Originally Posted by
Sy Reene
Related question somewhat.. but a visit to Trek, Giant or Spesh reveals that you can pretty much buy any of their in-stock bikes online. Trek even evidently offers ship directly to home; Giant and Spesh are still requiring you to specify the LBS you want to pick up from. So, what's the difference between these folks and Canyon, aside from there being an LBS likely nearby for service, whereas Canyon contracts with Velofix for the same?
Also curious.. does checking out with the big3 via online shopping cart, even if product is picked up at your designated LBS, cut out any of the LBS profit from having purchased the same bike in the store (assuming it would still need to ship from a distributor to get to the store in the color/size/model you want)? ie. does the LBS lose 'credit' for having closed the sale?
There's a clause in bike manufacturer owners manuals that states the warranty is void if the bike isn't put together by a certified dealer. If you ever ran into a warranty issue and they saw that you ordered the bike direct, they could ask you to produce a receipt showing that a shop built the bike up. If you can't come up with that receipt you'd be SOL on a warranty (potentially).
Every bike I've seen ordered to a shop, but not through the shop, was subject to an assembly fee ranging between $80-$200. Even warranty work was subject to labor fees, and not covered by the shop or manufacturer. Having worked for several shops, I can tell you that shop/manufacturer relationships have been soured over matters as little as $90. What happens is the manufacturer will balk on covering fees and tell the shop to pass it off on the customer (easy for them, as they don't deal with the customer). The customer will get blindsided by a huge bill for something they think should be covered, then the shop will be forced to cave into the customer and either eat the fees or lose future business. The manufacturer will throw the middle man under the bus and not give a hoot because they know they have a captive audience.