Foffa Bikes

Cousin to Charlie the bike monger.

^^shit, need to spread rep first. I'll try and come back for you!

Surely they would point you towards Scoble the Bike Butcher?

Don't you be such a silly sausage.

What's his beef?

You can never, ever win by responding here to any of this.

I was slightly swayed by dani's first reply, but the shooting down after that was pretty comprehensive.

I was never going to buy a foffa anyway and have openly mocked the only one I've seen in the wild.

This thread is getting a bit silly. Go to Condor's bike builder and see if the prices are any different to Dani's costs on the last page, I imagine they are about the same.

I'm not saying I'd have bought a Foffa in preference to my Condor, but I don't see the thread bleating on about how you can get stuff cheaper on the internet than in Condor. He seems like an alright guy, running a business, acknowledging mistakes, responding to community feedback. I can't really see that he's doing anything bad in his business.

Condor Heritage, Campag Chorus, Mavic Carbone's, carbon seatpin etc as a rough equivalent still works out £500 cheaper-and I'd be surprised if they didn't give a better deal in person tbh

And it's from a shop with proven track record that sponsors teams and gives something back.

Just saying.

Yeah - I wasn't suggesting that I wouldn't go to Condor in preference (in fact, I have gone there, twice, and when something needs doing I wouldn't have my bikes looked at anywhere else).

I was more pointing out that there's no point in lambasting prices which pretty much match the cost of most other shops selling bikes at retail.

Right, here is my answers to all the points you have raised:

Furious tiles, the only reason we keep persevering at protecting our brand is that people keep insinuating that we are ripping people off while we are not. Actually I will reiterate that we seem the only brand out there to offer not off-the-peg bikes at off-the-peg prices. The price for EACH COMPONENT that I have quoted on the 3 grand bike comes from the RRP of the UK distributors for those brands, so yes I can appreciate that on CRC you can get them for cheaper, but we don't have the buying power at this stage to get OEM accounts, so these are the average prices that you would expect from an independent bike shop that's been around for just over 3 years, and I certainly don't appreciate people suggesting that we are massively inflating the 'RRP' prices as you are suggesting. If you check the RRP prices for the Chorus group set and Bullet 80 wheel set check out the Chicken Cycles website yourself and you'll see that they match.

über_grüber, I need to clarify a very important point here. If our bikes were for the fashion conscious people only then we would be using hi-ten steel and the cheapest components China can produce, but that s not our case. So seeing that our frames are made from the same guys that Surly and BLB use (and I would really like to know where you can find a Cromoly 4130 double butted steel frame set for £240), our rims from the same guys that H+Son use (but ours are a lot cheaper) I think you ll appreciate why I appear to be giving a lot less credit to some of the people in the forum than they are due.

Also I just had a play around with the Condor bike builder and the same specced bike with a Mavic Cosmic Carbone SL which is £300 inferior than the Campag Bullet Ultra 80 is going for the same price as ours, so we are still £300 more affordable!

MDCC_ tester, the fact that we offer on our bike builder the option for an entry level Zaffiro tyre doesnt mean that people using some common sense and choosing a good wheel set won't go for some Continental Gatorskin (which are also on our bike builder), so asking me whether I 'have actually done the maths' is irrelevant since I am not the one that does the math but the people that bespoke their bikes.

Mechanical_vandal, you took the time to quote every single components using CRC prices and it works out as £2835.90, add a bit for labour and you get the same price we would charge you for the same bike but on top you'd get full warranty and a free service, so that's still better than buying the bits yourself (which would only work if you already had the tools and knowledge to put the bike together).
Also not sure why you are saying we are buying anything at "full retail"? We have never suggested this, and if we didn't buy at trade where would our profits be?

D-goods, yes like many of the posts on this forum this is another one of those 'have a go at the bike guy' cases, but I actually don't mind it because although it is a shame that some people seem to get so frustrated at the people that are actually working hard for something they are passionate about and are willing to admit when they are wrong and learn from their mistakes, we are still getting some very valuable feedback from this, which can only make ours a better brand on the long run.

RPM, in 3 years we have improved every single component on our bikes, changed our mechanics 3 times, launched 3 new ranges of bikes, grown our business by 300%, and got over 50 resellers of our bikes around Europe, so not really sure why you would say we haven't learned anything.

Kingcutter, if you think you know where we could improve our brand, then we'd love to hear from you. As I said many times before, we are a cooperative business and always listen to what the community has to say on any matter.

christianSpaceman, thank you for being one of the few people realising that we do try to run a genuine business and acknowledge our mistakes, which I don't think it is something that you ll find very common in this industry.

To conclude, 4 years ago we started offering basic bikes which we have improved dramatically over the years after listening and reacting to feedback from customers and discussions like the one on this forum, and it's a shame that some people here still associate us with the first bikes that we built. We have stopped 2 years ago reconditioning vintage bikes like we used to in the very beginning. We have even changed our mechanic three times in order to keep trying to raise our standards. We have always been willing to listen and discuss constructive feedback with everyone in and out of the industry. We have added many top of the range brands like Brooks, Cinelli, Fizik, San Marco, Miche (which I can appreciate not all of you might be too fond of but some people still like them and end of the day it's about giving people choice. But if you do have other options you d like to see on our bike builders let us know!). We understand that in life nobody can please everybody and Foffa Bikes might not be to everyone's liking, but we are just trying to run a genuine business and keep constantly improving our range of products and services, so I hope we can now move on and go out riding our bikes more!

All the best,

dani

^great effort

+1

Condor a) are notoriously expensive for completes but also b) give a 10% discount when you buy all the parts from them, which probably isn't reflected in the bike builder price. Just saying.

Regal, the Condor price I quoted earlier includes the 10% discount already.

Cue edscoble "......I still don't trust his mechanic though'

Or another 'yeah, but I still built a cheaper / better / prettier bike from something I found in Classifieds'...

I've just looked at your webpage. Your mixte bikes are pretty good looking - they must sell well?

The words and the background are the same colour when trying to build a bike so I cannot see a bloody thing when selecting components.

I clicked a pair of shoes to the checkout but I can't get to the checkout? I can't be bothered to sign up just to check if you have them in stock or not. Really bugs me when companies do that.

I've just looked at your webpage. You are pretty good looking

ftfy

Regal, the Condor price I quoted earlier includes the 10% discount already.

I did say 'probably' as I didn't know if you'd accounted for it. Their bike builder doesn't display it automatically (I don't think).

For the record, I don't have a problem with your prices in the sense that it's more or less what you'd expect to pay for a custom shop build. For an OTP they're expensive, obviously. And I wouldn't pay them. But then I wouldn't pay them for a custom build either, because I'd gather the parts and build the bike myself, like a lot of people here. But there's a niche within which you're now operating, of buyers with some cash to spend and little specialist knowledge, for which it's absolutely a fair price (notwithstanding any perceived brand cachet of the frame).

The problem you'll have here is that people here do have specialist knowledge, and they do remember those early bikes, and they were awful. I know you think that you need to win the PR war on places like LFGSS but I'm not sure you need to, really. The mainstream coverage you've been getting seems to have been very positive.

^ amen to that.

Whilst on the surface it appears admirable, and possibly brave to respond to forum comments, I believe it is less than altruistic.

This forum is full of intelligent, literate cyclists who are you are likely to be early adopters of what will most likely become 'mainstream' cycling trends.

My point is, when you post and engage in dialogue here, you are receiving advice you would otherwise have to pay a premium for.

My point is, when you post and engage in dialogue here, you are receiving advice you would otherwise have to **pay a premium for. **

bwahahahahahahaha! Quoted for posterity. C'mon guys we really need to get our heads out of our own arses. I can imagine the Thomson development team perusing the Scoble thread daily.

That ^^ is comedy gold, right there.

I know you think that you need to win the PR war on places like LFGSS but I'm not sure you need to, really. The mainstream coverage you've been getting seems to have been very positive.

This.

This thread had essentially died and gone into hibernation until you posted, no matter how reasoned your arguments you will not convince the likes of Scoble and all that you are doing by posting here is sadly encouraging people to have a go.

Seriously, can Jackc's comment be made into the official forum t-shirt? Pure Gold!