Chinese bikes? Again!

[pepperami]

I was out and about and passed a few mainstream dealers this morning.
Of course I had to have a look around while waiting for her’s-truly.
I noticed that even some mainstream dealers now have Chinese bikes on the shop floor.

This got me thinking, clearly someone must be buying Chinese bikes?
Or? Are Japanese/European bikes just to expensive nowadays?

Also these people who are buying Chinese bikes will need someone, somewhere to take these bikes to be repaired/serviced.

So is there a business opportunity here?, specialising in Chinese bikes.
I don’t means some scanky shark preying on the less fortunate.
I mean someone starting up a business that accumulates spares connections, accumulating technical data, a shop/venue where bikes can go to to be worked on.

Or is the poor quality of support from the manufactures in the first place means this is a non starter.?
____________________
I am the sum total of my own existence, what went before makes me who I am now!

[MCN]

People who buy cheap expect to fix cheap. I don't see this being a valuable business model so I'm out.

Edit: Unless you somehow build a national supply network with lots of exclusivities.
But you will be competing with Ali Esspresso and e-Bay et al.
____________________
Disclaimer: The comments above may be predicted text and not necessarily the opinion of MCN.

[MarJay]

Welcome to 5 years ago, bruv.

Chinese bikes are about a quarter to a third of the cost of the equivalent Japanese bikes. There are plenty of dealers around who pretty much only deal in and fix Chinese bikes. The quality of these bikes (Still mainly 125s but others are coming along) is improving. I still wouldn't buy one myself, but if you're 17, working in McDonalds and have to pay for a CBT, insurance and kit you're going to go for the £1300 Huniao rather than the £4200 Yamaha MT-125.

There are even businesses which deal in and fix solely Chinese pitbikes!
____________________
British beauty: Triumph Street Triple R; Loony stroker: KR1S; Track fun: GSXR750 L1; Commuter Missile: GSX-S1000F
Remember kids, bikes aren't like lego. You can't easily take a part from one bike and then fit it to another.

[Riejufixing]

[pepperami]

[pepperami]

[Riejufixing]

[Riejufixing]

[MarJay]

Our local backstreet place supplies Lexmoto and related brands new. They'll work on anything Chinese, get parts for anything Chinese as well as Jap, Brit, European and American brands.

In the workshop someone posted a list of dealers of just one Chinese brand near to the OP's house, and there were 5 (admittedly in London).
____________________
British beauty: Triumph Street Triple R; Loony stroker: KR1S; Track fun: GSXR750 L1; Commuter Missile: GSX-S1000F
Remember kids, bikes aren't like lego. You can't easily take a part from one bike and then fit it to another.

[rpsmith79]

[Polarbear]

As someone said, you buy cheap you expect to run cheap.

A mechanic, whether working on a mainstream marque or a Chinese is still going to expect the same wages. Electric, gas and rates are the same so....

How many Chinese bike owners are going to be happy spending may a 5th of what the bike cost on a full service by a dealer?
____________________
Triumph Trophy Launch Edition

[Riejufixing]

[pepperami]

[linuxyeti]

[linuxyeti]

[Polarbear]

[linuxyeti]

[M.C]

I knew someone who took their Vespa 125 to Metropolis for a service... £300

[pepperami]

Personally for me it’s not about the general maintenance, it’s about the more technical stuff.
Most people can do filters, fluids, chains, tyres and so on.
But all new bikes wherever they come from have FI and all sorts of electronicals .

That’s where the problem lies for me.
I have experience of bikes and have some understanding of what is going on underneath me.
God help newcomers who can’t even get a workshop manual.
____________________
I am the sum total of my own existence, what went before makes me who I am now!

[Teflon-Mike]

I think the question really aught to be, define a 'Main' Dealers?

In the age of antiquity, through to even modern-ish times, motorbikes were sold through local 'shops'.... and we are exploring the rise of the 'Retail Industry...

During the Victorian era, the industrial revolution displaced people from the country, into towns, where they essentially had to buy everything, rather than go out and pick it, cut it or kill it, as they needed, and the matter of 'Branding' came along, as a a mark of 'quality control'... before that, if you wanted a pound of flour, the shop-keeper dug into a barrel, and filled a bag on the scales for you. It could be half wood, or weevils, and often was.. so some-one pre-bagged it and stuck their 'Brand' on the label, as assurance, what was in the bag was the flour, the whole, flour and nothing but the flour you wanted... and 'Shopping' was born.... 'Branding' brought ever more 'products' to the the market-place, and ever more specialised ones.

Aside: my neighbour often bangs on the door, to 'borrow' and marvels at what's going on in the kitchen... quite often a bit of old motorbike... but that's another story! The very idea of making say Spaghetti-Bolognaise, from, like, base ingredients, like whole onions and mince-meat, actually boggles the brain.... "How d'ya doooo that! In our owse, it like, comes in a jar!" Honestly, I once coughs her inspecting a pepper... "I was looking for the instructions!" she offered indignantly! LoL.. but it is reflection on modern pre-packaged consumerist expectations.

The first motor-bike shops were push-bike shops, that added clip-on engines to the shelves, or whole pre-made motor-bikes. Those push-bike shops were themselves often off-shoots of a hardware shop or iron-mongers... and so the 'market-place' evolved... and so did customer expectations.

Another, slightly related 'aside'; when I was about 13, I remember Woolworth, putting Thomas Mopeds into the shop, and the 'spiel' that went with it, was that they were aimed, particularly, at women, who just wouldn't go into a 'motorbike' shop at the time... 'cos they had a bit of a reputation for being spit-and-sawdust dives full of 'ells-angel' types.... which actually WASN'T so far from the truth.... and remained so for most of my life-time. - It's actually how I met our Snowie! Almost a decade ago, now, she had the same issue, trying to get a chain and sprockets for her Chinese AJS Cruiserette thing..... and this is probably the problem with most Chinky-Bikes, still, TBH.

For starters, bikes are less than 1% of UK road transport. There are 99 cars on the road for every motorbike, and the 'Dealers' have big glass and chrome sales suites on the main drags into town... because they can afford them....

Rant against retail, and banking as well, since I'm at it; but, if a 'product' sells for say £1,ooo... straight off the top, the government takes £200 in sales tax... they get more, overall, but. Then the retailer takes around another £300. The whole-saler, then takes about £250... and that product, as you buy it in the shop, is around 3x the price it was when it left the factory.... the biggest share of what you pay, actually goes to the shylocks, charging credit fees at every stage along the line, and putting probably 25% on the sticker price to lend you the money to buy the thing there! But another rant.... that's how car-dealers can afford the big glass and chrome 'boutiques' we are so familiar with today....

Back up to the car show-room of old, and it was most often an 'extension' on the side of the old forge, that had started selling petrol... probably a century ago.

Actually a wonderful example of the family-force in the village just down t'road from the family-farm, we used to take the bikes to for MOT. 'Old-Boy' that ran it, was my granddad's age, and he was the grandson of the old black-smith... and would talk fondly of the old pumps out the front that were a ruddy night-mare if you wanted to get a tranny van down the side to the work-shop... they didn't work.. there was a modern Shell self service a couple of hundred yards up the road... but he wouldn't get rid of them, 'cos they wuz 'istory' and regail us with tales of how he had to pump them as a nipper, cos his Dad didn't know how to work the taps, used to selling petrol in jerry-cans... and the local squire honking his horn, and and and.... you think MY posts go on! Its heritage I tell, you! Heritage!

But, old Stowie, remembered selling my Great Grandad his first 'new' car, a Hillman, as it 'appens, and the anecdotes went on, as he recounted selling my Grandmother her Triumph Herald (Which my Dad wrote off, drink driving, but that's another!) and and on it goes, until we get to the Hyundai, a life-time later, and old Stowie shaking his head, "Bludy Jap-Crap!" (They're Korean!)... 'cos 'The Lad' who would probably have been a little older than my father, had 'made' him take the franchise, because, he sold too few cars to keep the BL logo over the doors, when they became 'Austin Rover', and the Ford fella had wanted him to buy a new lot on the new industrial estate, and send his mechanics to the Ford school for training, and and and....

THAT was the marketing trend of the 80's. Bigger, better, faster, more, glass and chrome. And it was in the contracts to even get a franchise to sell cars, and as old Stowie rued, they squeezed out the old fashioned family business for this faceless corporate 'branding'.

Incredibly... after 30 years of declining motorcycle sales.... 'some-one' thought this was just what the motorcycle industry needed!

As alluded to in my yoof, motorcycle 'shops' were spit and sawdust affairs. Most local dealer, in town, had been a push-bike shop, in my Grandad's day. In my Dad's they flogged motorbikes... by mine? They had a few second hand Yamaha's the mechanic didn't want to touch, whilst he fiddled with his Enfield 'twin', muttering 'bluddi Jap-Crap'... when I asked for a crank-case seal for a DT50... a-g-a-i-n... and even quoted the part number!

Down t'rowd, story wasn't much different; and the bike-shop in the next town was a 'bit' better... but you kept your crash-hat on when you went in, for risk of low hanging exhaust pipes and luggage racks... and there WAS real sawdust on the floor!

Up t'rowd, was the big-smoke, Brum.... which I mention because if you went up the Birmingham road, right on the main drag out of the city was THE biggest motorcycle shop in Britain... I think EVER.... Vale Onslow's.

It took up five blocks of the Stratford Road, and had been, at one time the main 'Factory' outlet for BSA motorcycles, and all their subsidiary brands, like well, Triumph, but Ariel deserve a mention too.

When I was in my teens... I was oft 'sent' to Val-Ons for bits.... bludy place was NEVER open! Five frigging doors, all of them locked! Basically they had shut the doors when BSA went bump in 1973, and never bothered to re-open them! Apparently if you went round the back, on a Sunny Tuesday, when the wind was in the West, you might catch one of the old boys, and if you wanted a labyrinth seal for a Sturmey Archer gearbox or something, they would probably know the exact bit you wanted, more all the other bikes it was used on, and they 'might' have one in a draw, one of the rooms over t'shop.... ah, yes.... must be t'other shop... hang on, I think Old Jim might have a key..... no no, he dont have a 'phone... he'll be in the Akkers with a Guiness... Lol.

Anyway, enter the 90's, and a 'resurgence' in biking, and a clientele that suddenly remembered that they had a bike licence, having taken tests on a Vespa thirty odd years earlier.. after finding out how much a Triumph TR6 cost, and the missus moaning "And where will you keep one of them, then?" And seeing these shiny, clean pocket rocket things on the cover of the VFR Riders Fan-club... sorry, "Motorcycle International" when they picked up the Sunday supplements, and thought "So where can I get me one of dem-den?" A-N-D enter the marketing men, who probably were also an ex-skootah-boi from the 60's, used to a brand new Ford Sierra every nine months, and taking it to the Ford Dealers and being asked "Mocca or Late, whilst you wait, sir?"

A-N-D the big-boys tried to go corporate like the car-dealers, with face-less designer chrome and glass showrooms, with HEAVENS!

CARPET!

That was what, twenty to thirty years ago, and of the Ikea Motorcycle shops that era spawned, few survived the decade.... the market just isn't big enough, and the mark-ups too small to support them....

And it is notable that the 'dealers' that have survived with the chrome and glass show-rooms, actually aren't often all that big, and they more often supplement their retail overheads selling not just motorcycles, but stocking out the shop-space with all the clothing and accessories to go with it...... and incredibly the mark-ups on garments are enormous in comparison to most consumer goods, especially motorcycles.

Just as an example; twenty odd years ago, the mark-up on basic service spares, like chain and sprockets, was 'maybe' 15-20%. The mark-up on a bike jacket? more like 150-200%!!!! And folk WANTED to buy them! Chain and sprockets? Tyres? Brake Pads?!? "How much? Nah... I'll just take the Jacket.... maybe next month..... reckon the one's I've got have another 300 miles in'em!".. you don't have to 'sell' the stuff that people want..... you DO have to 'sell' the stuff they actually need, but resent having to spend any money on at all....

Back to Chinky-Bikes!!!!!!!

Straight away, half the market for motorcycles of any sort in this country is for under 125cc 'Learner-Legals'.And conveniently that's mostly what the Chinks make. There are bigger Chinks, some only 'just' over 125cc, and there are a few, and its a very few, encroaching into the middle-weight sector. But... just sticking to the Learner-Legals, you have the biggest part of the market to go for..... B-U-T.... its back to that Jacket vs the brake pads.....

Bikes like the YZF-R125 or MT125, will pretty much sell themselves. They are what the customer wants, and they will beg-borrow-steal to get it, if they have to. Its emotive, not rational.

Bikes like a Lexmoto.... will sell as second best. They aren't what the customer 'really' wants, before you even start. What they want, is probably a car, or an aspirational 'big-bike'. They will buy the Lexmoto, because they need it, and its all they can have or afford, and its 'easy' only having to do CBT and not find the time and money to Do-DAS, or whatever....

Having bought that bike, that isn't quite 'all' they really hope for to start with.... "WHAT! I need to check the OIL!" And the maintenance bites!

Brought up on ready-meals and on-demand-TV, the expectations of typical teen of today, are ENORMOUSLY unrealistic. And when it comes to motorcycle maintenance, even more so. "Well, DAD doesn't check the oil in his car! He just takes it to the MOT man once a year! Don't he do it?" Idea that you not only need check the oil on a typical 125 at least once a weed, more, do an oil-change every 1000-2000 miles or so, is to so many an utter culture shock... and more 'mature' riders, even my own age, often aren't a lot better, TBH!

At least two blokes of my acquaintance have both 'tried' to tackle the 'Chiky-Bike-Problem' locally.... and both have given up in the face of this kind of reality-gap.

One even had the lease on a rather plush 'old-fashioned' car-show-room of the 1950's, that when he took it over was selling I think Carpets! He had rented the work-shop behind, and thought to re-purpose back to something like what it had been built for. He lasted about as long as it takes for the first tax demand to come in, I think. The argument he had with a customer's (rather large) mum over the bent centre stand spindle on his scooter, though was oft repeated reason for 'retiring' on grounds of hassle!

THAT is what any-one is up against.

Shops in the high-street, that sell cloths, with perhaps 300% mark up on them, with customer-repeat buying every six months or so as the weather changes, are going bump left right and centre.... In the face of super-stores and direct sales.

To start a shop, to sell motorcycles, that have a tiny mark up, and an even lower turn over? It would be financial suicide.

To make it work... you would have to augment the revenue from bike sales, with that from 'must have' bike accessories and clothing.... but even more... you would HAVE to get the customers coming back in the door, week in, week out, on the 'Service' side....

And... as said, folk walk away from the stuff they need like tyres or oil or brake pads.... its not what they WANT to spend their money on.....

And in a world where they believe that they don't have to pay a pro to check their tappets, even if they have some inkling that checking tappets might be a good idea.... and there's some-one on You-Tube that will show them how to DIY, and a chap at work that says you dont need to change fork-seals, just stuff the dust-seal with toilet roll....

You are REALLY up against it, before you even begin.

Which brings me back to the suggestion, define a 'Main Dealers'?

If the expectation is for something like the Ford dealership in town, with chrome and glass and a cup of capachino... you are probably NOT going to get it to pay for itself on the mark-up on the number of Chinky Bikes you could sell.

If your expectation, is slightly smaller scale, the size of an old corner shop, with a specialisation, like a fishing tackle shop.... you stand a better chance... but STILL, as the chap who argued with the Scooter-Owners over-size mum about the possible causes of its bent centre stand pin, you are STILL most likely jumping in on a wing and a prayer, and would have to work very very hard to, even as a one-man-band, make it pay a living wage.

We live in an age when a century of consumer-culture has come full circle, and SHOPS are an endangered species..... ANY shop... and you are pondering why there aren't many, not just specialist motorcycle shops, but ones that specialise even more acutely in Chinese bikes.... the ones that have the most optimistic and unrealistic cheap-skate buyers, and that even if they are of an equivalent build quality that most just aren't!!!

And It's worth noting, that Chink-Bikes in 'Dealers' isn't a new phenomena.... One of my local bike shops, were a franchise Kawasaki dealer, whey-back-when. Before that they were a main-dealer for one of the Brit-Brands, and I think that they had a concession for MZ for a long-while. I bought my AR125 from them, back in 1990, and they were 'convenient' being local. Very much of the old spit-and-saw-dust variety, I recall, some-time around the millennium, being perplexed at spotting what looked like a Honda CG125 in the shop, with an AJS logo on the tank.....

The Chinks have been about the best part of twenty years now. They have sporadically been 'in' and 'out' of the more obvious dealers... A-N-D.... for ALL the "Well, they complained about Jap bikes when they first appeared! Just wait!" comments about the chinks! I'm Still bludy waiting!

The first Japanese bikes appeared on the UK market around 1960, but didn't really make inroads into the market until the demise of the British BSA in 1973. Its a myth that their early offerings were clones of outdated European designs, but even if they were! By 1984, they were making water-cooled four-cylinder motorcycles, with double over-head-cam-shafts, multi-link suspension and aerodynamic fairings, that didn't just look modern, they were thoroughly modern, and even Japanese designs haven't progressed all that far from them!

The Chinese, in TWENTY YEARS! Have done little or no innovation. They have done barely any quality improvement, and they are STILL building motorcycles based outdated Japanese offerings!!!

It seems to me, that the few dealers that have put Chinese bikes in their show-rooms, it is, significantly because like the Brit-Bikes of the 60's, 'retreating' into the more profitable market of the big-bikes, so now, that is what the Japanese incumbents have done.

Once upon a time, Honda had something like 3x as many models in their catalogue under 125cc than they did over... now? they probably have three! And one of them was until recently made in India! Similar story at Yamaha! Thier top selling learner Legal is the YBR125... made in China! I m sure that the MT0125 will be migrated to chinese production shortly....

SO, the dealers that have taken Chinese bikes, I suspect have done so, because the poster-child big-bikes bring folk in the door, but once there, they have nothing to sell most of them, and the Chinky bikes are there, because they just dont have Jap-Brand Learner-Legals to sell, and where they might.... with a £4K price tag on them, next to a £5K commuter twin.... plenty of potential customers would soon turn around and walk out the door, muttering to their mate that they can do better on e-bay!!!

Ie: I suspect that the Chink-Bikes in the dealers are not so much even necessity as desperation... and that you would be hard pushed to put together a business plan that made any sense to start out trying to set up a shop to sell Chinky-Bikes, and only Chinky-Bikes! IF you could put together a sensible business plan for ANY shop these days, TBH.
____________________
My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[ThatDippyTwat]

I'm not reading that lot, I'll catch autism.

So I went to talk to a bloke I know that runs a small bike shop. A few Chinese re-brand's/clones, and an authorised Japanese brand, the usual small showroom, kit, products etc.

For him, it's Economics. We're not in the worst area by a long shot, there's jobs (for now), people have money.However, he says that apart from stereotypical mid-life crises, and the odd "had one since I was a kid" bloke, no-one is buying what they were 10-15 years ago. There's little to no demand to have the latest Triumph, Kwak etc. Almost nothing for commuters. Tourers get the attention, but most won't stump up the required beer tokens, and want 4 wheels instead at the price level.

The only decent sales demographic is the kids, and they're buying Chinese/Korean/Thai made bikes because, £3.5-£4.5K is mental for a 125, whereas a Sinnis/Lexmoto/Whatever is more like £2K.

He has a similar view on quality of the bikes. If you don't maintain them, they'll rot. Same as a Japanese bike will, but usually in a quicker timeframe. If you look after them, they'll generally be fine. Bugs have been worked out on the models the bikes are cloning, by and large.
____________________
'98 VFR800 (touring) - '12 VFR800 Crosrunner (Commuting) - '01 KDX220 (Big Green Antisocial Machine)

[DJP]

My only problem with the Chinese tat is the spares back up: Buy a popular Jap and you'll always be able to get the bits – new/used/pattern etc. etc.

Not so with the Chinese: Yeah, yeah – the part you want might be the same part as used on something else (if you CBA trying to match it up) but if not your back up is the shop where you bought the bike.

Which will have gone bust by that point...

Plus they only make little bikes and little bikes are all shit anyway.
____________________
Suzuki Bandit 1250
https://deejayp999.atwebpages.com/index.html
That's http not https

[linuxyeti]

[AdamEf]

Place I did my training a few years back sold new Chinese 125s. Because they knew they'd sell. They didn't do any servicing or repairs on anything except their own bikes though, so never had to deal with the aftermath of corrosion and parts failures a few years (or even year) down the line.

Someone mentioned it a while ago on here.. try and trade a few years old Chinese bike in against something at a dealership. They don't accept them as trade-ins which says it all. Fine when they're new, but the nature of them being mostly 125s anyway and more often than not thrashed by learners, coupled with Chinese quality is something they'd rather avoid.

That said, they are likely to get better quality in years to come and chances are people are going to have less and less money to spend, so...

[Tdibs]