Yet Carrera frames are made by the same people who make Merida frames, and people cluck and coo over them.
Nothing wrongneith carrera frames, andmthey are actually competitively light and svelte, no weightier that similarly priced competitors from big names. It's the componentry that weighs it down and, as you rightly allude, anything else at that price point is similarly lumbered with Suntour forks, heavy rims,etc.
The only thing wrong with Carrera at their price point is the name Carrera.
Carrera's used to be made by Merida but that was a long time ago. The Taiwanese brands are quite expensive now. I think Halford's also used Giant at some point. Giant and Merida are the two big bike manufacturers of Taiwan that manufacture and sell under their own brands as well as do OEM work but the OEM work is really for higher end models nowadays which have a margin for their more expensive products. Fuji-ta is the big OEM manufacturer and they have factories in China, Vietnam, Cambodia and possibly Thailand but recently
Halfords have been using Insera Sena of Indonesia for many of their Carrera, Voodoo and Boardman mountain bikes and possibly other types of bikes. A lot of halfords bikes have been made by them. Halfords are quite clever at constantly changing factories to get the best deal. Very old Halfords brand bikes were made in the UK by factories like Raleigh.
The Carrera frames are marginally heavier but then its a very small difference in weight that I personally don't think is important and Halfords bikes have very high weight limits, lifetime frame guarantee and despite their huge sales in the UK Halfords almost never have frame recalls. You compare that to
Decathlon who have had a huge amount of frame recalls for bikes including Rockriders and step thru models and their weight limits are much lower. Also worth pointing out that when it comes to mountain bikes strength adds weight. A Trek with a 28mm stanchion XCE or XCT forks and basic freewheel and cable disc brakes is going to be lighter than a Carrera mountain bike with a freehub drivetrain with more metal components and Suntour XCM forks with 32mm stanchions. Carrera will add weight by making a much stronger bike. However if you are really using a bike off-road you need strong components even if at the entry level pricing their performance is more rudimentary compared to high end air forks.
At the end of the day US and European bike brands don't really make anything almost all of it is coming from Asia and at best getting assembled in Europe. Most brands are just importers and don't put much design input into their entry level bikes because they can't afford to. I don't want to pay £250 extra to get a similar bike to a Carrera from Trek I personally don't think Trek stickers are worth that much. Halfords are basically a factory to retail business model and they sell at high volumes with a low margin, the logistics mean much better value than most brands. I don't need Halfords to sponsor a huge amount of sporting events, spend a lot on marketing or create margins for wholesalers and small independent bike shops that doesn't add value to me.
Also some of the entry level Trek frames use mechanical forming which is the cheapest way of bending tubes to make a frame and creates some pre-fatigue which has to be compensated for by additional metal material so its not just cheap components on entry level Trek bikes its also cheaper frame construction which is an invisible cheapness that most buyers won't see. At the time the Carrera models mentioned hydro-forming tubes which is the next quality level up.
I guess I'm quite a fan of Carrera because of their value and being a bit of a cheapskate. I see many people with the right brand on what can only be described as a very poor value bike. Especially when in the UK we have about £150k of government debt, pension liabilities and other liabilities on every single person's head from a baby just born to someone on their deathbed. To keep buying inflated price low value products is economic suicide.
