24 Sep 2010

2010/2011 pricing is now available for those that are interested - drop us an email. Prices have gone up approximately 15% across the board, but this had been offset somewhat with the high Australian dollar for Australian customers.

Leadtimes will also no longer be given. As a rule, expect 12 weeks but it could be anywhere between 8 and 16 weeks. This is because I am not running Thylacine as a full time business and I don’t want to create a stressful environment for myself or my contractors. Essentially if you can’t wait 4 months for a frame that will still bring a smile to your face for the next 15 years, don’t order one. If you need your new frame for a particular event, order it sooner to avoid disappointment.

For our Road frames, we are now no longer doing just frames - these will be sold as a Frame/Fork/Headset package only. Forks are coming from 3T and are painted to match the frame, and Cane Creek will supply our headsets.

Off-Road, our Mountain frames will still be available as frame only, or as a Frame/Fork/Headset package.  Forks currently are Fox only (Rock Shox may be available by next year) and headsets again are Cane Creek.

As always, we can source any parts you may like, as well as do complete bikes for those that want them. In the past I was running lean margins on the parts we sold but this will no longer be the case as they will incur a retail margin. I will always try and do better than local shop prices, but essentially building a complete bike and ordering every single part from a boatload of potential suppliers is a complete time sink.

These are the biggest changes for the upcoming year. The product is the same but the conditions in which they are delivered I hope will be more workable for myself and the people who work with us.

Posted by warwick @ 11:37 am

22 Sep 2010

Okay, so Floyd Landis is coming to Australia to speak at Deakin University’s “New Pathways for Professional Cycling Conference”, and as a result, you’d think they’d invited Satan or something. Landis is a busted drugs cheat, but unfortunately for him, has decided to actually put up a fight and attempt to out some of the bigger names, as well as campaign for reform. Many other pro cyclists have decided it’s in their own best interests to cop it on the chin, take the ban of however many number of years, and then come back. This year there’s a long list of returns to the peloton with the likes of Vinokourov, Millar, and a long list of others deciding just to shut up for the good of their careers.

There’s talk of Landis as being ’self serving’ but I’m not really sure where he adding to his ‘infamy’ for want of a better word is assisting that - aside from the fact that like me, anyone who can type about it, is. His presence anywhere as a vocal and active campaigner towards drug reform in cycling which to the outsider probably looks like an intrinsic part of the sport for better or worse is going to bee seen as a ‘look at me’ act, but can’t everything be seen in that light? And if not Landis to speak about these things and offer insight, then who else is better qualified?

There’s this strong undercurrent in the cycling community of Landis being a virtual Pinata for anything to do with drugs in cycling. The mere speaking about it makes him a target. Commentators such as Bridie O’Donnell and her attitudes to him speaking just smack of the whole “brush it under the carpet” / “Geez, shut UP Floyd, if we don’t talk about it, it might seem like it never happened” attitude that happens basically whenever bad shit happens. Bad shit DOES happen, and adults deal with it, no matter how a long, slow and boringly drawn out process it more than often is.

Humans have an annoying trait of burying their heads in the sand. Whenever someone says to you “I’m fairly non-confrontational” people generally stand around nodding their heads like Muppets. Rarely does someone say “Well, you should be confrontational, or else bad shit can happen and get perpetrated ad infinitum and you, my friend, will then be part of the problem”. Actually that sounds like me making friends at 3am at a party, but that attitude seems to be the norm rather than the exception. It needs to change, and even for that small mercy we should be thankful that Landis at the very least is putting his hand up and saying “Um….guys……this system is pretty shit.” At least he’s qualified.

My own personal attitude towards drugs in cycling is mixed. When you strip everything back, pro cycling really only exists as rolling advertising, and for that to be effective, you need a pantomime element. I like the panto - that’s why we watch. Pro Cycling is so all-consuming for the individual, that if you’re even vaguely aware of what they have to do to compete, you can see the allure of drugs when you basically come to the end of your natural ability but are only 1% off the pace. Add to that the paradigm of the rich drug history of the sport (beer and amphetamines were de rigeur even 100 years ago), and the fact that you’re already messing with your body in every other conceivable way and you can see how for many it’s not a huge leap. Or a leap you can easily make when you’re Directeur Sportif is giving you a nudge in the back while he shows you your bank balance. Imagine being thrust into that when you’re a Mennonite from Pennsylvania.

The big issue with Landis is selling his credibility. It’s easy in a way to cop a ban on the chin and say “Yes, I did it, I’m a bad boy, seeya in a couple of years”, but we find it harder to reconcile someone that denies black and blue but then changes their mind and then starts to drag others into the melee. To my eyes, Landis is probably seeing all these others get away with it and simplistically thinking that he can too, not being able to distinquish between his case and others. David Millar has purportedly said :

“If [Landis] had stood up and manned up four years ago, he’d be racing the Tour de France now. He’d have a different book out. He’d have not lost a penny. He’d be admired by young people. He would have a different life ahead of him…”

I’m not sure how not having an income for two years involves ‘not losing a penny’, but of course there’s a truth to this and that truth is “time heals all wounds”. In time, people will forget about the bad stuff and only remember that you ‘repented’. Read: Be a part of the circus or become a sideshow, which is exactly what’s happening to Landis. Conversely, the message from Millar, Vinocourov, Rasmussen and friends is “Just STFU, come back after your bans and pretend nothing happened”.

I see Landis as a tragic figure and I think his gameplan is pretty poorly conceived, but the reality is that Pro Cycling in a way needs Landis if it’s going to change. People love the Pantomime, but it’s a fine line when it’s being sold as something it isn’t. People only have a short tolerance for that, so it either changes or does it’s best to keep sweeping it all under the self-serving carpet in the hope that people keep looking it’s way.

Cycling is blowing it’s “there’s no such thing as bad publicity” horn, but you gotta wonder if an injection (pun intended) of the Truth wouldn’t hurt as well.

Viva Le Pantomime!

Posted by warwick @ 6:10 am

17 Sep 2010

Okay, so there are changes afoot here at Thylacine that are going to make things a bit easier for me trying to juggle everything and hopefully being able to do that juggling a bit more properly and with less, well, mess.

As of today, prices for frames are going to go up (15% on average), and leadtimes are also going to go up. (Prices have not changed since I started Thylacine back in 2003). Pricing structure is also going to change with no price breaks for different models - the costs are essentially the same and the reality is, only the function changes so I doesn’t really make any sense to support cost cutting when the materials price differential is negligible between models made from the same material.

Also, 2010 has been what I can only describe as a horror year for us in terms of our contractors and we’re cutting them back to just one for Steel, and one for Titanium. Both are located in the US so all our frames are manufactured there and that’s the way it’s going to stay for a near future (in case you were wondering).

Because of this, our leadtimes are going to go up to 12 weeks minimum because we’re not using multiple contractors. The downside to us having too many contractors has meant that we’ve found ourselves using contractors who constantly let us down in terms of leadtimes and quality control, and frankly I’m sick of cleaning up other people’s mess. It’s cost us a fortune this year and it has to stop.  We’ve been pandering to pressure to keep the leadtimes down and it’s just not worth it.

And finally because of this, I’ve also decided to cherrypick potential new customers. In the past I’d simply accept anyone who wanted a new custom frame, but as of now I’ve decided I need to build bikes that I’m interested in and that emphasise what Thylacine is about, so that’s how I’m going to roll (as they say) from hereon-in.

I’m hoping all this will mean that the day-to-day running of Thylacine Cycles from my perspective can be a less stressful and more enjoyable one, and from the customers’ perspective, it means that I can give the level of quality service and quality product I espouse on the homepage of the website.  I realise that in the past few months a lot of people have been disappointed and let down and I hope this is a positive step forward so I can design and sell the bikes I really want to, and give a level of service befitting them.

From the outside and perhaps for new customers’ it will probably look like business-as-usual, but I just wanted to post a little note here explaining the new changes in the name of fairness and transparency.

Posted by dicky @ 6:56 am