I am an east coast
American with plans to attend a wedding in Germany (Summer 2015). I am here to tell you that there is absolutely no way that I would visit
Europe without bringing my wheels.
Sure I could rent
a bike like I did when I visited Boca Raton, but there's nothing like riding
your own bike. The Boca rental was a
nice, carbon, Italian job, but it wasn’t my ride. I rode it for a day then we parted ways. I decided then that I would always take my
personal bike with me when I plan to ride.
Now if I’m going
to take my bike with me then I’m going to need a case. My natural instinct was to visit the local
bike store, but the hard cases that are sold at the local chains have low
prices and poor reviews. There are some reasonably
priced soft cases out there, but there is no way in hell that I’m going ship my
bike in a soft case. I don’t care what
anyone says, there is no way that a soft case can protect as well as a hard
case. That’s just common sense to me.
Sure you may save
a few bucks if the airlines decide to charge your soft case as an additional piece of luggage but you still have to worry about a possible broken frame when
you arrive at your destination. I don’t
travel that much so I can deal with the occasional baggage fee. FYI I just want to let everyone know that
British Airways does not charge an extra fee for bike cases (2015). Your bike will be treated as one piece of
luggage. One of the other international airlines
will charge you $300 each way. Needless
to say, I flew British Airways when I went to Germany.
Which hard bike
case do I choose?
Back story time:
When I wanted a
new bike I didn’t just go to the bike store, slap down a credit card and walk
out with a pretty bike. I wanted to
build my new bike, starting with a nice frame.
I researched frames for weeks until I stumbled upon a Look 695 frame
which was posted online in France. I
bought the frame and personally bought each and every component for the bike
and then I went to the local bike store.
I went to the store with the frame, wheels and many boxes of parts and
told them to get busy. They called me to
pick up when my masterpiece was complete.
Back to the
present:
Now that I have
the bike of my dreams, I need to protect it as well as possible when I
fly. My choices were narrow because I
had already decided that I was going to use a hard case. My choices came down to two similar cases. The
choices were an "expensive case" or a case that’s twice as expensive as the "expensive
case". Naturally I chose the lower
priced BikeBoxAlan (BBA).
It’s a cool
looking case that I saw being used by Chris Froome. If it’s good enough for Froomey, then it’s
good enough for me. I have searched and
I can’t find any negative posts about the case.
The next section
is a timeline of my process of buying the case and actual use.
Feel free to
contact me if you have any questions.
Initially I asked
BBA if their boxes were sold in the US.
They responded in two days and said that the box can only be ordered
direct, online or by phone. They also
said that it could be delivered to me in the U.S. in as little as 7 days.
That sounded great
but their website’s homepage says that the case costs $741 shipped to the US
but the when ordering the price in the cart was $356.67 British + $80 shipping which
is $659.26 U.S. total.
I was a little
confused about the price so I emailed them again. This time it took 5 days to get an email
response. Instead of giving me an exact price, I was instructed to visit the
website for prices.
After that poor customer
service I still placed an order for $659.26 on 1/31/2015. I only ordered from them because my choices
were BBA, a box that costs twice as much, or no box.
After placing the
order I received an email confirmation with an attached invoice. Neither the invoice nor the email body
mentioned a delivery estimate. After
four days with no information I was forced to email them again for a delivery
estimate.
I received an
immediate response stating that my box would be shipped on 2/26/2015. Initially I was told that it would take 7
days. Now after the order is placed I am
told that I won’t ship for another 28 days.
I didn’t appreciate having my money floated for a month but again you
know my choices. Besides I’m not
planning to fly any time soon so I’ll wait.
3/4/2015
The box finally
arrived and I picked it up at FedEx.
3/19/2015
To my surprise I
received a bill from FedEx $19.30. I
thought that I had already paid all shipping related fees. I contacted BBA and they said that it was for
import duties and taxes. A heads up
would have been nice.
8/27/2015
Germany
I arrived in
Frankfurt after a stop in London. My case
and bike arrived safely. The U.S. TSA
took a peek inside and left a note stating that they did. The note wasn’t needed because the scratches
on my black spokes told the story of their struggle with the BBA center pole.
The baggage
handlers at the Frankfurt airport had my case waiting on the belt when I arrived at baggage claims. All eyes in the
airport were on the guy with the big red case.
It was cool and embarrassing at the same time.
Even though my
cousin underestimated the size of my bike box; he managed to masterfully wiggle
it into his Volkswagen station wagon.
I had an awesome
ride during my stay in Schnelldorf. After
a short stay I disassembled and packed up my bike. The case arrived home safely. The baggage handlers at BWI aren’t as fast as
the Frankfurt guys. I had to wait more than 30 minutes for my case and luggage.
