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Things are a bit slow at work, and there is some danger that I may be out of a job sometime in the next six months. Going to start sticking my resume out there, getting the feelers out, but the whole thing's got me reconsidering an idea that's been in the back of my mind for some time now. I know it's nothing new and there are a few places doing this already, but it doesn't seem like there's much in the new england area...
Seems like there is a good market out there for used bike parts. Motorcycling as a sport is growing, and the number of newbies buying brand new gixxer thousands and wadding them up 5 miles past the dealership seems to be increasing every year. This provides an influx of salvage title vehicles selling well below the value of their parts, as well as a market of people looking for used parts to fix up their shiny new gixx that now has bent forks/rim/fucked up plastic/etc.
Another thing I've noticed is that old race bikes, say late 90's 600s, sell real cheap. They're no longer competitive in their class, their owners have moved on to bigger and better things, so they get sold for much less than has been invested in them. Often these bikes have desirable parts that go for quite a few bucks on ebay: aftermarket shocks, rearsets, spare rims, etc etc.
So I'm toying with the idea: why not set up a warehouse, outfit it with an air compressor and some air tools, and get into the business of buying damaged (and aged) vehicles, stripping them, and selling the parts?
The amount of parts money in a bike is truly staggering when you add it all up, just look at what parts are going for on ebay. $50 for a brake caliper, 50 for a rotor, 200-300 for a decent set of rims, a good few hundred for a motor / frame, another hundred or so for a swingarm. Any plastics in halfway decent condition will fetch 150-300 per piece, and there's a good 6 or 7 pieces on most sportbikes. Tanks are another hundred or so, rider and passenger seats fetch a few bucks, forks are a hundred or so, aftermarket pipes and shocks are work a few hundred apiece, rearsets go for 25-50 per side, clipons, controls...the list goes on.
I'm figuring most late model salvage title bikes can probably be stripped and sold for at least a grand beyond what they can be purchased for. Race bikes with a good amount of useful goodies and spares are the same. And a halfway competent person should be able to strip a bike, photograph and box the parts, and start an ebay listing for the entire kit and kaboodle in well under a day once it's whittled down to a science. Hell maybe even two bikes a day. But figure a day per bike once you've taken care of answering ebay questions, chasing deadbeat buyers, and shipping the parts once the money's in.
Of course there's overhead, you need a decent sized warehouse to strip the bikes, ebay fees are a few percent of the sale, and you have to take into account the time to find, purchase, and transport the bikes to the chop shop (I've no desire to run a bike theft ring, it's gotta be legit). There's definitely an economy of scale going, so to breakeven and start turning a profit would require a steady influx and outflux of bikes, at least a few a month if it's a one or two man operation, more if you start pulling in young kids at 6-7 bucks an hour to help with the dissassembly and ebay listings.
Just thought I'd put the idea up here to see if I can get a bit of feedback from NESR, I know there are a lot of people here who might know about this sort of things, maybe even some with knowledge of salvage auctions or connections to bike salvage yards like argos.
Do you think it's feasible? And just as important, is there any interest in such a venture? I've got experience running a small business and keeping track of financials, and enough understanding of bikes and wrenching to strip and catalog a motorcycle to get top dollar on ebay. Also, I've saved up a small chunk of change that I could potentially use for seed money but the kind of operation that would potentially turn into a real business would require at least a partner or two, preferrably one with connections to acquiring cheap bikes on a regular basis.
I dunno, maybe I'm just dreaming out loud and should stick to engineering...but the idea of owning a small business that would pay living expenses and allow me to work with my hands and make my own hours is attractive, and this particular one seems more feasible and less risky than any other I can think of. Not to mention the ties to the motorcycle industry is alluring, as a racer there is significant potential for deducting race expenses and becoming more involved in the motorcycle community.
Anyway, your $.02 is appreciated, even if it's just to tell me I'm an idiot and should stick to computer chips...
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