Failing Paint On Brand New Canyon Endurace

Firstly I just want to call out that this is my first post on here (so I understand how some might perceive this initial negative post which might be seen as company bashing). I assure you I have no agenda other than wishing to get this situation resolved.

To give a little background on this - after much deliberation I pushed the button on a new Canyon Endurace which was delivered on Monday. I spent the day carefully assembling the bike and actually read their manual back to back to ensure I was following all instructions as per their guidance. After completing the assembly of the bike, using my fingers I very carefully removed the large orange sticker on the down tube that says words to the effect of ‘read the manual first’. To my horror when I turned the sticker over it became apparent that a sizeable slither of the frame’s carbon coloured paint was removed with the sticker itself. While I completely understand that bike decals are not to be interfered with, bright orange information stickers on the surface of the frame are a different matter entirely. I want to stress how slowly and carefully I removed this sticker (my wife even watched my and remarked how carful I was being). It is worth saying that the paint is left with ragged raised lips around where is came off resulting in an area that is susceptible to further peeling.

As you can image I am kinda distraught about this. A brand new bike of this level of specification and price should not have a paint job that is so inherently weak. I have worked in a bike shop for 4 years and have never seen paint fail in this way.

So I contacted Canyon via their website straight away. Just now I received the response from them saying that the stickers are not meant to be removed and essentially my action in doing so has damaged the bike. They offered to send me a sticker to cover up the peeling paint.

My points of contention here:

- There is nothing in the manual about not removing stickers from the bike
- This is clearly an issue with the quality of the paint - it is concerning that an informational sticker manages to damage the paint so easily and destructively
- The sticker in question is a reminder to read the manual before use and is not part of the advertised livery of the bicycle - nowhere in any product representations is this sticker present.
- If this sticker is a permanent fixture of the bicycle then it should be made explicitly clear on the sticker itself that it should not be removed. While I completely understand that bike decals are not to be interfered with, bright orange information stickers on the surface of the frame are a different matter entirely. 

To be honest I am totally disappointed and worried about their response and I am really not sure about what to do next. I have replied to customer service and I totally understand that they are busy because of covid etc but this is quite concerning. I bought a Canyon partly because of their reputation in the area of customer service!

Do any of you have any thoughts about where I stand here or have any of you experienced anything similar with Canyon?