Finding Your Bicycle - Thoughts on Price/Cost

There are many things to consider when purchasing a bicycle but before we talk about any other details I would like to get the topic of price/cost out of the way.  This is one of the topics that comes up with people I know quite a bit.  If you've recently visited your local bike shop and taken a look at their inventory, you may have experienced a little bit of sticker shock.  The price of bicycles runs anywhere from a few hundred dollars all the way up to several thousand dollars.  Bikes are not cheap, especially good bikes.

There are many variables that go into the price of a bicycle, just like any consumer product.  I can't cover all of those variables but I will illustrate how I think of the cost of a bicycle.

When I was a kid in elementary school in the late 1970s I dreamed of a Schwinn Scrambler.  The Scrambler was a basic single-speed BMX bike that was appropriate for kids.  This bike was available at the local Schwinn retailer for $200.  I'll never forget that.  At the time $200 was a sum of money that was out of reach for my family.  It was never going to happen.

So just for fun, let's translate 1978 dollars into 2021 dollars.  To do this we can use the online resource Inflation Tool**.  This tool will apply previously calculated and researched inflation rates so that a comparison between 2 different points in time can be made.  In this case, $200 in 1978 translates into about $840.  WOW!!!

I realize that this is not a perfect apples-to-apples comparison because there are other variables in play that make the cost of a kid's bike significantly less than $840 such as offshore manufacturing, cost of materials, etc.  However, I think that this does illustrate the point that if anything, the real cost of some bicycles has actually gone down.

Let's consider the cost of an adult bicycle from the same era.  I own a 1977/78 Raleigh Competition GS.  This would have been considered a good quality bicycle for recreational purposes.  Not a fancy racing bike like a competitive cyclist would have used but definitely a reasonably nice bicycle.  I believe that the original price of this bicycle was about $350.  This translates into $1,470 in 2021 dollars.

So when you visit your local bike shop and see the that the prices start at about $500, just realize that these prices might not be as inflated as they seem.

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**NOTE:  I don't know how inflation rates are calculated and I'm trusting that this website has done enough research so that their estimates are reasonable.