LFGSS CC - LFGSS Cycle Club

Condor have the HHV stuff in, I think.

Out of interest, is there an off the shelf version of this "pro" milltag jersey I could have a look at somewhere?

This from 7VEN's meeting with Milltag last Friday
"The pro fit is very very close fitting and needs to be sized up by at least a size. Kind of like the difference between the Rapha Classic and Rapha Pro team jersey. If anyone is hesitant about sizing, they are welcome to go into the Milltag office to try one on or Peloton in Spitalfields have their products too."

Considering my other club kit is £31 for a ss jersey and £32 for a 'racefit' ss jersey, even if you want to fund the club through jersey sales I think the price is off by 40-50%.

The materials of said jerseys are obviously not premium but the printing, fit and finishing is spot on for intended use. ie. riding a bike for a couple of hours.

Edit: these are made in Italy not china too (at least from the label).

Having seen the newly constructed kit firsthand, it's improved massively in quality, construction and materials and not far off Rapha.
Personally, as I ride a lot, I'd wear it everywhere as it's a quality good looking jersey.
Difference in cut is like Rapha Classic v Rapha PTJ. you'd need to size up for the pro jersey over the club jersey.
The prices given above aren't what it costs us but, however given that we're a free club, money has to come from somewhere.
Think of it as a £wise cheap jersey but keeping the club finances going.

Is the £75 jersey really their cheapest offering? If there were two jerseys, one at £50 and another at £85 then I'm sure that would please the majority of the forum.

So yes, I would be more than happy to fork out for it.

@Dramatic_Hammer
Does your other club kit include a sponsor?
Do you pay an annual fee to the club?
Both of these aren't part of the current ethos of the LFGSS club- and currently the income will be direct from the sales.
Also its not super helpful posting a price list without a supplier name.

+1 for a skinsuit: as LFGSS is the club I'd be racing for, I'd prefer this over a jersey.

What was the reason for jersey sales funding the club? Why not £10 joining fee? People are always going to be happier paying a joining fee and a tenner less for their kit, behavioural economics innit. Gives you a source of annual income, people aren't going to buy a new jersey every year.

No sponsor; annual fee is £25 for working adults, less for everyone else; I understand that and am happy to pay a padded fee but I think even £75 is far too high as an entry level, considering someone unemployed could join my other club and get a jersey for a total of £41.
I don't know the supplier but I can try and find out - it's the price list to club members, as an example.

Yes skinsuits are possible but would probably need a minimum number of 10.
I was just trying to get some momentum going and get jerseys first then look at other stuff later.
Personally, would prefer a quality well fitting product from local dudes who love what they do.
If they are priced too highly for everyone, then so be it but not really sure I need another shit quality jersey for the sake of it.

I was just trying to get some momentum going and get jerseys first then look at other stuff later.

Yes, this. Thanks for your efforts with meeting Milltag etc - putting the jersey together has been adrift for six months or more.

What was the reason for jersey sales funding the club? Why not £10 joining fee?

This was covered early on and agreed in the kick-off meeting.

The club is free for all to join, giving anyone who wants it the ability to participate in any competitive event that they wish without needing to pay club dues annually. Which works really well for people here who largely race only once in a while... it helps support the club purpose, to help promote and make cycle sports accessible by removing a barrier (the formality of joining a club, paying dues, etc) and reflects well the highly independent cyclists who are on this forum.

The club does have some raw costs, but the point is to make them as low as possible. We have a domain name, affiliation fees, accountancy fees, bank charges, filing fees for some HMRC and Companies House things... in total it is anticipated that the fees are just North of £1k per year, and hopefully always less than £1.5k.

We cannot seek sponsorship, or rather we prefer not to. As it has knock-on effects. i.e. British Cycling do insure some events for non-sponsored clubs, and if we were sponsored we'd need to radically formalise how some events are done to obtain the necessary insurance, etc. Additionally affiliation fees are higher, and so on.

So... a non-sponsored club of largely independent cyclists without an overly formal structure.

The only question: How to fund it?

The answer that is most apparent: From club kit and merchandise.

Right now club jerseys are the way we hope to achieve most of that, then caps. Those are the bread and butter... but if we are in trouble we can resort to T-shirts too.

It would make little difference though: If we said the jersey was £60 and membership £10, you'd still pay £70... but at least this path means that those cannot afford to pay anything can turn up to an event in black kit and just ride and say they're part of LFGSS CC, not having paid anything and I'm cool with that.

Full respect to those who are putting their time and effort into this btw.

Yes, sorry wasn't trying to complicate matters further.

Ordinarily I would prefer to pay more for a better quality product, but the club jersey will likely only get worn when I'm doing club related things, not all the time.

BTW, we haven't even specific bib shorts, etc. The kit really is: high quality jersey and supply your own black shorts.

Again to reduce the total outlay that someone needs to make.

The only thing we need to produce: a high quality jersey that funds the club, and people love and can afford.

Those last two words is proving a stickler, given the funding and quality in the first bit.

Can anyone really not afford £10 to join a cycle club? That's got to be just about the cheapest membership fee for any sport. My old canoe club was £170 a year, gym membership is £50+ a month, golf club membership £hundreds. Anyone who wants to race is going to have to face the cost of entry fees and BC membership. £10 from 150 members and your funding is sorted, and you can offer whatever jerseys you like at cost to your members.

There are many cycle clubs already out there if people do want to pay membership fees then they can.

This one isn't one of those clubs.

But by your own argument, who couldn't afford a £70 cycle jersey? We know that answer isn't 'nobody'... so we'll care about the final price enough to control it a little.

£75 is right on the limit of what I'd like to pay. Feels a little bit 'ooof'. However if the quality is amaze and the design is amaze too then I could be easily convinced.

A wider gap between the prices would be nice.

My Uni CC used http://www.thecyclejersey.com/ I've worn this jersey a lot and it still looks and feels good about 8 years later. From memory, it cost about £40, membership was about £2 on top of the usual Athletic Union membership. We ordered a mix of SS, LS and Enduro shirts and the design included (iirc) 4 colours on the base white. I'd guess the order size was about 30 -40 tops.

I'd rather pay more for a premium product I'd enjoy wearing rather than having yet another mediocre jersey which I'll only ever wear because I need to rather than because I want to.

Would be wary of taking the 'yes, that's affordable' response on this thread as being a representative cross-section of those interested in jerseys. It's likely that those who don't feel it to be within their price range are less likely to come forward and say so, but are more likely to not bother joining.

It would be a shame if such a collaborative forum priced out a sizable proportion of its members.

Absolutely.

I would not be prepared to spend £75 on a jersey. A lot of people on this forum have a lot of money (and money they're prepared to splash around) but I'm not one of those people, and I suspect I'm not alone.
FWIW I have a milltag jersey and I don't think it's amazeballs. Perhaps this is a different style.

Maybe somebody who understands spreadsheets* could create a googledocs poll so that we can calculate from anon votes how much people would be willing to spend?

*I've just ruled myself out as I am shite at spreadsheets