Youtube channel "Kev Central" toured that factory and made a video, and I have to say it's a really strange operation. It looked like there was about a hundred employees, and very little automation. One guy would pick up a bike frame, hand it to the next guy, who'd put it on a cart.... Then another guy would take the cart to the next location where a fourth guy would take it off and hang it for painting. Then a fifth guy moves it to the paint oven.... Etc, etc. Seems like any kind of modern factory would have at least some amount of automation. A really strange business. Trek was still building bikes in Wisconsin until 2010 or so; I wonder what their assembly line looked like?
Good YT video on trying to make something in the USA
- Thread starter AZjeff
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Good point. The problem with automation is each change, no matter how minor, is a different recipe and different programming. If the change is bigger than that - say any change in the frame at all, it means maybe different tooling.
Still, you would think they would use some sort of overhead conveyor to move them around or something? Maybe they will get there.
I'm probably exaggerating a little, without meaning to. It was awhile ago that I saw the video, and I didn't take any notes.
I don't think your wrong. I am sure there is a little automation, but in general I think its mostly done by hand. Automating a bicycle assembly would be easy - if every bike was virtually the same. Like Henry said, you can have any color you want so long as its black. Walking through walmart I don't think any are the same.
Its a very depressed part of the state, there likely happy to have the work.
AZjeff
$50 Site Donor 2023
Look at this timeline of Kent Bicycles. Kent bikes
Note that BCA stopped production after 2020. BCA was a brand from the early days of mountain bikes, Kent must have bought the name. They tried and couldn't produce bikes and be competitive. The Kev Central YT video was 6 years ago and he notes it's an assembly plant not a production plant where things are made.
When you're trying to supply a bicycle that retails for $100 you probably can't afford to spend millions to automate to eliminate labor costs. Wait, eliminate labor?
@SC Maintenance you say we just have to shift $1T back to the USA. Nothing to it, who goes first? Can't even imagine what that looks like. Companies can import the materials from China or where ever to keep costs down but there needs to be a facility to put things together and labor to do it.
Note that BCA stopped production after 2020. BCA was a brand from the early days of mountain bikes, Kent must have bought the name. They tried and couldn't produce bikes and be competitive. The Kev Central YT video was 6 years ago and he notes it's an assembly plant not a production plant where things are made.
When you're trying to supply a bicycle that retails for $100 you probably can't afford to spend millions to automate to eliminate labor costs. Wait, eliminate labor?
@SC Maintenance you say we just have to shift $1T back to the USA. Nothing to it, who goes first? Can't even imagine what that looks like. Companies can import the materials from China or where ever to keep costs down but there needs to be a facility to put things together and labor to do it.
edyvw
$50 site donor 2025
I mean, the idea that this consumer culture is going to just eliminate $1T in imports is just not grounded in reality.
What we should strive for is to export more. A good product is always competitive on the world market. Where are our strengths?
There are always good stories about small manufacturers that find a niche area and can produce their products locally, especially if that involves specific knowledge and expertise. For example, Icelantic is a company here in Colorado that makes skis: https://www.icelanticskis.com/pages/about-us
They are not as popular as go-to skis like Rossignol, Nordica, Elan, etc., primarily due to their price point, but one can see a lot of people using them on the slopes. They are also more expensive (not like Stockli, Swiss-made), but they have a very loyal and large customer base for such a small company.
Companies like this will always have their place and customer base. But it is hard to make that ski a go-to ski among people here, for example. People want to ski, and skiing is expensive for the whole family, unless parents spend time with kids, know the ins and outs of the workings of the mountain. People are so close to mountains, but they are priced out. So, they will resort to savings in any way to make it possible for their kids to do it. Icelantic does not have a huge production line to supply various rental vendors with cheap skis like Rossignol, Volkl etc. can do. And while a bunch of people would like to support them, very few will buy skis for their growing kids, as they will grow out of them after one season. They will just rent them, which is an affordable option. Of course, Volkl etc. are made in Vietnam, China etc. and they can provide skis that Christy Sports or EPIC Mountain can rent for like $120-200 a season (package with boots etc). Icelantic can't do that. Maybe, someday. But they won't be made in Golden, CO.
Doing business with China really should be a statement of ethics. Find out about it. What China does is really not that much different than a certain country in WWII........I mean organs from their own citizens who don't agree.
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Here is the Google image and address.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/P...try=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDYxMC4xIKXMDSoASAFQAw==
Origin has been a decent success for a couple guys that got together a small family business. Started as a BJJ gi & apparel company that expanded to boots & clothing. Not cheaper than the box store imports but competitive in the mid & upper tiers. I prefer my Japanese made gi but still own an origin as well as some jeans. Also prefer PNW boots but they’re more $$$ compared to origin & made to my feet. Shop the sales & they’re not much more than wranglers for jeans.
https://originusa.com/
I VERY SPECIFICALLY said in my post#21 that they use Chinese parts. Here is my post. I am not sure why your so bent on it enough to rip on Kent bicycles twice in this thread. Don't buy one if you don't like that they use Chinese parts. At least there trying something rather than rolling over.
The trade will balance - this I promise. In 5 years or 50 I do not know. We can plan for it and work on it, or we can wait for the dollar to devalue and then we just won't be able to afford imported goods. Or we will go into some sort of cold war or hot war and China or whomever just won't ship stuff - like they recently stopped shipping rare earths.
Things may not be this bad, when it is economically viable, made in USA will appear.
It's just since we don't have ww3 that leave most geo players but us in ruin, we should not expect one country to have absolute monopoly on every industry.
We can still make cheap stuff and turn a profit.
Cheap fan made in USA.
Some gardening goods in Home Depot are made in USA with reasonable price.
It's just since we don't have ww3 that leave most geo players but us in ruin, we should not expect one country to have absolute monopoly on every industry.
We can still make cheap stuff and turn a profit.
Cheap fan made in USA.
Some gardening goods in Home Depot are made in USA with reasonable price.
The pvc pipe I used for my lawn irrigation was made in the USA & purchased at Home Depot. No more expensive than the Thailand made pipe.
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How are you supposed to balance it if you're losing sales to other countries that no longer want to deal with you, like Canada?
Since you want to go there. Works both ways I guess?
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China definitely has terrible ethics but I'm struggling to deal with how many people here don't see the similarities between now and what led up to to the things that happened in WW2?
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I mean yes. That's how it happened. You are correct.
Edit: what I'm saying is, if you're trying to balance out trade, who will you make up for all the lost sales to countries that decided they don't want to deal with you anymore? And lost tourism etc, lost tax income.
If that is the case, should we buy more or less from them?
The problem with people in the West, that have never dealt with China, don't understand what Mercantilism is. They think China Functions with a win/win philosophy like we do - but they do not. Thats why we keep loosing.
I like watching his videos. His video comparing weedeater line, the clear carburetor, and baseball cannon are my favorites. I'll check this one out later this morning.
Ask yourself why there are so many hospitals near prison camps? Our press does not cover such things.
I am a simple guy, so I don't much worry about how we get there - I just know we must, and we will because you can't run a trade deficit forever without your currency decreasing in value, which will balance it the hard way. So of course a country that enjoys a perpetual $100B trade surplus isn't going to want things to change. I would not either if shoes were reversed.
So you can argue about how things get done as the wrong way to go about it - OK maybe. Doesn't change that it has to happen.
I will flip things around. If US cuts a deal with Saudi to buy their sour crude for those refineries not yet converted, and we stop requiring Visa's for European, and Japanese, and S. Korean - or even Chinese Tourists to make it easier for them to visit Disneyland, and we tell GM/Ford to build their trucks here, they have lots of capacity, as just a guy in the South should I care?
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