New Web Site

[Hard Fit]

What do you guys think of the new Serotta website?

I assume it is still a work in progress. I would like to see more color on the home page. The ability to see what the bike looks like with different colors is great! I wish I could rotate the picture to see the head tube decal better. I wasn't able to get as big a picture as I wanted when seeing the finish options. At some point I kept getting a split screen with the wrong style bike showing. I felt that the picture for the Meivici AE could be improved. I was thrown off by the Ford decal. I think maybe a picture of the signature look would be better.

I use firefox on a mac osx. Some javascript might have been turned off so that the site did not work as it should.

[false_Aest]

Am I the only one that thinks that a website shouldn't go public until its completed?

What's worse: Seeing 2009 for a week or two longer (remember its April 2010) or seeing 2010 with links that don't go anywhere?

[jpw]

Continue to fabricate great bicycle frames, but overhaul the communication, marketing, and admin side of the business. The 2010 website says a lot about what's right and what's not right. This is constructive crit.

[Gothard]

Pet peeve of mine: spelling.
I hope they don't write it the same on the frame: Couer d'Acier SE

[jpw]

I wonder if the site is being put together from within the company, or by an agency?

[Climb01742]

can someone help me understand what the new site does that the old one didn't? it's not that there's anything wrong with it, but it feels like a site that could have been designed 5 years ago. i may have missed it somewhere, but as far as i can tell, there isn't even any use of video.

[BCS]

Hate to be the one that says the emperor has no clothes but I am disappointed. For a website that was long overdue, it shows somewhat of a lack of attention to detail:
the spelling
custom ottrott listed under ready custom
photo of Legend GS in the SE gallery
lack of geometry info
the gallery is only marginally better than 2009
etc.

Truth be told, you don't buy wine based on the label and the same holds true for bicycles. However, compared to the websites of similar builders (IF, Moots) and some of the single-man shops (Kirk, Strong), the website (still) lags far behind.

Still love the forum and riding my 2 Serottas

[SEABREEZE]

Perhaps they could of presented a Beta version, to us forumimites.

So they could get feed back, to present a stellar site...

[jpw]

Perhaps they could of presented a Beta version, to us forumimites.

So they could get feed back, to present a stellar site...


Oh come on, that would be far too sensible. :beer:

[pdmtong]

IMHO the new site does not improve upon the previous.

The errors and broken links are amateur given the accessiblility of web tools today and state of web design

IF has 12 people and their site is spirited and innovative. Even Parlee overhauled their site recently. Both shops much smaller than Serotta

C'mon...this is the non-dealer face of the company. Peple want to know why they should pay $$$ more for a legend than brand X.

I'm not a hater. I love my ottrott.

[tim11]

and I can buy a solid gold headbadge key ring at the IF site for $2,000. Sweet!

[92degrees]

and I can buy a solid gold headbadge key ring at the IF site for $2,000. Sweet!


It would be $4K from Serotta. What's your point?

[pdmtong]

and I can buy a solid gold headbadge key ring at the IF site for $2,000. Sweet!

all it takes is one sale..... :)

[sg8357]

It would be $4K from Serotta. What's your point?

That is sooo mean. :)

I was looking for the typical Serotta owner photo.

The doctor holding his Serotta with the Beech Bonanza V tail* and Porsche 911
in the background.


*nickname "fork tailed doctor killer"

[jpw]

On reflection, why would one expect a builder of wonderful bicycle frames to necessarily be good at building wonderful (or even just adequate) websites. If it's one or the other I'd rather ride a wonderful bike than surf a wonderful website.

The website reminds me of my school reports - "could do better". :beer:

[KeithNYC]

Every now and then I hear on this forum of a seemingly mythical "standard" Serotta geometry. I'd really love to see a chart of this on the website (as that's the only way I'd want mine- designed by Ben)

Not a hater- I'd really love a CdA

[false_Aest]

Dear Serotta,

Your website is like Christian Rock (so close to being good but so far). Please re-consider your choices and aim toward Mozart's Requiem Mass.

Stryper (http://s0.ilike.com/play#Stryper:To+Hell+With+The+Devil:263161:m177923 5)

Mozart (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d88xIIRDI9U)


Lock thread and start over.

[spamjoshua]

Serotta makes bikes. They do a great job of doing so.

As an outside observer, looking at both www.serotta.com (broken links, typos, the down time during the migration, etc.) and at what happened with the migration of the forums from forums.thepaceline.nets to forums.thepaceline.net

I will say this...

Whoever they hired, whoever it was that advertised themselves as the experts able to respond to Serotta's needs... That company failed. Its amateur, professionally contemptible, and just plain sad. I openly mock you and your IIS.

I hope that Serotta will get money back.

Joshua

[quattro]

and I can buy a solid gold headbadge key ring at the IF site for $2,000. Sweet!


Made you look! I own a SS IF head badge, worth its weight in gold!! :p

[BCS]

Serotta makes bikes. They do a great job of doing so.

As an outside observer, looking at both www.serotta.com (broken links, typos, the down time during the migration, etc.) and at what happened with the migration of the forums from forums.thepaceline.nets to forums.thepaceline.net

I will say this...

Whoever they hired, whoever it was that advertised themselves as the experts able to respond to Serotta's needs... That company failed. Its amateur, professionally contemptible, and just plain sad. I openly mock you and your IIS.

I hope that Serotta will get money back.

Joshua

Porsche makes great cars. People buy 911s without ever going to their website. But they still advertise and have a website. IMO it is very good, frequently updated and informative. Making excellent products is not enough. Top brands still need to be marketed. Or they may cease to remain "top brands". I agree with your assessment of the web design but ultimately Serotta signed off on the project. Hopefully 2011 will be better, released in January and incorporate some of they suggestions from the Serotta-faithful.

[rePhil]

Could it be a case of too much red?

[rugbysecondrow]

Address change from forums.thepaceline.net to what it is now has broken all the cross referenced forum links with the threads. I was winding down the rabbit hole of a topic yesterday and there was a link to another forum thread on the subject...that link is now broken.

It is frustrating because there is so much good info here and to have those links lost is a loss.

[Ahneida Ride]

Porsche makes great cars. People buy 911s without ever going to their website. But they still advertise and have a website. IMO it is very good, frequently updated and informative. Making excellent products is not enough. Top brands still need to be marketed. Or they may cease to remain "top brands". I agree with your assessment of the web design but ultimately Serotta signed off on the project. Hopefully 2011 will be better, released in January and incorporate some of they suggestions from the Serotta-faithful.

Porsche has a Kick a** web site ...
Wish I could afford one.

[spamjoshua]

I remain open to helping fix the forums.

It needs:

1. A web server redirect/rewrite to happen on www.serotta.com that interprets forums.thepaceline.nets and sends it to the right place. That will save all the google cached, bookmarked, otherwise recorded links already published/available on the net.

2. All of the internal links, all of the links in the bodies of the vBulletin messages that are recorded in MySQL, to be reworked.

Problem 1 should be a "quick fix" even on IIS, for whomever hosts www.serotta.com

I would be happy to help the folks managing forums.thepaceline.net (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP (vBulletin)) fix problem 2. Its mostly just a reg ex problem with plain text.

Joshua

[spamjoshua]

The importance of a quality web site: it is but one more piece in solid branding, great marketing, capturing first impressions...

I am ignorant of that side of things, so honestly, it failed to bother me anywhere near as much as broken links.

I can barely dress myself in a way the missus tolerates.

Joshua

[rugbysecondrow]

The importance of a quality web site: it is but one more piece in solid branding, great marketing, capturing first impressions...

I am ignorant of that side of things, so honestly, it failed to bother me anywhere near as much as broken links.

I can barely dress myself in a way the missus tolerates.

Joshua

awesome!

[clunk]

Agreed about the website. But what do folks think about the new lineup?

[MattTuck]

I personally like the new website, except for the Ford bike.

I do LOVE the Molteni picture.

And, is that Andy Schleck?

[pdmtong]

thread drift

I'd like to see the ready custom geo's for the HSG and ottrott GS...

Is $800-900 upcharge for "custom" reasonable? I'm not really gettng this. On the one hand, it seems "nice" to give people a stock size a price break. On the other hand, it's telling me if I want a 21cm HT I'm gonna have to pay large.

If the premise is most folks can fit a stock size, then is this saying there is $800 (less profit) additonal infrasturcture cost to work in a non-std design?

I can see some extra time to make sure the odd numbers balance/fit...maybe thats where the upcharge goes? and supposedly the ready custom is all dialed...just order and start the torch

[spamjoshua]

Mr. Kirk wrote about the cost of customization. Does anyone have the link?

He wrote of building the Atlanta frames, and what change/customization meant in terms of interruption to the build process: Of re-reading order sheets (of looking for order sheets), additional communication between shop and customer, between serotta and the shop, of re-reading order sheets (of looking for order sheets), of resetting tools...

Joshua

[Ahneida Ride]

Mr. Kirk wrote about the cost of customization. Does anyone have the link?

He wrote of building the Atlanta frames, and what change/customization meant in terms of interruption to the build process: Of re-reading order sheets (of looking for order sheets), additional communication between shop and customer, between serotta and the shop, of re-reading order sheets (of looking for order sheets), of resetting tools...

Joshua

This is absolutely true .... Custom takes tons extra work..

How do I know ? .... Corded HandleBra involves much more effort then
I would have imagined.

[jpw]

On topic; so did Pete McKeon see this one coming and get his head down for two weeks to avoid the PM bombs? Smart move Pete.

[flickwet]

Serotta makes bikes. They do a great job of doing so.

As an outside observer, looking at both www.serotta.com (broken links, typos, the down time during the migration, etc.) and at what happened with the migration of the forums from forums.thepaceline.nets to forums.thepaceline.net

I will say this...

Whoever they hired, whoever it was that advertised themselves as the experts able to respond to Serotta's needs... That company failed. Its amateur, professionally contemptible, and just plain sad. I openly mock you and your IIS.

I hope that Serotta will get money back.

Joshua
I actually understand what spamjoshua said in this post, and in his other ones he really seems to know what he's talkin' about... cuz I don't

[jpw]

This new website has to be killing interest from potential new customers. The homepage product 'toolbar' has no live links to frame models. What kind of thinking is that? It's ridiculous to the point of being utterly moronic.

[Ti Designs]

Ah, I think I understand now...

[BumbleBeeDave]

. . . looks bad. Many links just don't work.

BBD

[BCS]

Is the Ottrott Ready Custom identical to the Fierte IT??

[pjmsj21]

Is the Ottrott Ready Custom identical to the Fierte IT??

When I purchased my Fierte IT, I asked about the differences excluding the custom geometry and was told that there is some differences in the tubing between the two. I think the seat tube for one, on the Ottrott is butted vs straight guage on the Fierte and there may be other tubes as well. Aside from the benefit of customizing your ride, the only other savings would be a slight reduction in weight.

That being said I think the Fierte IT was a tremendous value (maybe Serotta realized it was too much of a value). Where else could you buy a stock carbon/ti frame for what some of the Fierte IT's were going for on the street.

[William]

http://www.teaberryltd.com/images/1General/kid_on_computer.jpg


:D ;)

[Ahneida Ride]

and William can still post pictures ....

You just know software problems exist.

[BCS]

When I purchased my Fierte IT, I asked about the differences excluding the custom geometry and was told that there is some differences in the tubing between the two. I think the seat tube for one, on the Ottrott is butted vs straight guage on the Fierte and there may be other tubes as well. Aside from the benefit of customizing your ride, the only other savings would be a slight reduction in weight.

That being said I think the Fierte IT was a tremendous value (maybe Serotta realized it was too much of a value). Where else could you buy a stock carbon/ti frame for what some of the Fierte IT's were going for on the street.

Not that I doubted you but I did a little search:
Through the power of the Internet Wayback Machine, I went way back to last week to read the description of the Fierte IT on the 2009 site.

http://waybackmachine.org/web/20090217225400/http://www.serotta.com:80/fierte_it/specs.html

The tubeset and the entire description of the frame is identical to the ready custom Ottrott. Right down to the claimed weight of 17.6 pounds in a size 54 with a Centaur Kit.

Other than the ability to choose Race or Performance geometry (not sure what this means yet) I think the frames are one in the same