Opening a new shop.

I miss Kinoko too

Compare that to ‘non-serious’ cycling products sold; entry level bikes for leisure and smart trainers. These are £700 purchases. Those take little time to sell and have flown out.

I’m not suggesting ^ these are the markets. I’m trying to show people will happily spend on leisure.

You make a good point, and folks will spend money on leisure if they perceive it’s worth the expense. I haven’t seen actual stats but I suspect that the large majority of cycle users would rather spend £1000 on a holiday than on ‘just a bike’, even if they can get considerably more hours enjoyment per £ out of a bike.

ahah. spot on. i miss tokyo fixed too

As a vision this is good but to have to sort trade accounts for all those brands 😩

And yes i was a regular at tokyo fixed and kinoko, my first fixie was a soma rush with phil hubs.

Tokyo Fixed when it was in some cellar was totally charming. So much so I’d always just buy something keirin but useless (like a kashimax tt protector or MKS chain tugs).

About the club thing. Being very close to a big local club and offering 10% discount seems to work. It builds loyalty and gets members buying new bikes through them when the time comes.

Actually running a club isn’t necessary.

Once a buyer...

Not that I have the slightest clue on running a store, but harping on what @Maj said, a more boutique store would be great from my perspective as a customer.

Maybe get involved with the different trends that pop up I’m thinking similarly styled to The Woods Cyclery/Seabass. Get involved with what’s going on over seas with the trendy releases in Japan Blue Lug/CrumbWorks.

Maybe focusing on the smaller limited releases from Nitto, Mks in the bike packing/xBiking realm. Team up with a local bag maker maybe do store specific colour ways. Not so bothered personally about the cafe side of things but hat might just be me. But a place to view these boutique brands in real life with a good sense of community around would be the one.

As for the social media side like what’s been said already, do away with the copy paste descriptions and pictures , a nicely styled website with real opinions on the products would be great.

Maybe this is just my idea of the ultimate shop haha!

With all these fancy boutique trinkets, one fears an extremely poor margin . Its also incredibly fickle and far too trend driven with product that is available readily online. These small shops that have filled the last page or so, are either no more ( if they turned a profit?? ) or demand their owners to be so heavily involved that time off is scarce and again, profit is minimal

With all these fancy boutique trinkets, one fears an extremely poor margin

Yeah. People are telling you what shop they want, not what shop could actually be viable.

Yes was definitely more of what I would want vs what could turn over a profit and cater to a wider audience!

Maybe this is just my idea of the ultimate shop haha!

Yes, not very sustainable.

i mean, if you're looking for business consultancy, pay for it, you're asking a bike forum of people who specialise in buying increasingly niche and rare trinkets what sort of shop they want to buy their trinkets from.

Also, I suspect, a forum full of people who rarely use bike shops.

Most likely not, hence why most of these boutiques are online only, and in countries where they are way more popular.

bingo,

I was searching my local area the other day to find a bike shop which had "a nice vibe" after the guy i tried completely ignored my simple request to "line the valve hole up with the logo", and found nout.

just wanted to pay a lovely shop £130-200 to set up my new bike when it arrives rather than me "sort of doing it right but not really trusting it" nothing, they all looked like they'd give me a bike back which looked like it had the design ethos of a 2008 pro peloton

would be great if i could pick up some nice nitto bars and mks pedals there too, because surprisingly, v hard to try online!! what if they look wank!!

I’m imagining a wall completely covered in obscure handlebar shapes.

a forum full of people who rarely use bike shops.

the first post explains this; never ever look at 'us' as target demographic, we are the worst.

we know better and we demand too much for too little

People who ride bikes are the worst.

We are the worst of the worst.

How dare you.

It’s 2021 Everyone shops in Lidl and pops into the tasty indy deli on way home.

lfgss is the indy deli of bike forums.
#notlikeotherforums

So we should open up a lfgss bike shop? The worst of the worst.

employees paid 8 hours a day to argue on if we should be selling cable discs or not

Music to my ears

If it's an out of town indie bike shop, definitely use this free font and pay no more than £40 for the logo

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See the bad trader thread.