Trek Recalls girl's MT220 bike

If you bought a Trek MT220 Girl's bike for your daughter in the last 3 years, you might want to pay attention to this.

I thought I should help spread the word about a product recall that Trek Bikes issued on one of their girl's bike lines earlier this month. I only learned about it this morning, as I've been somewhat slacking in keeping up with the bike news because I've been so busy with FHF and the move, but it's especially important to since it concerns the safety of kids.

Apparently, the gussetted models are not affected by the recall, but for full detail please visit the Trek Bikes Safety & Recall webpage and download the 2008 Trek Girls' MT220 Bicycle Recall.pdf to find out exactly which models have been affected. If you have any further questions or concerns about the safety of your bike, contact your local Trek Bikes dealer and see what they have to say.

Won't somebody please think of the children? Oh wait, they did...

Park Tool Sues Serfas Over Pump Colour

When I try to explain to people how competitive the bicycling industry is, I usually get a "yeah, yeah" type of look. "Of course it's competitive" is the standard reply, "they are, after all, in the business to make money." Well, uh, gee. Thanks for the intro to Economics 101.

Then I move one to explaing how for each price point (which can start at $300, and go up by increments of $50 - $75) every one of the large manufacturers has a bike, and usually they are all comparable to each other. Trek's $600 bike is going to be right on par, for quality & value, as a bike from Specialized, Giant, or Norco. And the same thing pretty much applies to bikes that costs $300 or $3000.

Of course there are differences between brands, and Product Managers have to make those tough decisions to stay within a certain price point, such as "if we downgrade the suspension fork, we can upgrade the drivetrain" or "we can put double-walled rims on, but we'll have to use a cheaper handlebar stem and saddle." But when you are comparing "Bang-For-Buck" value, most of the big players in the industry are neck-and-neck. There are always exceptions to the rule, however, and occassionally you come across a product that blows it's competitors away by increasing that "bang-for-buck" value.

For any competitive industry, especially one that is exceptionally secretive about sales figures and market/product research & development, it does seem like there is a lot of, um..."imitation" that goes on (you can call it "copying", "borrowing" or just plain "ripping-off" if you'd like). And the latest episode of squabble over "copying" is brought to you by Park Tool Co. and Serfas Inc., with Park Tool's Lawsuit over Serfa's use of the colour blue in their pumps.

You can read more about it here.

Personally, I'm not sure who I side with on this one. I'd love to anybody else's opinion about this.

Once again, thanks for reading, and check out the website! Don't forget to click on the Google Ad links -every click counts!

Resuming service on March 8th!

The move is on!
(wasn't that a Kenny Loggins tune?)

Well, we've started packing and will finally be out of the apartment and into the house this Thursday. With so much to do, I am freaking out just a little bit, but I'm sure it'll work out fine. After all, there is no other option.

I figure it's going to take the first week of March to sort things out, so I am officially announcing...
the first day of service for 2008 will be Saturday, March 8!
Until then it's just phone calls, my friends. So we can still make house-call appointments, arrange to have your bike picked up, offer advice, and generally talk your ear off.
That is, except for this Thursday and Friday, due to transfering our service over. Man, moving is a drag.

New Website Up!

Well, it's been a long time coming, but the new website is finally up. Continual Cycles v3.0 is here! After having a third person say "Oh, you're still in business? I checked out the website a couple of times and nothing seemed to be happening" I decided I'd better get off my butt and re-vamp the site. There are still a couple of things I'd like to work on, like the planned photo gallery, but for now I'm happy with what I've got and I'm hoping that you'll like it too. Bicycles aside for a moment, I'd like to talk a bit about the new site.

I'm excited about the new site because I'm using CSS for layout and am now XHTML 1.0 compliant and, aside from a totally new look, I've slimmed down the size (in Kb) of each page. I've also done away with that hokey javascript drop-down menu bar that was the site navigation. Not that the site was large, by any standards, but it makes me feel like I've upgraded my skills and besides, the site will load faster.

Now that I think about it, it's a little like getting a better bike, one that was lighter and faster than the old one. Sure it can go a little faster because it's lighter, and it will be more fun to ride, but it will ultimately take an improvement of skills to really make that bike come alive.

Still in the works is a photo gallery that (hopefully) people can/will upload their bike & bike related photos to. All I need to do is choose a format, learn how to make a decent thumbnail bar, compile a bunch of photos, and find the time to accomplish all this. No sweat. Maybe I'll make a T-shirt that says "Photo Gallery 2009 or Bust!"

All kidding aside, I'd love to hear what you have to say about it. Check out the website. Leave a comment, and thanks!