Yep, they won't let their products be exported across international boundaries also.

S Works Shoes - A$280 from Evans Cycles UK
In Australia, A$450

The reason for the price is because of the Aus dealers. The dealers are the one asking for price pertection . I could really care less. If I dont like something I dont buy it. How often do you go into a TREK store and find other lower priced brands or any at all.

Yeah my LBS has two locations. One carries Specialized and Pinarello......the other carries Trek and Felt.

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It's about power. Specialized has the power right now to do this sort of thing and they owe it to their shareholders.

But if you had a retailer with more power then Specialized than the retailer would dictate terms. Look at the golf industry. Giant retailers (Golf Town, etc.) now call the shots and brands must compete to be there. Category killers is the technical term. A killer in the sense that they eliminate all small independent competition. However I don't know if the bike business is big enough to support a category killer. Small independent shops may be a permanent fixture of the cycling industry and if so they will continue to be a the mercy of more powerful manufacturers and distributors. Although if you bought every bike shop in a major geographic area you would be on your way.

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I work for a Specialized dealer and as far as I know we haven't received any threats like that (although I have heard of it happening). The other brand we carry is Cannondale which is a combination that I've seen in a number of spots. While I personally prefer Cannondale, I don't have anything against Specialized. I really like their saddles and shoes and most people seem to agree. Whenever I've had to deal with Specialized, things just seem slower and more difficult to deal with than with Cannondale. Granted, that's the only company I have to compare it to. For reference, we do a bit more business with Cannondale. I think its like 850k versus 950k. It seems like that's enough to satisfy Specialized. The shop I work for has considered bringing in Giant if we had a bigger space. I think that would be mistake. In my mind Giant and Specialized are too similar. It would be interesting to see if Specialized would say something in that case

This post explains exactly what happened in a shop I go to. Two years ago when Cannondale was bought out by Doral the shop suddenly dropped Cannondale and Trek and went all Specialized in a week. The weird thing about it was the owner was a huge cannondale fan. At the time I thought it was a Cannondale issue but it could have been the specialized rep comming on strong.

My LBS deals: Trek, Cannondale, Cervelo and Specialized. I'm still trying to figure out how they keep up with certain minimums, plus stocking all the Bontrager and Specialized gear their contracts require. They're pretty much the only decent bike store in town, so that might have something to do with it.
I've had positive experiences with all my Specialized products.

@tonytourist

Trek, Bontrager, Cannondale, Cervelo and Specialized all in one store?! Such madness!
Where is the black magic you speak of ?!?

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Exp001

A high end shop I used to work at dealt with the same thing a while back when Spec was pushing HARD for dealers to carry certain bikes and products. The shop luckily had enough brands and balls to say FU and drop Spec completely.

Except the weird part was they didn't: somehow they manage to still purchase saddles and shoes from Spec and that is all... It's a great setup but very different from anything I have seen.

They were carrying Cervelo, De Rosa, felt, cannondale, time and a couple other small brands at the time.
I think the only brands they have picked up since the Spec fiasco is BMC and Scott

@prendrefeu

I agree, it gets pretty crazy in there
http://www.teamactionsports.com/bike.php
Beware of the black magic

This is not exclusive to Specialized, many companies in many fields do not allow cross border sales...

Fox Shox does it, Santa Cruz does it, etc, etc.




Really this is an issue with your lbs or that sales person being bad at his job.

I know this thread is about hating Specialized and all but they aren't really doing things that others In the cycling industry or other industries haven't done or are doing...

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Even though you may have had a bad LBS, you brought up an experience I had a few months ago I didn't think much of at the time.

I asked specifically about buying a CAAD10 frameset, and not only did the salesperson seem disinterested, saying "that's not what you want" (without me saying anything about my needs) but almost immediately tried to push me to a Specialized complete bike even though I expressed zero interest in buying a complete CAAD10, let alone another bike.

Said dealer sells Cannondale, Specialized, Giant, Felt, Pinarello and Storck.

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Almost all my cycling purchases are over the Internet.
I like some of their products (e.g. shoes, gloves, saddles) but as it is almost impossible to purchase Specialized over the Internet (internationally) I expect they will continue to loose my sales.
... Their loss, someone elses gain.

Given the present economic climate, to have the ability to do that and still be turning a profit is impressive.

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Question.

Why is it Specialized gets all the bad press? Trek and Cannodale do the same thing as well Giant. Is Specialized is the only company that make this info public? Having worked with Cannodale and Giant they were both great. Never worked with Trek but have had many a friend/customer tell me about the poor service they have recieved when there was a warr issue.