This has bothered me for some time, if you have read my about page you will find this is one of my biggest complaints.
A couple months ago I was in a bike shop in search of some metal pedals for my mountain bike. The plastic pedals that came with my bike had lasted through some great rides up until the point I wrecked. The wreck came as a result of my miss-judging how slick a side hill was while cruising downhill.
While inside the store I quickly browsed the bike selection. I found many bikes that would be well suited for some heavy riding, and I found their entry level bike, you know the one they use to discourage and upsell the potential buyers. This supposed entry level bike was way over priced and was significantly lower in component level to the next bikes up which where $600+.
An older couple came in and they started browsing the selection of bikes when a salesman walked up. He asks what they are looking to use the bike for? The lady replied that she wants to ride on the paved semi level parkway that the city has for a bit of exercise. So I immediately think about my GMC Walmart bike which doesn't have anywhere near as nice of components as their entry level bike does, and the countless miles that I have ridden with it.
The salesman quickly takes them to a bike that is equipped with hydraulic disk brakes, 100mm front suspension, rapid fire shifters, and tubeless tires! He then explains just how well this bike will work for them and how light weight it is, and how good the brakes will work.
I couldn't help to think about mountain bikes in the 90's with linear pull brakes raging downhill and working great for the aggressive riders. Then I can't help to think that this lady in her late 60's that probably weighed 120lbs sure wouldn't require those state of the art hydraulic brakes to stop her on that flat trail. And she sure wouldn't ever use the full 100mm of travel that front fork had unless she found herself flying down the side of hill and in that case she would have bigger things to worry about than the capacity of the front fork!
The couple quickly moved over to the cheap bike which at that point the salesman started telling them how that bike wouldn't hold up and it is designed for children, and that the manual disk brakes don't work as well. Sure the salesman wasn't lying, the hydraulic disk brakes are better at stopping, and those other options are nice to have in some cases, but this bike shop was trying to sell what I call higher end bikes to a casual rider. You can find some very capable bicycles at pretty reasonable prices that would give the couple above great performance and reliability.
Not all bike shops are equal. My wife likes to ride a bike a couple times a week, and we go around the local reservoir on a gravel road occasionally. Knowing that she wouldn't be thrashing around on a single track trail and hitting jumps, because that's not her style, she wanted a bike that did have front suspension to cushion the small rocks and dips in the road. We set out to buy a bike that met those requirements.
We found a bike shop that sold us a Raleigh Eva 2 which is overly suited for my wife's needs for $250. We even went to Walmart, but at the price of the Raleigh, even the closely priced mongoose was no match for the components of the Raleigh. We found a bike online for $200 that was equal in component level, but it came down to the most important tie breaker in my eyes. The Raleigh got her excited to ride a bike, and that combined with supporting local business was worth $50 more.
My wife and son riding
Now I'm sure there are many bike experts that would say the Raleigh Eva 2 wouldn't hold up to riding on pavement, but I will say it holds up just fine on a rough road, and I personally wouldn't have any problems taking it out on a single track trail.
