electric bike retailers are just businessmen

[tepol]

If people post interesting or thought out comments, I don't see that it matters who they are, dealer or not.

When new stuff comes out or stock comes in, I find it informative when a dealer lets us know.

Of course dealers act in their own self-interest - at its most raw and short term, yes making a profit. But long term profits will accrue to dealers who keep their customers happy.

For myself, I buy, from time to time guitars, cameras and bicycles. I long ago learned that basing my buying on the cheapest deal is not always best. In all the cases mentioned, I tend to go back to the same dealers. They have good prices, I can see and I can try the goods. In all those cases, they have been brought to my attention by word of mouth or good reports from experienced people in forums like these.

I hope all my favoured dealers make a good profit. That way, when I fancy a new camera or e-bike, they'll be there to sell it to me.

So yes, electric bike dealers are businessmen. The 'just' in the thread header seems to imply there's something wrong with that.

The term " business " esp with men has taken on more of an insidious tone in latter years thanks to oil companies , gulf war , bank cartels , governments - and Im sure you know the rest.

And if you dont , you should check out Wiki leaks documents entitled " Bike Dealers " , but only if you prepared to be suprised.

T

 

[Ultra Motor]

Most retailers are e-bike enthusiasts, including myself!

I ride mine to the train station every day to go to work, do the shopping on it, go to the gym, everything. I can talk for our CEO and President who are also based in London and it is their only form of transport, neither own a car.

I can't think of any who are in it 'just for money'

 

[allen-uk]

you should check out Wiki leaks documents entitled " Bike Dealers " , but only if you prepared to be suprised.

T

I get more gullible as I get older, so I checked out Wikileaks for Bike Dealers, and was duly surprised.

A

 

[tepol]

I get more gullible as I get older, so I checked out Wikileaks for Bike Dealers, and was duly surprised.

A

there's always one , eh ?

 

[BBB]

Am I a Businessman ? Yes I do in fact own a cycle shop, and I have seen only two of my customers on here and as I am based in the Channel Islands I am hardly here to promote my shop as we do not, or ever would sell electric bikes on line. One thing that I have learnt in business, is that customers need back up, and you cannot just walk in to any cycle shop and expect them to repair your electric bike, so aftersales is a very important part of my business.

I use this forum to keep up with the latest updates and to gain as much information as I can to help with electric bike repairs, because the product user is the best feedback that you can get.
I chose two extra suppliers that use this forum simply because they did, and were not afraid to face the public, I take my hat off to them.

Some suppliers choose not to come on this forum and one of them for sure has a similar attitude when it comes to aftersales, they seem to be invisible.

Yes I do want to make a profit, it is not a dirty word, but I have about six electric bikes in my store that I took back from customers because I realised they were not up to the job. If I had been using this forum before I imported the bikes, I wouldn't have bothered dealing with them. These bikes will be used as spares to minimise my losses on them, but my customers are now very happy with the different makes that I ended up supplying them with.

I have sold nearly 400 electric bikes, so if I lose on a few, that's part of life being in business, and sometimes you cannot always charge the customer for repair time when trying to find some tiny electrical fault. So again, that is par for the course.

I feel my customers gain from me using this forum, so please do not even think of banning 'Businessmen'!

 

[lemmy]

And if you dont , you should check out Wiki leaks documents entitled " Bike Dealers " , but only if you prepared to be suprised.

That's astonishing! Osama Bin laden, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Ghengis Khan, Joseph Stalin - all bike dealers!

I should have realised about Hitler at least when I read his book 'Main Bicycle' many years ago. But the others, who would have thought it?

Bin laden's 'Afghanistan On A Bicycle', Mussolini's 'Voyages To Abyssinia By Bicycle', Gengis Khan's famous lament 'A Bicycle, A Bicycle, My Horse for A Bicycle' and Stalin's 'A Short Bicycle Ride For 20 Million To Siberia' should have given me clues. But I always think the better of people and assumed they were simple dictators, not evil bicycle dealers

 

[EdBike]

People in the trade are perhaps some of the most informed, most helpful and arguably most passionate people in the industry - why bar them?

We live in an extra-ordinary world where consumers can now take charge. You can lay waste to an eBay seller with negative feedback, you can tweet your appalling customer service experience and share your pictures of broken products on Facebook...

You have the power to do this, to answer back. The web has turned "selling" into a two-way conversation again; 'they' all know this. That's partly why they're here - one, 'they' find it interesting and two; they want to know what you think.

If you get the odd gobby post, you can ignore it or flame the person for doing it. It's your community as much as there's.

Yes, businessmen are out to make a profit. What you'll notice on forums like this is the people who have been in business the longest think about their customers first. So they're not gonna try and p*ss any of us off with a shameless self-promo post which isn't going to help them in the long term.

Tradesmen - do you agree?

 

[allen-uk]

We live (fortunately or not) in a capitalist society. People buy things, other people try to sell them things.

No-one here, as far as I've ever seen, is underhand about their position as a dealer. They all freely say they're a dealer for this bike or that bike.

And until the revolution (a good electric bike free for every worker) this is probably the best we can expect. (I came to this site as a newcomer, and no-one tried to con me!)


Allen.

 

[piotrmacheta]

Personally I think it's great that the dealers tell us about what's available and any future developments. Most people will only buy once they have tried but it gives us a clue as to what's worth trying.