Look for Viathon bikes online at ViathonBicycles.com in mid-May, and soon after at Walmart.com. For anyone familiar with the beer industry, this is like Anheuser-Busch creating Shocktop, not Anheuser-Busch buying Goose Island or Elysian. But Im a little mystified that the mountain bike is a cross-country hardtail 29er, a style of bike thats pretty out of fashion at the moment. It doesnt have to adapt to the future, it is the future. According to Spinhirne-Martin, Walmart is not currently planning store-based service departments. See how long we last Shimano Consolidates Entry- to Mid-Level Groupsets With New CUES Drivetrains, Opinion: Five Things The Bike Industry Could Do Better, Throwback Thursday: A Brief History of Direct Mount Derailleurs, Buying a Bike From a Shop Versus Buying Online, DH Bike Review: Canfield's Jedi Masters Rough Terrain, Review: Mythos 3D-Printed Titanium Stem is My Kind of Excess, DH Bike Review: Orange 279 - A Staple of British Downhill Racing, www.singletracks.com/blog/mtb-gear/first-ride-review-deciphering-the-viathon-m1-hardtail-mtb, www.outsideonline.com/2295486/single-track-minds, www.diycarbonbikes.com/collections/hardtailframes. All this went down in April and May of this year. The frames are engineered and designed in partnership with Kevin Quan, a longtime designer whos responsible for well-known bikes from well-known brands like Cervelo, Parlee, and Pivot. Join Outside+ to get Outside magazine, access to exclusive content, 1,000s of training plans, and more. jim preston mchenry, il obituary. The parts kits feature quality components from premium suppliers. Well, so much for that. Viathon's goals seem to be crystal clear with the R.1: Build a race-ready road bike for a high-end audience without the high-end price tag. The impetus for the brand was therefore personal, not corporate. Pretty sad that a brand new YZ250 cost thousands less than some of the bikes I come across in the wild. For those people, being able to buy a high-quality bike online means they dont have to go into a potentially scary, elitist, unwelcoming bike shop where theyll be uncomfortable and possibly judged.. unless you can pay for it with your grocery bonuses / tickets that accumulated over a year after you forgot the card on your neighbors house after playing some domino. The multi-tier distribution model of sporting goods companies doesn't help either but it's a reality that's likely not going to change. Not a fan of Walmart. A long wheelbase and dropped chainstay design supports wide rubber and rough riding conditions. Press J to jump to the feed. Will hopefully bring the prices down across the board. The website has no we-can-offer-keenest-prices-because-were-Walmart spiel. The brand is starting with three models: the R1 road bike, the G1 gravel bike, and the M1 29er MTB. Viathon made a big splash when it announced its presence to the bicycle world back in April, leveraging the cost-efficiency muscle of its parent company, Walmart, into a line of carbon bikes that . Again- something we cannot make a call on. Unless they are basically making no money on the bikes, I find it hard to see how they could undercut their competition, especially considering the frames themselves don't really often anything out of the ordinary. The Viathon M.1 is available in three complete build kit options, starting at $2,400 USD. Read more. Dave Rome Apr 2020. Another new direct-to-consumer brand, Remot, alsolaunched this week with far less buzz, despite being owned by American Bicycle Group, the holding company for established high-end brands Litespeed and Quintana Roo. Maybe you don't, but I do. @Greg B We did not experience that issue, but as you say, the clearances are minimal, and that is not an uncommon issue with many combinations of calipers/wheels. A 69.5-degree head angle and 73.6-degree seat tube angle are what many brands had a few years ago. Viathon calls the full carbon frame optimized for light weight & efficient pedaling, claiming a frame weight of 870g a size 54 with all hardware. Andy T fitted the ShockStop stem and immediately felt the benefits. I like his channel and all but want to see people ride bikes like I would or better. Its not the frames: they arent open-mould no-names, all three shapes were CAD designed by the legendary Kevin Quan Studios of Toronto, Canada. But once you lend them a bike and let them tear it up, they are all-in, 99% of the time pending an injury. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. Schedule a one-on-one call today! bikes Brilliant, someone commenting who clearly has no idea how much it costs to actually make a bike. Viathon G1 Bike: At The Finish by Guitar Ted with Andy T. The Viathon G1 has been ridden a couple of months now by Andy T, and so we are ready to give the final verdict on this Walmart distributed bike. I won't shop with them. Although from a bike industry perspective, the geometry is a few years outdated even for a hardtail. In an interview last week at Sea Otter, a bicycling industry gathering in Monterey, Calif. I came to Walmart to grow the bike industry. Spinhirne-Martin doesnt need to fret about shipping: he outsources that to industry veteran Richard Wittenberg of Lucidity-Podium Marketing, who has been involved with in-house logistics for brands such as Ridley, Cannondale and Factor. I spoke with him at the recent Outerbike expo in Idaho, the second public outing for the brand. It turns out that Walmart bike buyers, as much as theyre dismissed or even ridiculed, include some passionate fans. All the frames are carbon fiber, and the gravel and road models fit solidly within current design trends that prize features like disc brakes and clearance for wider tires. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts, http://www.walmart.com/cp/viathon-bikes/8471299, https://www.viathonbicycles.com/products/road-bike-r1-105. Does it seem like a no-brainer to spring for Viathon for people interested in that? We highly recommend retaining the original shipping box & protective packaging for future use. 2G for 105, 1.5G for a frame. Viathons carbon bikes retail online for between $2,300 and $6,000. Now on to the final word on this carbon fiber crushed rock roller. But to drive the demand, there needs to be a product in place to capture attention. 'Box-store bike' takes on a whole new meaning as Walmart launches Viathonn, a private high-end cycling brand. RZC Investments, founded by Tom and Steuart Walton, grandsons of Walmart founder Sam Walton, owns Rapha and part-owns Allied Cycle Works, a high-end bike manufacturer based in Little Rock, Arkansas. I have noted that we are not the only ones saying this, for what it is worth. $$$ Outdoor & Sporting Goods Company Privacy Policy Photos See all Videos See all 0:11 They are currently in a process of rebranding it because they realized it's forever associated in people's minds with entry level or even below entry-level (BSO) bikes. As we continue to build out the platform, we welcome other brands, said Spinhirne-Martin. ummm.I regularly pass the bikes in walmart on my way to the sporting goods section to buy fishing/hunting stuff and I don't know of these $500 walmart bikes you speak of$250 is about the top price going unless yall have some gucci walmarts wherever this story was based? Or on the other hand, that lower price may be just the ticket to smooth out the ride. Walmart is the largest retailer for bikes in America by a good margin. Except none of that happened. It's very hard to make it and also find decent paying work. bicycles what happened to viathon bikes Byjunho 3, 2022 At Viathon, we believe that great bikes make riding more fun. It is aimed squarely at millennials and digital natives. what happened to viathon bikes Right? So far, Viathon isnt saying much about what makes its bikes different, nor is it telling much of a brand story. A few things are apparent with Viathon. 5G for Dura. Good question, Dan, and one we'll come back to in just a minute. Unlike, say, the car industry, its relatively cheap to launch into the world of making bicycles, even bespoke framed ones. Viathon is hitting the market with three model families. what happened to viathon bikeshtml5 interactive animation. It appears the newswas first mentioned in a Pinkbike story. viAtHOntM is a systemic product. The company's launch includes three bikes: the G1, R1 and M1 for, aptly, gravel, road and mountain biking, respectively. A fine example might be the PRO Discover Carbon Seat Post which we reviewed, but there are others that would do the job well also. The Viathon Lineup. bike brands don't make as much as you think per unit. We tested the brand's top-end M.1 Mountain Bike for 6 weeks to gain an. Kev has 43,000 subscribers. There's this scales of economy thing you should look into: Compare top end to top end, yeah you can get a budget moto for less than an s works, but that is simply because motos prices increase at a much more exponential rate. So this is competing against the Ibis DV9? All rights reserved, an opinion column about Viathon's unique formation, Workers at REI Cleveland store vote to join union, Hi-Torque closes Road Bike Action and Electric Bike Action magazines, Top Executives Tackling Biggest Bike Industry Challenges at the 2023 Bicycle Leadership Conference, Suplest shoes now available in North America through Blacksmith Cycle, NY City Council passes lithium-ion battery safety package. Second, the designers chose to mount a dropper seatpost as standard equipment on the M.1. That's a hell of alot of awesome MTB trails read about it here Do Steu and T-Dubs ride Viathons? Its almost impossible for Walmart to develop premium offerings with the Walmart name, which is synonymous with keen pricing and out-of-favour out-of-town malls. But Quan is the only person mentioned in a team of top bicycle industry veterans with decades of collective experience. The only other real face behind Viathon is brand manager Zach Spinhirne-Martin, who spent nine years with the online retailer Competitive Cyclist before joining Walmart as its bike category manager. A slacker/longer hardtail in the Chameleon/Honzo mold, with carbon frame for $2k might get people looking. https://bikepacking.com/routes/arkansas-high-country-route-northwest-loop/. Were partnering with the bike industry to deliver so we dont mess it up, said Spinhirne-Martin. (if they care about value, they'll go YT or Canyon, etc.). In effect, the brand is a sortie into a high-end scene, allowing Walmart to test the waters of a rarefied market. Even more interesting was Jordan's underlying premise that at least some of those hundreds of millions of Walmart customers would for reasons unknown and perhaps unknowable leap at the opportunity to purchase a full-dress carbon bike with a price tag northward of $3,000 precisely because they didn't have to go into a brick-and-mortar bike shop to purchase it. Hes also the founder and part owner of Knight Composites. Makes me think of the Walmart gaming pcs released a while back, which were so bad reviewers raised concerns about their safety, despite the presence name brand components. Walmart (and the greater MTB community, tbh) would be better served by selling an aluminum hardtail trail bike w/ decent components, a dropper, and moderate/slack geometry that is trail ready out the door for $800-$1200 (a pricepoint unobtainable currently in the new bike market) so that new riders AND riders who are cash strapped have somewhere to get started that isn't going to fall apart on them after a few rides. And the mountain-biking-mad Waltons have also upgraded the MTB trails close to Walmarts corporate HQ in Bentonville, Arkansas. Viathon has chosen a RockShox SID RLC with 120mm of travel. So we have the greatest potential to reach a larger subset of the American population than any bike shop, or any other brand, he claims. I built the brand without them knowing about it at all, reveals Spinhirne-Martin. Will people buy them? For now, no. Viathon equips the M.1 with two clever features that challenge the common definition of an elite cross-country bike. Viathon is backed by the big box retailer but has teamed up with industry veterans that'd designed frames for brands like Cervelo and Pivot. And does it matter, because the nut is now unusable? Time for competition to drive down the absurd prices on bikes. We could ship anywhere but Im concerned about customer service, because I dont have distributor partners globally. Like Remot, Viathon debuts with three offerings: one frame each in road, gravel, and mountain, with three levels of build kit. If we stopped inventing new shit the whole circus might just collapse in on itself overnight. Not that Viathon is going mass-market anytime soon. By signing up for email newsletters, you agree to GearJunkie's, Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window). Huh, no one wanted to buy a $6k hardtail that has no track record? But if Viathon is going to have any real impact, its the next set of new bikes that will matter most. ruston city court hours; conventional tillage advantages and disadvantages; texas express lane payment; i can t pass the praxis core writing I will also say again that for the extra money, a RedShift ShockStop stem cures that front end issue. I think it's time for a Field Test review on this bike to dispel or confirm all the controversy. As technical editor Dan Cavallari pointed out in our sister publication VeloNews, "Viathon ticks almost all the high-end boxes for a bike with a lower pricepoint. I'm seeing an unbranded power meter, but no mention of it. No mention of gearing.