LBS - Best service and price

chadmuffin

I find Quinn cycles in liverpool to be a very good lbs very helpful and reasonably priced gear. i dont mind paying a little bit more over than wiggle crc etc there only a 10 min ride from our house and will always have a look at any problems on my bike

roger_merriman

shin0r wrote:

My LBS is brilliant - M & D Cycles in Abergavenny.

Not really local, it's an hour away, but Miles, the owner is a great guy and seems to be more interested in making sure you have the right kit as opposed to the most expensive.

I would never ask him to price match CRC and the like, the personal service more than outweighs saving a few quid.

used to live nr abergavenny, in the clydach gorge. used to go to gateway cycles just across the road. never liked M & D much not sure really why, he never didn't any thing wrong as such just never felt that friendly.

I now live on the edge of london with a old fashioned friendly bike shop under 5 mins walk away.

roger

jonny ramrod

I think the point of having a top lbs is kinda being missed....

We all know you can get ace deals on line, but if you have problems with it, putting it by your pc wont get it fixed. (if you catch my drift)

To me, being able to go into a shop that you have built up a relationship with, have a brew and a chat, try out the latest 'must have' bike or bit of kit, getting small repairs done free of charge, advice and help on set up etc, your bike 'jumping' the repair que, is worth 10 times more than a price match at whatever faceless on-line store you care to mention.

Also the chances are, that if you show a bit of loyalty to them, they will repay you with a good deal or discount when you come to get your next big purchase off them.

On that note, i can 110% say that i have the best lbs (even if it's 12 miles away), W homer cycles, in Ellsmere port, cheshire. check out www.homersbikes.co.uk to see what i mean.

My rant over.....

FSR_XC

I guess we're pretty lucky in Cornwall.

Yep Certini is my favourite, but 2 other Cornish shops (Bike Chain Ricci & Clive Mitchell's) are also recomended here.

Maybe one of the mags should do a mystery shopper and rate shops around the country??????

Matteeboy

Well Clive Mitchell have just REALLY impressed me.

When I got my Stumpy in August, we got a Globe IG8 hybrid with hub gears for wife. We do a 10 mile daily "commute" (we work from home!) and it's pretty seriously hilly.

CM told us it had about the same gear range as an MTB - we soon found that it didn't - the lowest gear is VERY high and the hills, although possible, were very very hard work on it. So took it back to see if they could do anything - Anyway, they are taking it back (full refund) five months later and we are paying £150 more to get a Rockhopper Disk for my wife - we found the hybrid to be less useful than we thought and really needed an MTB after all.

Wife had been using my 1997 Stumpy (a bit old!) so is well chuffed.