Comments on: Roundup: Reviews of various family transport bikes

By: henry

henry — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:59:06 +0000

Hi Sylvain,
Happy to have saved you some trouble and money.

Here’s the scoop on the Babboe Big: The design is certainly better than the horrible cheapo bikes and the quality is somewhat better too. But the Babboe not nearly of the same quality as any of the €1000 plus bikes such as from Bakfiets.nl, Gazelle, Fietsfabriek, Winther, Nihola, ‘t Mannetje, WorkCycles etc. Fact is that, even for larger firms such as Gazelle, these bikes are expensive to make and sell. Nobody can alter the laws of economics.

The basic problem with the Babboe is that their story is dishonest. Neither Rabobank nor any other firm is “subsidizing” the sales of Babboe as implied on the Babboe website. Why would they do that? Babboe has NEVER sold a bike for the supposed €1200 retail price nor is it worth anything close to that much. From their introduction the Babboe has always been available with some “special deal” or another for €600-700… plus assembly costs. This is actually probably a little on the high side given the bottom of the line parts the Babboe is made with.

In short there’s no such thing as a “free lunch”. I suppose some people are happy with their Babboes though when customers bring them into WorkCycles for repairs they’re generally not so enthusiastic. Apparently they’ve very slow and hard to pedal, and the inexpensive wheels and hub gears seem to have short lifespans.

Personally I’d much rather ride an ugly, second hand Christiania, Bakfiets.nl etc than a brand new Babboe.

By: vinslay

vinslay — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:27:49 +0000

Hi Henry,
I am in a similar position to one earlier blogger in that I need a good bakfiet (preferably two wheeler) and was nearly suckered into buying a real “bargain”…
Well it seemed odd that when all other bikes are around 1500 these ones were so cheap, so thanks to you and others for the posts.
I realise that you work for workcycles, one of those bikes would definitely be my top choice if it were not for my tight budget…but then again good quality shouldn’t be cheap. Anyway I was wondering, since you seem to have fixed many bikes and brands, what you think of the babboe big ( http://www.babboe.nl/bestellen/acties/rabo-actie-babboe.html ). It seems that Rabobank is subsidising a large portion of the price for what seems to be a well made three wheeler…
Sorry for this long rant but I would really appreciate your expert opinion.
Many thanks,
Sylvain.

By: henry

henry — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 21:59:14 +0000

Hi Måns,
I haven’t yet seen the Christiania two-wheeler so I can’t offer any meaningful feedback there. I’ll just note that the Cargobike and it’s accessories have been highly developed over the last ten or so years and has made thousands of our customers very happy. WorkCycles doesn’t produce the Cargobike but we do sell it in our two shops and handle the distribution in some other countries. So yes, I’m biased but I still love this bike and even my wife rides one with our son.

There is supposed to be a Danish distributor for Bakfiets.nl (check on their site) so it would certainly be worth your while to compare it to the new Christiania. Of course WorkCycles can send a Cargobike to Sweden but it’s really very expensive to send a single bike.

Good luck!

By: Måns

Måns — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 21:47:19 +0000

Hi Henry,
I would love to have a Cargobike long. However, I can not find any retailer for this bike in Sweden or Denmark. I will go to Copenhagen in a week or two to try the new two-wheeler model of Christianiabike.
http://www.velorution.biz/?p=2306
Hopefully it will be an acceptable substitute for the Cargobike.
/Måns
Lund, Sweden (close to Denmark)

By: henry

henry — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 20:52:37 +0000

Thanks Måns. The Kangaroo is a nice bike. It’s high price and unsuitability for the abusive life of a Dutch bike have limited it’s popularity here but it rides very nicely and the child seating area is safe and adaptable. It should be a serious consideration for areas where theft and vandalism are not such big problems.

By: Måns Holgersson

Måns Holgersson — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 20:47:38 +0000

Hi,
Here is a test published in a danish magazine 2007:
http://www.kangaroobike.com/media/kangaroo_testvinder.pdf
Regards,
Måns

By: Aaron

Aaron — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 08:56:52 +0000

Hi. I live in Australia and have had a Christiania for a while now. I recently started blogging about why we got it and what I have done to it along the way – lifewithatrike.blogspot.com

We have found it pretty good – especially after adjusting the gears to cope with our local hills, the steepness of which is not seen in Denmark or Holland!

Very informative site by the way. Loved the link to the review where the lady tipped a Christiania (I have not done that as yet!)

Cheers

Aaron…

By: Patrick

Patrick — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 20:37:30 +0000

Hi Henry,

My wife and I are happy Christiania trike owners/users. But now would be a bad time to try and provide a solid review, as
– we’ve childlessly used the trike for cargo for four years
– we only just became parents (it took longer than we thought it would…)
– we’ve just had the trike upgraded with 8spd hub and drumbrake

so, i’ll submit a thorough review after some more time with child cargo.

cheers and thanks for the informative site

patrick

By: henry

henry — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 18:12:04 +0000

Heleen,
Thanks for the tip about the Kassa bakfiets test. I watched it and was very happy that our bike was the top choice. I translated their Dutch language report and wrote a post about it as well. Links to both have been added to the post above.

By: HeleenH

HeleenH — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 17:07:34 +0000

Hi Henry,

Vara’s Kassa zendt zo een test uit van bakfietsen (NL1), zie http://kassa.vara.nl/portal?_scr=kassa_artikel&number=4271668
waar je waarschijnlijk vanaf morgen de uitzending kunt terugzien.