mconlonx

I was going to talk about competitive pricing, but then I clicked through to their website...

Instead, I found this pic:

SquidPuppet

$750.00 for a non custom frame/fork, and no mention of tubing brand or butting. No wonder, eh?

Wilfred Laurier

Not outrageous compared to Surly, for instance. And Surlys are all made in Asia.

Jeff_Caul

You can check out the company I work for. I'm actually the one that puts these babies together. We're one of the few custom builders left in the US. We have a couple of frames to choose from and you can go from there.

Mark Sr

Easiest way is probably to buy a new Worksman and put a few personalized parts on it to suit your needs.

Or search Craigslist & find yourself a used version of what you used to like and rebuild it using USA made products that can easily be found on e-bay. I delivered newspapers as a kid on Worksman Cruisers. Even though they are still made here in the USA, I like finding old ones & re-doing them w/ US made parts. Wald is a US company that used to make all kinds of bike parts, but now focuses on bike baskets. Troxel, Mesinger, and Persons all made seats here and often NOS examples can be found for reasonable prices. I picked up this old Worksman a while ago for cheap,:



that I'm in the middle of a re-do with that is going to be a great, one of a kind bike:



Emory (made in Jacksonville, FLA) is another old brand of beach cruisers that can occasionally be found:



Good Luck!

StephenH

There are or were several brands of industrial cruiser similar to the Worksman. Mohawk is one that comes to mind also.

The fact is, if people demand the lowest possible price for stuff, they're going to wind up with stuff made for the lowest possible price- and quite likely, that will not be in a country paying reasonably high wages. For example, there are a LOT of custom framebuilders that can whip up a really nice bike for you- but it won't be $100 like a Walmart bike, either. Worksman is not a large company, and a bike bought from them will have been made in fairly small quantities.

Last I heard, there are zero bicycle tires being produced in the US. Most of the derailleurs and other odds and ends that go on a bike will be imported.

You can buy "American made" cars but half the car will have been made overseas, or you can buy a Toyota or Volkswagen made in the US, so it's all kind of mixed up as to who made what. I once owned a Plymouth Volare, but it was made in Canada.

Wilfred Laurier

Please accept our apology.

surreal

Late to the party... here are my contributions:
@Mark Sr Welcome to bikeforums. I'm the same guy who posts as Bicycle808 on RRB. BTW, ppl with Worksman, contact Mark Sr for some awesome reproduction Worksman head-decals!

re: Worksman. Worksman bikes are rad. I got quite a few. A lot of imported parts on them, but still, tough to beat for the price. Made out of thick-walled 1" pre-rusted xxxtra heavyweight steel... painted with watercolor paint or maybe it's food coloring, but the stock paint doesn't last.... the frames are dirt-cheap and ovebuilt and the best currently-produced frame for those of us who like to customize cruisers.

re: Wald. Wald still sells a lot of cool bits. In addition to the baskets Mark Sr mentioned, they still make fenders, headsets, OPC BBs, seatposts, stems, handlebars, racks, kick stands, front sprockets, training wheels, etc. But, yeah, the days of Wald-built cranks and rad BMX stems coming out of Kentucky are gone. Everyone with a coaster brake should look to Wald for replacement coaster straps. Best $1.50 I've ever spent.... Just caught up with the Wald guys at the Phila Bike Expo. I picked up an awesome khaki flexfit cap with the Wald insignia in blue. Hottness; it was a freebie, but I feel I've earned it by constantly promoting their bars and #4080 headsets and fenders and stuff online...

re: Emory. Emory apparently is bringing the VR-1 to market quite soon. Will be expensive, but will also be stainless with a high-tech headset, gates belt drive, etc. The latest pics I've seen show something that looks a lot like the old Emory Mojave model...

re: Fireman's Texas Cruisers. I've looked into buying one of these, but I didn't. Yet. Everyone who owns one seems to love it, and rust-through doesn't seem to be a problem long-term. FTCs are all welded by Sal Correa, who built bikes for SE back when SEs were US-made. Quality shoudln't be a concern.

OTher US-made cruisers.... it's gonna be BMX-ish stuff, but 3-bars still dominate. Santa Barbara Cruisers are well-regarded; they're basically high-quality Cook Bros knock-offs, built by a one-man operation in Cali. Pricey. No website. The guy who owns the shop is a dude named Rex; he seems to be building very small-scale, mostly for customers that are local to his shop. But take a gander at some hottness: 2013 Santa Barbara Cruiser 26 - BMXmuseum.com

Genuine Bicycle Products. I got an Article One frame from Atomic Paul; the welds are a bit goofy looking, but good penetration, everything is straight, details are really good. Made from thick-walled 4130 tubing; heavy, overbuilt, designed to take abuse. These have a Littlejohn Fireroad cruiser vibe to them; GBP also makes a Champion-style and a low-boy, named the Article Two and Article Three, respectively. Relevent to this thread, GBP has just come out with an imported frame called the RedMenace, i suppose due to its Chinese origin. I haven't built my Article One yet, b/c I keep hemmin and hawin' on the wheelset.
2011 Genuine Bicycle Products Article One - BMXmuseum.com

-True Torch. More BMX cruisers; they make a few different flavors, including yet another 3 bar. I got one; welds are buttery-awesome, and they should be.... welded by a dude named Johnny Severin, formerly of GT bikes fame BITD when GTs were made in America. However, the QC is off on these; the seat-tube wasn't honed, the spacing was weird, other customers had issues with the finish. I'd been riding my Pro around with a cheap coaster-only build for a while, but now it's in pieces. I can't decide if i wanna re-build it or sell it. Here's an example of a TT WFO:


-When Schwinn closed its Chicago Factory in 1980, things went badly for cruiser bikes in the US. Murray, Ross, and Huffy kept going for a bit, but.... No more. 26s lived on in US-made form mostly with the industrial bikes and with BMX cruisers. Seems to be a resurgence, now. As far as my current stable goes, beyond Schwinns, my post-1980 US-built cruiser fleet includes some Worksman INBs, a Trailmate tall-framed industrial bike, a Robo-built Emory, and the aforementioned Genuine Article One and True Torch Webco Professional. I like'm all, but the welds on the Emory and the Trailmate are realllllly ugly. Penetration seems good, but they don't have the "stack of dimes" look that I prefer. Instead, it's more like a "wad of chewing gum". But, both frames are older than my wife, and they're still rock-solid....

If you like the US cruiser "industry", such as it is, you'll wanna buy Wald products whenever possible, palp a late-model Worksman, and build yourself a fun BMX cruiser. B/c that's what we have left; if we don't support that, there won'b be anything left at all. I can see that folks on this thread don't care for the FTC bikes, but i wanna get one, probably in the 29er flavor. The bikes are pretty awesome, and it's the kind of company i'd like to support.

howeeee

There are about 5 bike manufactures here in Detroit now, they are making mostly commuters and fixed gear bikes. Shinola makes beautiful bikes, the frames are actually made in Wisconsin by a Schwinn family member, The cost is not cheap 1900 to 3200. There is another company making a commuter that is around the 500 dollar range.

I like riding cruisers sometimes, so I keep about 7 or 8 older Schwinns (-:
Sometimes I buy them to just to ride for a couple months then sell them.
The ones in the pictures I keep. Would like to keep them all, but I just cant lol