms are shut and they are stuck at home. Taking advantage of low traffic volume and good weather.
It's been lovely seeing whole families enjoying the Joy's of cycling together.
Whether a significant make the long term shift commuting and general mode of transport is yet to be seen.
I'm of the view only an increase cycling infrastructure will make it feasible for real long term shift.

Same here... Even better, they expect it to be a tenner max or free, 'It's just tightening a few bolts, can't be that much work?'.

Most are understanding and are very thankful we are open and some even tip generously 'Just a tenner? Please take 20'.

The guy who was mentioned in the initial post popped by AGAIN a couple of weeks ago, this time with a CAAD 8, broken shifter, close to £250 work and we took payment upfront!

Once bitten, twice shy...

Mate can you just tighten up my brakes?

NO

Yeah I'll do it for a tenner or £15, usually it's more than just a tighten, misaligned pads and/or broken noodles and mangled cables or outer.

Another favourite,'There's some problem with my S, it's a quick fix...'

bent hanger and twisted mech

Mate can you tighten up my gears?

Yes we build bikes, it’s £60 and there’s a 4-6 week wait.

I’ve had a trike booked in to be build from a box (came from China).

It came in two separate box and nearly 90% in pieces.

End up texting customer to raise build labour from £45 to £100 and that’s me being generous.

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Check the axle for the rear wheel, I think it is D shaped. A customer brought one in for a Tune up after suffering some grinding noise. Turns out the wheel wasn't properly fastened and the D bushing/bearing in the wheel is now rounded...

£45? Fuck. That. noise. 100 minimum. That's time you're not gonna get back. If you're good at something, never do it for free/cheap.

@TM We're sending bikes in the giant boxes, and posting instructions with them on how to twist bars and put pedals on. I'm about a dozen conversations down where people have installed the forks backwards.

The manual is hilarious, I love how it describes stuff “the O wheel go on the O” etc.

It’s been crazy the last few weeks. The workshop is booked is booked til the 30th, and we have a pile of 26 bike boxes waiting to be built. We’ve been open 4 hours a day and have been doing £5k. Madness. On the downside we’ve been presented with all manner of shitters to be fixed up. I had one that had been in a garage for years, it was covered in snails, snail shit, leaf litter and fuck knows what else. Charged him £35 before I even touched it. I mean, you’d wipe your arse before you visited your proctologist, right?

We had someone wanting us to quote to convert one into a hand (tri)cycle... 😂 I mean I’m kinda sorry that we weren’t able to help but what exactly did they expect us to be able to do?

You can always count on the British public to ignore colour coded L and R stickers. It’s no wonder we’re shit at sports many of us can’t even match colour coded dots up.

my pedals fallen off

Is it the right or left?

how do I know?

Is it the chain side or none chain side?

chain side

That’s gonna be expense

😢

I didn’t expect it to be so bad! We’ve taken to printing out a basic assembly manual. Did it work? Fuck no. Daily complaints.
Opening up email should be fun tomorrow.

£45? Fuck. That. noise. 100 minimum. That's time you're not gonna get back. If you're good at something, never do it for free/cheap.

Even £100 is cheap for a trike build up from a frameset, took me two and a half hours to try and modified it enough to make it safe to ride!

I know right... Is it one with swept back bars and saddle the size of a wheel of a cheese? AND very flimsy basket between the rear wheels?

Think so, white basket that need to be bent to fit together, oh yeah and the seat post "quick release" is literally a handle that turn to make it tighter.

So much this. Sold several sets of cranks every day for a month now, Madison etc are gonna think I'm selling them on ebay.
We've come back into a quiet week which is deliberate, turned off all adverts, reduced website visibility, not answering the phone or emails much, need a break, utterly wrecked*

*he says still at work at 9.30pm, haven't left the building since 9am, and this is standard every day.
Got to get it while there is work out there but at same time health is suffering and getting to the point that would like to see some sunshine!