Bike sales in decline

[Smokin Joe]

Bikebiz are predicting that cycle sales could be down by one million this year in comparison to 2016 figures.

http://www.bikebiz.com/news/read/uk...o-sell-1-million-fewer-bikes-this-year/022040

There have been a few threads here lately about cycle shops closing. The global picture is not much better either.

 

[Banjo]

Could be partly due to the millions of barely used bikes available secondhand from people who didnt stick with it.

It would be interesting to find out what makes someone buy an expensive bike then quickly stop riding it.

I would hazard a guess that dangerous car driving would be high on the list but think the wave of anti cyclist trash in the gutter media could be responsible for quite a few .

Of course the good old British weather can be discouraging .

 

[Cycleops]

That’s surprising. I know that businesses that don’t move with times will fail but bigger businesses who have embraced the selling revolution can also have troubles. If Evans are making a 36% gross margin that’s pretty good so if they’ve slipped into the red operating costs and overheads may be to blame.
I can understand why Brompton are doing well as they are not a ‘bicycle’ company.
Maybe as suggested it’s a periodic trough.

 

[Drago]

The anti cycling rhetoric has reached a crescendo this year, which won't have helped.

 

[Smokin Joe]

It would be interesting to find out what makes someone buy an expensive bike then quickly stop riding it.

Fashion.

Cycling's popularity rose very quickly in a short space of time. British riders were winning races at the very top level, every C list luvvie worth his or her salt just had to be seen on a bike anywhere they could find a TV camera. You cannot rise that far or that quickly without a sharp fall coming sooner or later. The acid test will be how cycling levels compare to those of ten years ago once the five minute wonders have gone onto something else.

 

[Dirk]

Could be partly due to the millions of barely used bikes available secondhand from people who didnt stick with it.

You could have something there.

 

[Pale Rider]

Fashion.

Cycling's popularity rose very quickly in a short space of time. British riders were winning races at the very top level, every C list luvvie worth his or her salt just had to be seen on a bike anywhere they could find a TV camera. You cannot rise that far or that quickly without a sharp fall coming sooner or later. The acid test will be how cycling levels compare to those of ten years ago once the five minute wonders have gone onto something else.

A couple of bike shop owners I've spoken to in York and Sunderland agree with you.

Brad and our world beating track cyclists caused a useful spike in sales for a couple of years.

Cycle to Work, for all its faults, continues to shift bikes, and those sales tend to be from bricks and mortar shops.

Ebike sales are growing, but nowhere near fast enough to make up for the decline in push bike sales.

The manager of the shop in Sunderland said very few of the cycling boom customers have stuck around, most of the shop's current sales are from people who have been using the shop on and off for many years.

 

[400bhp]

With the way the sales of bikes works it’s always going to be this way.

If the industry manages to either move the market to:

a) car model (cars mainly bought through work based schemes or on HPI), essentially renting

b)white goods, essentially making machines with a finite life

The industry has some of both and tries hard to make bikes pseudo obsolete, but the very notion of bike ownership (ecological, freedom) makes it very hard to treat bikes like throwaway objects.

Not that I want it to go that way.

 

[Johnno260]

I bought mine around a year ago, and it was a battle getting the wife to accept the want/need to ditch the hybrid for a drop bar.

I got a great deal on a 2016 spec bike when the shop wanted room for the 2017 models.

It will be a while before I can justify a replacement, and I don’t want a replacement as I love the bike.

 

[Tangoup51]

I think electric bikes will take the reign. - Especially when people start making more durable DIY kits that offer more power on tap than any legally sold electric bike in the UK, which can convert most types of bicycles into something that isn't a bicycle anymore.

Can't say I wouldn't be excited for such a change, imagine a bicycle with an electric ability to push it beyond 40 MPH - All without the goverment restrictions that a car and motorcycles have. - That would be the ultimate tool of freedom and for alot of us, that's all we really want.

 

[swee'pea99]

The anti cycling rhetoric has reached a crescendo this year, which won't have helped.

Indeed. The callous stupidity of one 18 year old is days of headline 'news'. This (from a link on another thread):

isn't.

 

[screenman]

Cyclist not making new cyclist welcome, you only have to look as far as this forum to see people moaning about newbie cyclist at times.

As for going on about so called 5 minute wonders, that one really gets me, if you have never tried something and stopped because it did not do what you wanted it too then you are living a sad life in my humble.

 

[Andrew_P]

Cycling is the Squash of the 80's.

 

[Yellow Saddle]

Fashion.

Cycling's popularity rose very quickly in a short space of time. British riders were winning races at the very top level, every C list luvvie worth his or her salt just had to be seen on a bike anywhere they could find a TV camera. You cannot rise that far or that quickly without a sharp fall coming sooner or later. The acid test will be how cycling levels compare to those of ten years ago once the five minute wonders have gone onto something else.

Exactly. And, it is no different to zillions of fancy golf clubs and scuba tanks and running shoes lying around unused, all inspired by Tiger, Jacques, Mo and whoever happens to be hero of the day. Tomorrow fashion is still a niche sport and that's why I don't know what it will be.

 

[Smokin Joe]

Cyclist not making new cyclist welcome, you only have to look as far as this forum to see people moaning about newbie cyclist at times.

As for going on about so called 5 minute wonders, that one really gets me, if you have never tried something and stopped because it did not do what you wanted it too then you are living a sad life in my humble.

I've tried lots of things, but I've dipped my toe in at the bottom to see if I like it first.