Bike Builds: Why the Cheapest Bikes Come with Front Derailleurs and the #1 Upgrade to Make

Singletracks Mountain Bike Podcast

Singletracks.com

Wilderness, Sports

4.7 • 574 Ratings

🗓️ 30 May 2022

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Aaron Abrams is Director of Product for Marin Bicycles and is currently based in Taiwan. The Marin bike brand has been around since 1986 and the company’s slogan says their bikes are “Made For Fun.”

In this episode we talk about how mountain bikes are specced, and how product managers make decisions about which parts to include.

When planning out the builds for a bike like the Marin Rift Zone 29 (three options, priced between $2,000 and $3,000), do you start with a set of say 3 price targets and choose the best parts that make those prices work?
How important is overall bike weight when it comes to build specs?
What is the purpose of speccing house-brand components like bars, saddles, and stems on bike builds? Is there a lot of cost savings by going this route?
Why did Marin recently start selling branded aftermarket grips, bars, and stems?
We rarely see full suspension builds that mix and match forks and shocks from different brands. Why is that?
How do you know if consumers are going to like a part, say a particular tire model, or if it’s going to perform as well as another competing part choice?
Why do so many entry-level, budget bikes include front derailleurs? Is it because no one is making a cheap 1-by drivetrain, or because buyers at this price point think they want a lot of gears?
What is the first component you would personally upgrade when buying an entry-level mountain bike?
Why can't customers choose from a menu of parts when ordering a mountain bike? Why are we still, for the most part, limited to just a few set choices when it comes to builds?
Have pandemic-related supply chain issues altered the way brands are thinking about bike builds going forward?
Do the athletes you work with weigh in on component choices and build specs for the models they ride? Do outside sponsorships make this tricky?
Where do customers tend to get the best value when it comes to buying a complete bike: at the low end, or the high end?

To get a better sense of some of the parts and builds discussed check out marinbikes.com.

✏️ A written transcript of this conversation is available to Singletracks Pro supporters: singletracks.com/support

--Keep up with the latest in mountain biking at Singletracks.com and on Instagram @singletracks

Transcript

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0:00.0	hear that it's your big macdonald's hunger calling because the big arch is back and this time
0:05.3	is here to stay with juicy beef cheddar cheese and that big arch sauce hungry you are now order delivery
0:12.2	on the macdonald's app serve from 11 am upcharges and fees apply to delivery orders subjects
0:18.1	availability price and participation may vary hey everybody welcome, welcome to the Single Tracks podcast.
0:23.1	My name is Jeff, and today my guest is Aaron Abrams.
0:27.5	Aaron is director of product for Marin Bicycles, and he's currently based in Taiwan.
0:33.4	The Marin Bike brand has been around since 1986, and the company's slogan says their bikes are, quote, made for fun.
0:41.2	We're going to have some fun today, aren't we, Aaron? Thanks for joining us.
0:45.0	Yeah, good times. Thanks, Jeff. Thanks for having me here.
0:48.0	Well, so tell us a bit about your background. How did you get involved in the bike industry?
0:52.9	Yeah, so, as you said, right now, I'm the director of product for Marin Bikes.
0:57.5	I've been in this role for probably five, four or five years at this point, and been with
1:03.9	Marin Bikes for almost nine years, going on nine years this summer.
1:08.1	My initial start in Bikes was basically as a child. So my father started
1:15.3	a bike shop in southern Arizona in 1976. And then I was born about six years later and grew up in
1:22.9	that bike shop. So independent bicycle retailer and, you know, kind of in the boom of mountain bikes,
1:30.9	really. So, you know, I was basically born at the time that mountain bikes started. And by the time
1:37.6	I was in the shop, you know, eating ball bearings and chewing on inner tubes, it was like the heyday, you know, going into the early 90s and then
1:46.3	into the 90s and the 2000s with all the crazy suspension types, all that stuff. So I was a pretty
1:54.2	voracious student of bikes and, you know, like I said, at that time, mountain bikes. And we were
1:59.9	riding a lot of bikes at that time in the mountains too.
2:02.6	So fast forward a little bit. I went off to university and figured I would be a lawyer or something and that bikes were behind me.
	...

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