Talk:Quality Bicycle Products

Where/what is the encyclopaedic value of this QBP self-congratulatory article?

Where/what is the encyclopaedic value of this QBP self-congratulatory article? -Semperlibre (talk | contribs), 5 January 2010

As with most start-class articles about companies, it briefly outlines:

• notability
• who started it and when
• what and how much it makes or sells
• where it is located and with whom it trades
• other notable details as described in major publications: in this case the Star Tribune and VeloNews.

If there is something missing, feel free to add or request it. -AndrewDressel (talk) 16:06, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, okay, the article reads like a marketing piece. But it is referenced and the information it contains is, in general, fairly appropriate. I've made a few edits to improve it (I hope...), and I encourage others who see problems to do the same. Be bold! It is always easier, and far less helpful, to complain about something than it is to work to improve it. Ebikeguy (talk) 23:58, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

NPOV

Okay, so what are the specific complaints?

• Is the article unsourced?
• Do the sources have a conflict of interest?
• Are the sources unreliable?
• What is the current point of view or bias?
• Are there other significant views that have been published by reliable sources?

Without a single detail supporting the claim, it should be removed. -AndrewDressel (talk) 20:43, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, it has been 7 days with no response. If someone does feel that there are legitimate issues, they are welcome to replace the banner and itemize them here. -AndrewDressel (talk) 14:52, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

I think it's great that the sections lower down each start with a caveat that they read like a news release, which is probably how the info got here in the first place, from a company operative. That's excellent, in my view. Well done, crowd sourcing crowd! People can read it and take it all with a grain of salt.

The only thing I would suggest would be to add that caveat to the start of the first section. As soon as I got to the 3rd sentence, I could tell it most likely was written by a company operative. That's okay. Better to have a full description than something limited, sketchy, unsourced, etc. But there should be a caveat banner there. Star-lists (talk) 23:06, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

The largest distributor?

The article states QBP "is the largest distributor of bicycle parts and accessories in the bicycle industry", and has a reference from Zinn to back it up. It seems likely that the industry in question is the US bicycle industry, and not the global one. Here in Canada the bike shops I've worked in only very seldomly order from QBP (Picking up obscure parts that the Canadian distributer don't carry). What's the situation in Europe or Japan? It seems likely that their are larger distributer's there. --Keithonearth (talk) 21:32, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Good point. Edited to make "largest" claim US-based. Ebikeguy (talk) 14:42, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Not so fast. You may find a additional sources that need to be incorporated, or you may replace the existing text with a direct quotation from the existing secondary source, but you can't just make a guess about what the source must have meant and put that in instead. I've restore the original text and added an additional secondary source that matches the others. -AndrewDressel (talk) 18:55, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

No guessing involved; The headline of Zinn's article makes it clear that he is referring ONLY to the US market. The Star Tribune article specifically states that QPB is the largest distributor "in the country." I could not find any claim that QBP is the largest distributor in any market in the Adventure Cyclist article. Therefore, none of the references posted support the claim that QBP is the largest distributor outside the USA. My recently-reverted language should be reinserted unless someone can provide a reference that supports the current language. Ebikeguy (talk) 19:11, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

1. The Star Tribune article is from 2008 and so is superceded by the following two.
2. While the subtitle does say that "QBP is the driving force behind U.S. bike shops" for Zinn's 2009 Velonews article, he states in the body that "[QBP] is the largest parts and accessories distributor in the industry" without qualification. It is definitely not clear that Zinn is refering only to the US market in the that statement.
3. The 2010 Adventure Cyclist article has no such geographic qualifier in its title and states, in the last paragraph of the first page, "To understand how Steve Flagg took a small business importing hard-to-find bottom-bracket spindles and chainrings from Japan and turned it into the largest parts and accessories distributor in the bicycle industry,..."

Can anyone find any other sources that might clarify this further? -AndrewDressel (talk) 19:57, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Sorry I missed the A.C. ref. It appears likely that all these references are being pulled straight off QPB's "History" Page, as the language is remarkably similar in all cases, so I'm thinking that these ref's are not as NPOV as I'd like them to be. That said, they are the best we've got right now, so perhaps you are right and we should leave the language as referenced unless/until we come up with something a bit more concrete. Ebikeguy (talk) 20:07, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

No sweat, and good catch on where it might all be coming from. It should would be nice to find some kind of ranking. -AndrewDressel (talk) 04:27, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Rankings or income numbers. If we find a distributor in, say, India or China who does more $$$ worth of business, then we can re-insert the "US" language. Ebikeguy (talk) 13:20, 25 January 2011 (UTC)