Bureaucrats on bikes to invade downtown Tucson
Let’s hope so anyway. Tucson is apparently leading the way in creating “bike fleets” for city employees and, ideally, others, to borrow to get around town during the work day. Raytheon is also implementing this program. Now if only they would stop buying bikes from China for these programs and instead focus on high-quality, low-maintenance, somewhat-low-tech machines, (or even cargo bikes!) I could really get on board with the idea.
As I was finishing up this post, Lauren pointed out that I should not be so critical, and that nearly all bikes these days come from Taiwan or China, including her beloved Bianchi!
Okay so that is a good point, but nevertheless I was still quick with my rejoinder: I personally own seven bikes. Two from America, two from Mexico, one from England, one from Italy, and one from France. All good, solid, rugged machines a person can be proud to ride upon. And as brilliantly successful as we are here at tucsonbikelawyer.com, we are not the economic powerhouse of Raytheon. So how hard can it be?
–Erik Ryberg
Update from Lauren
The unfortunate reality of the bicycling industry these days is that pretty much all of the big names outsource most of their manufacturing. I’m happy to hear that a company like Raytheon is making an effort to implement programs to get more employees on bikes….period. I would expect that they would pursue the most efficient and cost-effective means by which to do that…which is to purchase the bikes from a big name company such as KHS or Giant. So yeah…I’m not going to be too critical of their efforts.
Individual consumers, however, can make more conscious choices when it comes to their purchases…such as seeking out local frame builders like Ed Foster (that’s a picture of one of his offerings)…or buying parts from companies like Chris King, Paul, or Phil, which still manufacture in the U.S. However, being a conscious consumer is oftentimes more expensive. Arlo Todd is in the process of creating a website dedicated to bicycle companies that manufacture in the U.S., which I think will be a great resource for conscious consumers.
-lauren
February 13th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Erik,
I think your portrayal of Giant as a cheap,low-quality bicycle manufacturer is unfounded. Trek and Specialized both outsource most of the low to mid-range bike manufacturing to the same factories that create Giant bikes!
In terms of value, many of the bikes that the Taiwanese manufacturer sells offer higher level componentry as compared to their American counterparts for the same price. I have personally ridden on at least 3 different mid-range Giant bicycles and have not found any of them to be low-quality. I think it’s unfair to lump them together with low-quality just because they are made in China. I’ve seen some really terribly made Chinese bikes, but I think it’s pretty safe to say that most of them are not exported over here.
The idea is to reduce the reliance on cars in Tucson and if less expensive bikes = more bikes, than is that really such a bad thing? Is that “made in USA” or Italy, or France sticker really so important?
February 13th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Hi Mickey,
I only said they were made in China and Taiwan, not that they are low quality or even cheap. And I have to agree with you that the “Made in” sticker shouldn’t be so important.
So perhaps I was too quick to criticize and too flippant, as Lauren said.
But I still think those bikes are ugly compared to the Dutch commuter bikes.
–ER