The bike industry crisis
- Thread starter Jabubu
- Start date
Jpez
Down on the left!
Nor should you. It’s none of your business what or how much people choose to spend or not.
Yep at the start of Covid all the suppliers expected a down turn so had paused all their purchasing and manufacturing increasing demand further.
Flow-Rider
Burner
I'm seeing prices go down but top tier mountain bike shit will never be cheap.
A Lot of the shortages were due to shutdowns too: mines, ports, factories, whole cities, etc. Manufacturing took a huge hit for quite a while.
The Duckmeister
Has a juicy midrange
Covid brought a kind of cascading shitstorm. With most of the world going into lockdowns, the manufacturers thought, "well there's no point making stuff, no one will be able to buy it or use it" so cancelled or greatly reduced material/frame/component orders. Then the world did the complete opposite to what was expected, and the demand for bikes went ballistic, and the whole supply chain got caught on the back foot, and due their own capacity restrictions, all the way along the chain, couldn't meet the demand, and it was just one big messy snowball effect.
A lot of that has ironed out now, but I think the bigger problem facing smaller "proper bike" manufacturers is that the arse has pretty much fallen out of the non-eeeeb market. I've been out of The Biz for two years now, so my impression may be a bit out of date, but in my last year there, very few "meat-powered" nice MTBs went out the door, but cheat-bikes were flying out. The impression I get is that not a lot has changed on that front.
A lot of that has ironed out now, but I think the bigger problem facing smaller "proper bike" manufacturers is that the arse has pretty much fallen out of the non-eeeeb market. I've been out of The Biz for two years now, so my impression may be a bit out of date, but in my last year there, very few "meat-powered" nice MTBs went out the door, but cheat-bikes were flying out. The impression I get is that not a lot has changed on that front.
I think people who bought emtbs during the pandemic are also putting them up for sale now too. For a good second hand one with low km it can be about the same cost as an entry level mtb now which would make it even harder to justify.
Chriso_29er
Likes Bikes and Dirt
Back in 2018 I purchased my giant at a smidge over 40% off.
I don't think big discounts a new thing for the big players, particularly Giant lol.
Haakon
has an accommodating arse
That’s just their excessive mass shaking the ground as they pass by.
pink poodle
気が狂っている男
When are the sales starting?
sane
Likes Bikes and Dirt
This reads like a list of sales in Au atm. Maybe taking longer than usual to clear out previous models but it’s pretty familiar I reckon.
edit. Link would help…
18 Bikes That Could Be Updated in 2024 - Pinkbike
The roster of potential new mountain bikes that might be competing for your cash this season.
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Ben-e
Captain Critter!
I can speak for the construction industry versus energy. Its been the major factor (along with skills shortage) that construction costs (building activity and materials) have increased massively. Post Covid, we were placing 25% contingencies on contracts. My understanding on retail is that there is always 100% mark-up; e.g. import: $100, wholesale: $200, retail: $400; even small increases in import costs significantly impact retail pricing (im no expert though).
Can't help but look domestically though, at retail price gouging made possible by duopolies; perhaps CRC etc was like this. IMO their bikes were crazy overpriced; did brands like Nuke really add much more 'value' over well-established players..?
ozzybmx
taking a shit with my boobs out
You'd wonder how a privately owned bicycle manufacturer is making 33 models of bikes, sees the profits go south, order book not as full as it was but still drives the company to this position.
Then gets 'someone in' to tell them its not working
Cull 20 bikes, go back to its roots with HT's and a few FS bikes. Ride out the storm happening in the UK and bike industry then ramp up again when things are better.
jrewing
Eats Squid
Exactly.You'd wonder how a privately owned bicycle manufacturer is making 33 models of bikes, sees the profits go south, order book not as full as it was but still drives the company to this position.
Then gets 'someone in' to tell them its not working
Cull 20 bikes, go back to its roots with HT's and a few FS bikes. Ride out the storm happening in the UK and bike industry then ramp up again when things are better.
Calvin27
Eats Squid
Actually crazy that you could at one stage buy an alu ebike version of that for $5.5k
Stredda
Runs naked through virgin scrub
The spec was pretty awful though. That's what I don't like about Specialized, is that to get good spec you have to pay through the nose.
To compare apples with apples, my 2015 Norco Sight C1 was $7300 new with similar spec to this Stumpy.