BikeBandit Files Bankruptcy

[ghostler]

I was looking at some old links of mine. I was browsing a Geocities backup archive of my old motorcycle blog:

http://www.oocities.org/highplainsthumper/ This was about my old 1987 Suzuki LS650 Savage that I once owned, a really nice minimal totally aircooled single lung bike (single cylinder 650) that I used touring all over New Mexico and parts of Texas, Arizona, and Colorado. (I'd show up at a motorcycle rally, people would ask me, "How-in-ell did you get here from there with such a small bike?" I'd tell them that back in the 1970's, a 650 was a big bike.)

Then I clicked on the BikeBandit.com link. It no longer exists. This surprised me, as back 18 years ago, I was purchasing parts from them for my bike. I search a little further and found this article:

https://jalopnik.com/motorcycle-parts-s ... 1848823954

Apparently Fall 2021, they failed to fulfill customer orders, then filed bankruptcy February 2022, but did not shut down their on-line ordering site right away. A number of people paid for merchandise that was never shipped.

They used to be one of the heavy hitters motorcycle parts wise. However, I ran into problems with them when I shipped my 650 to Okinawa 2005. They would not ship parts to my USPS Okinawa P.O. Box for some odd reason, although I was a faithful customer of theirs for several years. After, I then went to Ron Ayers and a few others, who did honor my overseas US mailbox. (AFAIK, shipping costs were same as to California.) Since, I have not used BikeBandit at all.

Nowadays, I guess I can now say that they turned woke.

I hope that none of you have been buying parts from them and got stiffed by them.

[usmalenurse]

I had used Bike Bandit several times for tire purchases and always came through without a hitch. So glad I opted for other sources when I bought several items for the 'Wing this spring..... You just never know these days..

[cushman eagle]

I,too, was surprised to find it went bankrupt.
I had used Bike Bandit for probably 20 years, ,
and a couple weeks ago,I had a customer bring me a 1997 Yamaha 350 Big Bear for repair.
I started to look for parts in Bike Bandit to find they went bankrupt.

[ghostler]

Another site that disappeared earlier than BikeBandit was BikerCom.com, out of the Netherlands. They disappeared may be 8 years ago, but did not stiff anyone AFAIK. I bought a really nice custom rear package rack for my LS-650 Savage that allowed me to mount a mini-trunk behind the pillion rest. There were a few other items I bought from them.

This was when ordering across the pond wasn't that expensive shipping wise (as it is now), and they didn't charge VAT to overseas customers in US. LS-650 Savage accessories were hard to come by, don't know why, because they made the bike from 1986 to 2020 (24 years, although missing from US market around 1989-1992).

As I'm getting older, the 2001 XII is slowly becoming a little heavier than I'd like to wrestle with. Was looking at newer mid-sized bikes several hundred pounds lighter. Don't know why they keep putting puny gas tanks on mid-sized bikes of less than 4 gallons, some with less than 3 gallons. It doesn't cost that much more to put a decent tank. Seems they are all in cahoots with each other.

I don't want to go to a heavy hog so I can have a fat bob tank. Defeats the purpose of wanting something lighter weight to tool around in.

[SgtSlag]

Sad to hear BikeBandit is gone... I ordered a number of parts from them until a few years ago. I used to shop for aftermarket bits and bobs from JC Whitney, until they pretty much eliminated their bike stuff. I got some great aftermarket trunks from them, around 2010, or so. Trunks are still made, I believe, but harder to find a seller for them, outside of e-Bay. I really liked ordering from JCW. Visited their (very poor) storefront, on a road trip through the area, once. Discovered they were not really into retail sales (likely less than 1% of their sales, seriously).

As a young teen, in the late 70's, I thought that was a golden age for bikes (I still believe it was, to be honest; back then, the All Purpose Japanese Bike was King, Baby, and you could mod your bike how you liked). Now, I believe the early 2010's were a mini-golden age for bikes. A lot of the generic, aftermarket stuff has disappeared. Too bad, really sad, for me. Cheers!