I hate stickers.
Friday, October 12th, 2007I hate stickers. No, not all stickers, just ones on bicycles. No, not all stickers on bicycles, just the ones that come on bicycle components, loudly advertising the manufacturer and often even the model of that component. Specifically, wheels are generally the worst offender.
One of the first things I did when I got my road bike was to take off most of the stickers. Well, actually, Sarah did a lot of it because it’s damn near impossible to get those things off, and she’s better at it than I am (not to mention incredibly patient). But a couple stickers we left on there because it just looked like too much of a pain to take them off.
Since I got a new wheelset, I removed all the stickers. These stickers weren’t as loud to begin with and were actually surprisingly tasteful, but my bicycle looks so much better with nice clean, unobstructed rims. In fact, it looks faster, too. It wasn’t hard getting these stickers off, but they left a gummy mess of glue behind that was really difficult to clean off, even with my new can of Finish Line Citrus Degreaser. This stuff cuts through the gunk on my chain like nobody’s business, but even with it, it took me probably 30 minutes per wheel to remove the gunk from the 5 stickers.
I think it was worth it. I should have taken before and after photos, but I didn’t. I really wish manufacturers would (a) not put stickers on their stuff or (b) at least have the common decency to use stickers that can be removed cleanly without a lot of fuss.
One of these days, I should take the rest of the stickers off my mountain bike wheels, too …