http://ingliscycles.com/i/r_h_r_rw/r_h_r_rw1.jpg

I sympathize on the Soulville inventory, BUT if that’s the case, just sell the frame.

As a conumer who would have bought either frame configuration (and recently did pay a premium for another company’s mixte frame), I have the following observations:

(1) As you’ve pretty much said, there’s some rationalization on price and sourcing in your kits on the Soulville.

(2) The uniquely attractive part of the Soulville is the frame. The particular comps for me are wheelbase length, styling, horizontal dropouts, and steel vs. aluminum. The drivetrain is a bummer, inasmuch as it is neither all that cheap nor all that magical (vs. Red Band, Alfine, i Motion).

So many things to try and address…

Bar height; The stem is a flip/flop stem that allows some rise. Admittedly, as this is a new model for us, we are feeling away around this and we always listen and make changes when we can. In the future, I honestly see revising the frame with a taller head tube- but that could be a year from now with the way lead times are growing. Since Mike is the one who designed the frame… let’s ask him why the head tube is so small…

Fork steerer tubes; shipping bikes w/ uncut steerers would definitely result in the revolt hinted to by Rick. Besides, it isn’t just the steerer- you need to have long enough cables and housings to meet that height as well and that leads to another complaint from many retailers. The majority of shops- not all- prefer to simply pull a bike from the box and make a few slight adjustments before putting it on their floors. I get angry calls and emails from retailers when a bike takes more than 30-45 minutes to assemble and put on the floor. Seriously.

Supply; I wish we could have every bike in stock all the time, in every size and every color… but we just can’t. A) We’re too small of a brand to warehouse the bikes and pay for them- it’s very expensive to run massive inventories. 2) Lead times have ballooned beyond imagination. Case in point- Shimano Nexus 8spd hubs on the SoulVille went from about 60 days lead time to 180+. That’s why we made a mid-season change to the SRAM 7spd hubs. It’s impossible to forecast those kinds of changes. 4-B) We also couldn’t have even begun to account for how much more popular the bikes ended up being. That sounds a little smug I know, but the bikes sold far better than we hoped. We always have faith in what we bring to market or we wouldn’t do it… but having demand for a bike be 4-5 times greater than forecasted means a lack of inventory.

All that said, we’re super happy that things have been improving for Masi and we’re gonna keep trying and we’re gonna keep listening to what folks like you have to say- and I say that in total sincerity. It’s feedback like this that has helped us to create the bikes that keep popping up. For that, I have to thank YOU.

Tim

Never counted, but I guesstimate that from inquiries–a lot of them–that I could have sold at least 50% to 100% more of the various Soulvilles had I been able to convert a lot of walk-ins and a few of several phone/email inquiries into sales.

I don’t want to eff my boss by screwing his relationship with Masi, but I work for a shop in a good highway location in a good retail area and people come in and ask for the Soulville by name. Now and again,I can sell them something else in a commuter and a lot of times it might be a better proposition for them from a price/performance pov, but the conversion isn’t nearly as good as if I could give them what they want.

When you get a self-selecting customer who has sold himself, it’s pretty crappy to see him walk out the door. Putting them on a list is pointless, since I can’t tell then when they might be available.

Regarding steerer tubes, you would see a mass revolt if shops had to cut steerer tubes – even if they had to cut 25% of the steerer tubes on new bikes they received, there would be a mass complaint to the manufacturers. The time involved to remove (make sure bearings don’t get contaminated) the fork, headset parts, front brake…then cut the steerer, clean up the cut, install star nut… Too much time for a mass-produced bike. But, if you want a custom build, most framesets are sent with un-cut steerer tubes.

In addition, fork makers also impose a limit on how many spacers you can install on top of a headset. In the case of a carbon steerer fork, that amount is usually 40mm. The Alpha Q Extreme fork is made with a super stout steerer and you can run 130mm of spacers. For aluminum steerers, it would be a little more and for steel steerer, potentially even more. But, running almost unlimited amount of spacers would likely be a liability issue for manufacturers.

Hmmmm, maybe reverting back to quill stems is a novel concept. No, seriously. But this is unlikely to happen on a large scale. The logical way to get bars up is to just make frames with taller head tubes and larger frames and get away from the sloping/compact style. Leave that style to the racers.

It’s not that much work. Sure, the bikes may look a little weird on the shop floor, but a decent shop is going to do a fit session, anyway. That’s when the stem height should be set——not at the factory in Taiwan.

You’re not making these things from Vibranium or such. You’re not waiting upon little Keebler elves to carve lugs and braze shit on. If you don’t have enough, up your orders. Duh!