April 15, 2024

Oh boy:

The drama that unfolds from one's own actions can be both compelling and cautionary, illustrating the powerful impact of personal shopping decisions, expected outcomes, and reality.

It hit the customer hard. Like a slap in the face he was immediately irritated that his new bike wasn't shifting properly. I know 95% of the newsletter subscribers are certified bicycle experts and can spot a heap when they see it but read on and see if maybe you can share some knowledge with friends and family during future interactions so they can avoid the feelings you're about to read about.

A guy and his buddy go online and see a "full suspension" mountain bike and decide they are both going to buy the exact same bike and go have some fun. They make the purchase and drop the bikes off to be built by my colleagues. They build up the bikes and they are promptly picked up and taken away. This is a normal bike shop situation. However, as life would have it, one of the bikes has a problem shifting. Now, I'm not into trashing anyone's purchase they choose to make, but having to explain that a $299.95 "bicycle" is barely going to function like the photos on the website they purchased it from takes some guile and tact or you come off as a know-it-all ambassador of bike mechanic hubris that will drive anyone up the wall and cause more drama that you can imagine. One of the bikes was brought back in and my co-worker got the brunt of the anger and calmed him down by stopping what he was doing and looking at the problem. He had to step away for a moment so I grabbed a screwdriver and starting checking the front derailleur and lo and behold due to the horrible engineering of the frame you can't even get a screwdriver to seat properly in the limit screws. A few ninja tricks were needed and I got the adjustment done and took the bike out for a test ride. It was not really working so I came back in and make another tweak to the extremely poorly made derailleur and it worked fine for me when I rode it.

One thing to note about bicycles is they can be $100 bikes or $10,000 bikes and when they are in the workstand they will work perfectly, but once you swing a leg over and start riding they flex and settle in to a position that oftentimes doesn't allow for crisp shifting and a quiet braking system. A capable mechanic has to know that adjusting to the riding moment of some bikes is the goal. The workstand just helps you get it close to correct. I come back into the shop and ask the customer to ride his bike. It was truly working just fine for me. He states that when he pushes the shifter it should work. I retort with yes, that is the ideal situation, but sometimes you have to massage the shifter a bit and let it work the derailleur slowly so the shift can be made. He didn't take this well, he is a light switch kind of guy, it's either on, or it's off. There is no middle ground. He went out the door and came right back, "It's not working."

These are the moments where you just can't say what you're thinking, no way, nope, you're going to cause an meltdown if you say the low budget bike is clad with poorly made components and even worse design engineering. So what do we do? Make the customer happy. We don't want to irritate him with the truth, even though it is probably justified at this point, so my co-worker takes the bike outside and tries to get it to work and it's just not working correctly and he offers to put in a warranty claim for the bad component. While the 2nd trouble shooting ride was underway I talked to the customer like I was holding a newborn baby. I ever so gently explained that online purchases don't always live up to expectations. He mentioned that his friend's bike, the exact same bike, works perfect and his should to. I agree, but, I let it go there. Nothing I could say at that point would help the cause so I just reiterated that we'd make it right. We're the number one shop in the region for over 7 years running and it's because we care, we go the extra mile and make the customer happy no matter what. This isn't a fault, it's a feature that keeps our customers coming back year after year. They know we're here for them.

As problem solvers we take deep satisfaction is making customers problems go away. It's what we do. When we get this type of self-imposed grief its frustrating, but we know it is simply part of the game. We have to deal with the good and the bad and carry on. So, there you have it. Caveat emptor. Have a great week and please share this email with your friends and family. You may help someone avoid a bad shift and that's a win in my book.

Peace,
Paul

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