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What are the Specialized designers thinking?
Ok…you are thinking it and I am saying it. What is the Specialized design team thinking lately?
The paint jobs coming across the Specialized mountain bike line seem to be getting worse with every release. For me, it all started with the “candy corn” SX Trail. A fellow riding friend, APPBLING, sent his off to the powder coater straight out of the box to get stripped and re-coated silver. According to his comments on the frame, the paint was even more laughable in person. Now, look at the gallery below…the Big Hit’s, Stumpjumpers and Demo’s all look just as bad. If you take a look at Specialized.com, the rest of their lines seem to be going towards these dark and light browns like the Stumpjumper below. I don’t know about you guys, but I do not think this color scheme is working.
I am saying nothing about the bikes or how they ride. Specialized has built its reputation on great riding bikes over the years. Other than the Future Shock program taking longer to get dialed in than some had hoped, these terrible looking frames still hold true to the ride quality of a Specialized bike. Hopefully, they get the kinks worked out on the Future Shocks so that they do not do any more damage to the line.
I have to think that the designs of some of these frames are hurting sales. Not every buyer is able to have their brand new frame re-coated if they do not like now it comes standard. With the competition (Trek, Fisher, Gaint, Cannondale) going to bolder designs using more standard colors, most potential frame/bike buyers are going to pick the better looking frame given cost and quality being equal. Like it or not, most riders (myself included) are pretty picky on how their bike looks on the trail. I applaud Specialized for going outside the norm, but I think they made a wrong move by going in this direction. Hopefully, 2009 will bring back the Specialized bike line that we have grown to love, and these radical colors and designs will be something we all joke about at trail heads in the future. In the meantime, it looks like we are stuck with these designs for awhile.
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- Brown Carbon Specialized Stumpjumper
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- Red and Black Specialized Big Hit
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- Blue and Black Specialized Big Hit
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- Candy Corn Specialized SX Trail
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- Brown Specialized Big Hit
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- Purple Specialized Demo
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7:37 am
I agree; some of these new color schemes are horrible looking. As an experienced rider, I look at how a bike feels/rides first, but my wife is very new to mountain biking. She’s been looking for a new bike and the first thing she looks at is the color scheme. I’d be willing to bet novices are not going to want to call undue attention to themselves on the trail.
12:30 pm
Whew! I’m glad I’m not the only one.
As a 29er fan, I’ve been trying to like this paint job but I just can’t:
http://www.specialized.com/OA_MEDIA/2008/bikes/7383-51_d.jpg
2:20 pm
dude. agreed. i have no idea why they don’t leave one model per line a conventional solid color.. think of it- “i had to buy the high end model because it was the only all black one in the line..”
Specialized, that one’s free!
4:56 pm
Their road bikes still look nice so the person responsible for these atrocities must only work in the mountain bike department…
8:16 pm
Yeah, some of it is kind of cool, like an earthy thing, but I like those colors more on clothes than I do bikes. My sparkle silver rocks though. Let’s ride Rob!!
12:13 am
I am a fan of the Big hits paintjob. the blue and black and the red and black are very nice. The art style is native based, Haida I think. Since Haida are west coast indian tribes and that’s BC area. I suspect it may have something to do with the BC connection.
Why stick to plain single colours, I wish more bikes would have paint jobs like airbrushing.
6:07 pm
I say “Once you go black, you won’t go back.” However I am considering doing a future ride in a “bruise purple”. The Specialized line is just goofy looking. You know I am not that conservative, but there is a very fine line between clever and stupidity or in this case just plain fugly.
hellbellys last blog post..HijinX!
7:37 pm
Whatchu talkin bout, Willis?? These paint jobs are sweet! Well OK, the brown Stumpjumper is questionable. But the rest are beautiful! And they’re totally unique, unlike 99% of the other paint jobs out there. I heart them. Good job Specialized for being different.
7:39 am
@Jen: I guess it is just different tastes. They are very different…that’s for sure.
1:52 pm
I bought a 2007 Specialized instead of a 2008 practically on the paint jobs alone. The bike I got looks like a beautiful Porche, while the other ones in the LBS looked like Scion artist concept cars. I’m even a graphic designer and think that is a little excessive design-wise. Bottom line, almost all of the new line are repulsive.
11:45 pm
I totally agree with the other Jason. It would be really easy to offer a high end color way option for XT level models. (and a small image of the alt color could be used in the print marketing to keep the edgy look out front)
I was running lower-end Enduro SL last year just because it came in black. It had the same frame shock and fork, so I swapped out EVERYTHING. Though truth be told, I hated the suspension so much I am a Trek guy this year.
2:06 pm
Don’t agree. Love the brown!
If we only had toned down designs around (which can be good, but usually are boring) it would have been depressing.
1:29 pm
Ya, I pretty much like the look of all of them except for the candy corn color. My brother thinks the same. However keep in mind this is the opinion of a 16 year old (me) and a 13 year old (my brother). It seems this new paint design is probably suposed to be appealing to the younger generations. At least that’s my view.