I usually avoid specialized and giant. I've owned multiple treks so it's not a big brand thing, just don't care for either of them. I also try to avoid sram brakes.

 

I must be having an 'off' night. I can't seem to dial in many specific examples but I'll take a run at describing two things that come to mind. I'm thinking of marketing in general.

Too darn Clever;
I recently heard the Tire name; Tacky Chan and it reminds me of all types of products that you might find with clever or funny names. Schwalbe has a line of tires with cute names or just being different. It's cool, but this tactic makes me suspicious. Simply put, a clever name draws me to a conclusion the item is awarded some benefit or attention, yet this has nothing to do with quality, value or reliability as best-in-class. In essence, I suspect people buy stuff just because it has a cool name.

The Original;
My second point is about "the originator". Some person or company is credited with being the first or original inventor / designer of said product. Again, I am suspicious. It isn't that I don't believe them, I just don't feel like their item or product is necessarily the best based on the sole fact it's the original. You shouldn't either.
Plenty of products have come along that are "Me-too" items and are better in various ways.

In my limited clarity, this is overnight number 4 of working 12 hr shifts and I'm just too damn old for it. (It's temporary though)

✌

 

Commencal about a year ago, they posted a youtube video of one of their very well known riders riding here in western CO. And some of those spots he was filmed riding on were off limits to bikes. Trails listed and posted as hiking only trails only. Now, I don't agree with that, but it's not my call on what trails get closed to riders. But, some of those trails are very close to local trails that we have lost the ability to ride. The last thing we need is more "justification" for closing more trails.

When I emailed them. They just told me sorry, they are not from here. So they didn't know. Which is a crock of crap reason!

 

Pointless you say...

SRAM, because I didn't like an X9 set up I had many years ago. Avoided them ever since.

Muc-Off because it's expensive for generic products with a bit of pink on them (full disclosure: I am actually using their sealant in one of my bikes as it either that or Stans from my LBS, and Stans stinks).

Giant for absolutely no reason at all.

I want to say Specialized due to them being awful at a corporate level, but I've owned a Demo 8 and SX Trail and loved both of them.

Troy Lee because they make me think of Guy Fieri and I've got no other reason to acknowledge his existence.

...and now you can all suffer him too.

 

SRAM, because I didn't like an X9 set up I had many years ago. Avoided them ever since.

LOL too funny. My irrational hate is towards Shimano because their 9 speed stuff from this era was always letting me down. A new bike I bought in the early 2000s came with SRAM X9 and it felt like a revelation. I've been Shimano free ever since and haven't regretted a moment.

I guess my other irrational beef is with Maxxis. I loved the Minion from the 26" era, but everything I have ridden from them since has been slow rolling with a tendency to fold over. I could deal with this and move on. We have so many choices, but the thing that gets me is that any critical review I have left here seems to get removed, which really grinds my gears.

Oh and I guess since I'm on the tire talk, I avoid Stan's. The rim tape is brittle and fussy, the sealant eats side walls, and it makes bizarre boogers. I think this is probably a rational beef.

 

5Dev parts.

So many youtubers sporting them because they got them for free, acting like normal people would pay this much for parts. It's just one of them things that remind you of everything that's wrong with the industry.

 

Muc-Off anything. Nearly all of their stuff is overpriced and average at best (and actively terrible at worst) but the irrational hatred stems from the fact that it’s everywhere and most “normies” think it’s the “premium” stuff.

My only experience with Silca is their Synergetic wet lube, which so far has been pretty good, but I’m not sure it’s noticeably better or longer lasting than my usual go-to despite costing more.

 

Awesome Strap

 

None, cuz it's a waste of time to fret about a faceless corporation.

 

but their history of aggressive litigation

As long as your not posting from an OS made by Microsoft or Apple, otherwise your supporting aggressive litigation

 

Don't be this guy.

 

Probably SRAM. Comes from two things.

-Way back in 2006-07 I was on SRAM components and the failure rate was crazy. Went through more SRAM parts in a season than the next 20 years on Shimano.
-I have seen way too many of their chain break. On the WC circuit the high failure rate of the early generations of 12-speed SRAM chain was open secrect. I know multiple people who have broken a bones when their SRAM chain broke mid sprint. SRAM deflected and would always say it was an issue with quick-link install(it wasn't).

I know SRAM makes a really good product nowadays but I still can't buy their stuff.

 

I don't have any pointless beefs, all of my hatred for various brands in the bike industry is fully rational and 100% justified, and they're ALL on my boycott list forever. I do not currently own and will never buy another product from Specialized, Schwalbe, Crank Brothers, Fox, Rock Shox, or Stan's.

 

YT. I will never, ever buy anything from them after the way they treated Aaron Gwin.

 

Trek, for punishing Lemond over his comments on Armstrong. Specialized for excessive litigation.

I actually like Giant... say what you will about them, a Trance uses off-the-shelf bearings and common shock sizes. Let's not talk about Overdrive steerers though, at least the frame is compatible with standard forks.

 

S_R_A_M: I used and enjoyed almost all of the individual components brands that now comprise the conglomerate. Grip Shift, Sachs, Rockshox, Avid. As independent entities they each made fantastic stuff and that made my bike life better. Today, I avoid Scram entirely. Their hypocrisy knows no bounds. Schram only exists today because of the settlement they won from Shimano in the 90's. Now Shram uses all the same tactics it accused Shimano of to dominate the OEM market.

Shraam's documentation sucks. Their component group inter-compatibility is impossibly incoherent. "Flattop" chains? You have to be kidding me!

 

S_R_A_M: I used and enjoyed almost all of the individual components brands that now comprise the conglomerate. Grip Shift, Sachs, Rockshox, Avid. As independent entities they each made fantastic stuff and that made my bike life better. Today, I avoid Scram entirely. Their hypocrisy knows no bounds. Schram only exists today because of the settlement they won from Shimano in the 90's. Now Shram uses all the same tactics it accused Shimano of to dominate the OEM market.

Shraam's documentation sucks. Their component group inter-compatibility is impossibly incoherent. "Flattop" chains? You have to be kidding me!

It's very interesting that when SRAM purchased ZIPP, Mr Silca, Josh went with.
AND
You'd think that the sponsor of Silca's podcast would be SRAM wouldn't you.
BUT
It's not, It's Shimano. How embarrassment.

 

Brand? Like, 95% of them. I look at geo charts, find my XL size, and then go down to th chain stay carefory. And it's like FourThirtyEight. And then I go to the S size. FourThirtyEight.

🤮🤮🤮

 

Trek. If only because some of their racers camped next to us at a race once and were sh!t neighbors.

Has nothing to do with their bikes, but man, they were awful to be next to for a few nights and just generally unpleasant people.

 

Trek. If only because some of their racers camped next to us at a race once and were sh!t neighbors.

Has nothing to do with their bikes, but man, they were awful to be next to for a few nights and just generally unpleasant people.

That's funny. Not even my main beef with Santa Cruz, but the same thing happened to us with their "race team". They were complete assholes all three days.

 

No beefs, but just don't want to support any of the big brands. The bigger the brand the less likely I'll be to buy one of their bikes. Is that weird? FWIW my two bikes are from Knolly Bikes and Pipedream Cycles. I've got a REEB on my radar for for future (next) purchase. I used to say if I were to buy from a bigger brand it would be a Pivot because that's what my favorite local shop sold, as well as that it was an AZ company and I was an AZ resident. Now that I'm in Utah, maybe an Ari?? Nah, I'll stick with little botique brands.

 

SURLY.

I bought one of their bikes shortly before covid hit, and then when the George Floyd protests started up, they started posting all sorts of political BS everywhere, and I had a few things to say about it. Mostly along the lines of...you're a bike company, STFU about politics, nobody cares what you think about social issues or wants to hear it. They banned me from their social media, which was fine. I sold their bike and replaced it with....wait for it.....a Specialized! which turned out to be twice as good as half the price.

That SURLY was the biggest POS I've ever owned, but they do sell other things that might suit my needs (tires, handlebars, etc.). Never again though, I'll never spend another single red cent with them.

With the whole "alt-cycling" thing turning into a bunch of non-conformists conforming to the non-conformist norm, with boutique brands, swept back bars, rigid forks, hand made this and that, my embracing of Specialized and other big brands is kind of middle finger to that whole scene. I'm so alternative, I ride big brand mass market bikes, bitches.


.

 

I was just listening to the Pinkbike podcast review/engineering interview of the new Trek Fuel EX...it struck me that part of my pointless beef with the big brands is that they seem to build bikes based on cold calculated consumer consensus - trying to nail the broadest market, gutless and amorphous in their own opinions and views - just making bike-business decisions. Now this does tend to land them with good bikes, consistently maybe even exactly what people want...BUT what I prefer, for reasons unknown to me, is a bike from a group of people who say "this is the bike WE want to ride, it didn't exist, so we built it. You don't have to like it, that's okay, we built it for US and those like us." There's just something exciting about that kind of passion, it might be polarizing, controversial, but it's also aspirational. Even though I'm in the business world myself, I just admire the almost anti-business ethos of saying F'it to the market, we're just gonna make cool shitt for us. I'd rather try a bike from a company that has their own opinions, even if I don't agree, just to try what they believe in, rather than a bike that was created via the median most popular polling to be the most acceptable to the widest audience, blah. Similar to politics I guess, I'd rather someone have his/her own views that I can agree with or not or partially, but not this "tell me what you want and that's who I'll pretend to be" so I can get your vote BS. That's my best crack at my illogical beef with certain brands.

 

Interesting take. This is why I like Pivot. They get endless sh!t for their use of Superboost and press fit BBs, but they don’t care. They made informed engineering decisions and don’t give a rat’s ass about the blowback.

 

Specialized. The origins of the company were even born of a ripoff, then all the predatory legal actions were unforgiveable. Its run by goons. Advertising is cringe. Don't find their bikes inspiring or interesting tho their parts catalog has some real value. I like their racers so that's a bit of a conflict sometimes.

I have a 30+ year issue with Hayes even though I want to like them, I'm continually disappointed.

 

I'll add about specialized that the way they're approaching their world cup gravity program is really cool. Feels like an F1 team with constant development, prototypes, taking risks technology wise to try to find an edge, etc. I love to see the downhill performance envelope pushed the way they're pushing it.

They probably couldn't do all that unless they were the big monolithic corporation they are, with a big monolithic corporation R&D program and budget behind them, so I guess I shouldn't hate big monolithic corporations? (and even in the grand scheme of things, it's a bike company and it's always going to have more soul than say Walmart or Sony).

 

I feel like you didnt use the word "monolithic" enough in your post.

 

 

Fox apparel , something about being a motocrosser and their gear got trendy by people who didn’t ride


still hesitant to buy, I know they make great stuff and support the MTb race community

 

Trek’s Armstrong Lemond things is bad, real bad. And Specialized team of lawyers too. But the R&D of those big brands can be nice and build durable products. But I do love our new DVO suspension stuff and the abilty to speak live with them on the phone is fantastic, same with Ari/Fezzari crew Cloward is a good dude and their texting system while not perfect is still pretty good.

 

Mavic. I used to be a dyed-in-the-French-wool Mavic fanboy. Then a freehub fell off when I removed a wheel from a bike to fix a flat. Spilled the freehub guts in the dirt. In theory, that could happen to any friction fit end cap thru axle style hub. But it hasn't. Only Mavic. Last Mavic product I have owned.