Ebay bikes

J. Saulinskas said:

On Ebay their seems to be numerous Motobecane and Mercier brand bikes for sale. Are these any
good? Why so many?

Both brands used to be well respected French bike makers. Motobecane (and possibly Mercia also) sold
the rights to their name. The current bikes have nothing to do with the original company and are
made in China.

IMHO, just having popular Shimano components does not make a good bike. I would also be very wary of
buying a new bike on eBay unless I knew exactly what I wanted and what I was getting. If you have
fit or warranty problems, who do you call?

Art Harris

Quoted message said:

If you have fit or warranty problems, who do you call?

Ghostbusters!

Cheers, helen s 🙂

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Quoted message said:

On Ebay their seems to be numerous Motobecane and Mercier brand bikes for

sale.

Quoted message said:

Are these any good? Why so many?

Most manufacturers don't distribute to dealers who sell by mail order. Usually the warranties are
void unless a bike is sold by a dealer. There are a few brands that do seem to allow their dealers
to sell by mail order, and these tend to be the ones you see on eBay. Which is not to say that
any/many of the "new" bikes you see on eBay are covered by a warranty, although some of the sellers
do claim to be dealers who back their products.

As someone mentioned. these Motobecane and Mercier bikes seem to be imported by a company that's
having the frames OEMed in Asia somewhere, and then bolting stock parts of good quality to them. Not
that this isn't a fairly standard way of creating bikes, or that a decent bike can't result from it.
I've seen some fairly favorable reviews of some of these new Motobecane models (and some
not-so-favorable ones as well).

As always, the acid test of road bike buying is fit and comfort, and that's tough to assess via mail
order, and tougher to correct in a transaction with an unknown seller. Buyer beware.

RichC