Taking a career jump into the cycle trade

[d8mok]

Thanks for comments

Insurance I feel is a must. Too many folk looking for a quick buck to take the risk. I did look at the city and guilds course nearby but it looked a little half hearted and still £1k for 10 days. Feel like it would be better maybe to spend more on the Cytech.

I’m going to write a bit of a business plan and let someone I know good at business have a read to see if it stacks up. No point doing it unless I’m forced (redundancy for example) if it doesn’t make money to support myself. If my job situation changed out of my hands I’d probably give it a whirl without doubt.

Ideally I’d do 5 days a week and make sure I clear 100 quid net a day. Not sure how possible this is initially but Once repeat custom comes surely quite easy given the hourly rate bike shops charge out at. Overheads would be tiny.

In terms of money I’d be taking a huge paycut and losing a new car every 6 months plus other perks but it’s not all about the cash now and more about feeling good. However saying that , I still have bills and bike bits to buy lol.

Buying and selling is something I do quite a bit of anyway so I’m guessing this would continue so can’t really be included.

Long term our aim is to move to Spain so I’d like to have transferable skills which can move across.

 

[rwm1962]

Be aware getting parts is a bit of a nightmare at the moment which limits what you can do.

 

[danson67]

Insurance wise...worth asking Yellow Jersey: https://business.yellowjersey.co.uk/
They cover me for workshop stuff and framebuilding, public, employer, product liability, business interruption etc. for around £500/yr. under their 'Business from home Level 3' with a few extras.

Here's their fact finding form: https://business.yellowjersey.co.uk/bic ... fact-find/
And their rough price guidelines: https://business.yellowjersey.co.uk/mob ... /packages/

All the best,

 

[d8mok]

Re:

Cheers I’ll take a look.

 

[Splatter Paint]

Re:

A big question is who is your customer base?

Round here (Surrey) on any given day there will be loads of high-end bikes in use on the road. In the commuter belt, they probably would welcome a home-collection facility. However, would you say be able to dip into a portion of the lower end market (<£500 bikes)?

If I was going to trust you with my Hei Hei to take home in your van, I’d want proof of insurance and proof you were competent to work on it. Push that a bit further, a modern e-bike might cost more than your £5k van! The difference though is the customer with the 2020 e-bike can get a replacement if it gets stolen from the van, whereas my old Hei Hei is of more sentimental value.

Personally I have also considered this and came to the conclusion that it would be too much hassle for a big set-up and it’d kill my love of bikes.

SP

 

[d8mok]

Re:

Customer base would be cheap and cheerful bikes mostly. These would be the bread and butter.

I’m in the peaks so lots of decent riders and bikes around my way. I’d lean more towards MTB though.

I’ve got a £8k modern build and if I’m honest I don’t have any emotional attachment. It’s insured so if anything happened .... And have never had issue leaving it for a bike shop to do invisiframe for example.

My retro ones wouldn’t go to a bike shop though so With all due respect you wouldn’t be my target audience with a heihei and I’d probably refuse as I know what owners (myself included) can be like with their pride and joy.

 

[hamster]

One opportunity in the Peaks might be an 'out of hours' service for tourists who bust something and want to go riding the following day. It's a big commitment time-wise. Also many might not be prepared to pay premium prices (which I think it should command).

 

[shedobits]

Re:

Here's hoping that you do well with your intended venture in the UK.

Having lived and ridden in Spain for 15 years can I offer some information based on personal observations gained from hanging around LBS's? It's the culture here to fit for free of charge any components bought in the shop at list price, (this has changed a little since the world wide shortage of bikes for them sell so repairs and spares are helping to keep them in business).

There are very few low cost bikes to be seen around and the most popular bikes to be seen are high end carbon XC 29er race bikes. MTB's are often put away for July and August and carbon road bikes make their appearance as it's too hot to mountain bike during the day.

I've yet to meet another retrobiker so I think there won't be much revenue for you from that direction I'm afraid.

On the bright side there's snow on the mountains, a blue sky and it's the law for cars to give cyclists 1.5 meters clearance when passing.

Any way I'm shure you will make the right decisions and if you need any more info please feel free to PM me.

 

[d8mok]

Re:

Brilliant thanks for the info

Spain is a while off for me yet I think but great to have some insight.

I’ve noticed whilst out there lots of road bikes and XC bikes. I took my Evil Insurgent in 2019 for summer and had fun in the mountains but it was hard work climbing in that heat.

Where abouts are you?

 

[Rod_Saetan]

My tuppence worth:

If you are dealing with cheap and cheerful bikes I would assume that at least 50% of them have unforeseen problems that take you way longer than you'd hope to sort. Secondly, the people who own these bikes aren't always amenable to spending a big chunk of the new cost on parts to get it running, yet you won't know this till you've had the bike in the stand for half an hour. There is a reason some shops charge a lot for a blanket service - yes some bikes come in clean and well greased with caring owners, but the ones that don't soon eat into your cost per hour. A couple of suppliers will make life (and margins) a lot better, but you may struggle for decent bits - ie Madison are the main Shimano distributor and they aren't easy to get an account with. I have worked for several shops who used to order Shimano from Wiggle/CRC to get something to put on a customer's bike, seems like that probably wouldn't work now though, and its yet more time faffing about and waiting out of your day. Budget £2k for a solid stock of consumables, cleaning fluids, gloves, some mechs and other bits so you can crack on with stuff immediately, budget £15 per week for biscuits.

It will be a slog, hard work and lots more hours than you want to start with if you are wedded to the £2k p/m amount certainly, you'll get quicker the more you do it but I would expect that it will sap some of the joy you have for bikes currently, you definitely won't want to fettle a Retrobike at the weekend after 60 hours of fixing other people's bikes during the week. I've done some mechanicing and it left me a bit annoyed with bikes!

Most normal people don't know what Cytech is, and I generally don't insist on it when I'm employing mechanics in shops but it can be a really useful thing to do, and its handy to have an Industry accreditation to put up on FB/the website etc. It may give you a bit more confidence in your own ability too.

Hope that doesn't sound too negative! I have a few friends who have tried this, one is making a good fist of it but he is an ace mechanic and a very hard worker, who also has a little black book full of wealthy customers from his days working in a high end road shop, and he is based in a posh bit of Surrey. Give it a bash, I started in bike shops by accident, I just figured if I was going to spend all day talking about bikes I might as well get paid for it, its not what it was even in the decade I've been doing it though, but I have learnt so much, met some amazing people (and, frankly some truly awful ones - ha!) but I'll be pleased if I can still call it my career in 15 years time when I retire (with no pension or savings but a lovely fleet of bikes).