I'm also a big fan of Rivendells and of Grant's philosophy about bike riding. However ...
It seems to me that the base of cyclists who are tapped into Riv is very small. We (all of us on this list) buy as much as we can manage (two bikes last year for myself and my wife). I tend to buy well made stuff, then keep it and use it for a looong time, which means that I'll need another new bike in about 25 years. When I have everything I need, I quit spending. I don't buy and then trade/sell as a hobby, just to try out the latest models. Nothing wrong with that, but I think that the Riv customer base, in general, spends to its limits and then drops off to a quieter level. Unlike the wanna-be racer crowd, we just don't need the latest "New! Improved!" carbon fiber, spandex goodie every season. I know that I am actually not going to get any faster by buying a titanium bolt that weighs 1.243 grams less than the steel bolt. Rivs are not made with planned obsolescence in mind, the traditional way to keep up sales. Riv needs a bigger customer base. We on this list do what we can, but I doubt we can save the company. So seriously, does anyone out there have the kind of marketing background needed to expand the customer base? What Riv needs in the long term is more buzz and more paying customers. Who can help? Reid -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
