UK bike sales plummet

[dave123456]

Master Bean said:

dave123456 said:

The inflation was crazy to be honest. I bought a canyon cf slx 8 di2 in 2019, £3,250 from canyon iirc. Same bike, with discs now admittedly, £6,200…

Don’t want to start a discs v rim argument here but I’m not going to upgrade
whole bikes at that price, I’m on the lookout for a decent set of hunt wheels to stick on
for a refresh it and I’ll run it for another few years.

There's your problem. An oxymoron. You want an upgrade.

See correction above for the pedants.

[ecsrobin]

DirktheDaring said:

One of my neighbours, neighbours is the UK Canondale importer, apparently in lockdown he sold out his entire allocation for the year within a month or two.

Even high end/slow selling/odd sized stuff that often sits around until the end of season was sold out, he couldn’t get any extra allocation no matter what and he had zero surplus to flog onto Paul’s Cycles etc.

• this could all be bks but it’s exactly how I was told the story.

Sounds about right. I was looking at a Santa Cruz recently and the importer was saying no more stock for this year.

I really want a new bike as I think the sum of parts to get my Giant back up to a good standard (been neglected a few years) will be close to the same but prices are just crazy and I can’t justify it.

[PastelNata]

Stick Legs said:

The point I was making was that for the casual fan the ITV4 coverage was indicative of a growing mainstream popularity.

The point I was making is that GCN+ / Eurosport are likely too much competition for ITV4. They’ve emerged to dominate cycling coverage and so ITV4 will not be certain they can get viewing numbers to make buying rights worthwhile.

[thebraketester]

Doesn't everyone want escooters now?

[tertius]

PastelNata said:

Stick Legs said:

The point I was making was that for the casual fan the ITV4 coverage was indicative of a growing mainstream popularity.

The point I was making is that GCN+ / Eurosport are likely too much competition for ITV4. They’ve emerged to dominate cycling coverage and so ITV4 will not be certain they can get viewing numbers to make buying rights worthwhile.

Really? The GCN coverage is dire such that I won’t even make the effort to find the highlights, whereas I’d definitely watch ITV coverage.

[dave123456]

tertius said:

PastelNata said:

Stick Legs said:

The point I was making was that for the casual fan the ITV4 coverage was indicative of a growing mainstream popularity.

The point I was making is that GCN+ / Eurosport are likely too much competition for ITV4. They’ve emerged to dominate cycling coverage and so ITV4 will not be certain they can get viewing numbers to make buying rights worthwhile.

Really? The GCN coverage is dire such that I won’t even make the effort to find the highlights, whereas I’d definitely watch ITV coverage.

Got to admit that the GCN presenters are a mixed bunch, some are pretty good, others, despite their cycling pedigree, fall so far wide of the mark to be unacceptable.

[Scabutz]

It seems to me that interest has warned since the high of 2012 with Wiggo at the Olympics and TdF. I see similar things with Triathlon, now the Brownlee brothers have moved from the mainstream interest is dipping and events are being canned due to lack of participants.

We need an enigmatic British rider to get people back interested maybe

[PastelNata]

tertius said:

Really? The GCN coverage is dire such that I won’t even make the effort to find the highlights, whereas I’d definitely watch ITV coverage.

I quite like it, no complaints from me.

[dudleybloke]

If you already have a decent bike there's usually not enough of a performance/tech increase with a new model to justify the expense.
Nice if you can afford it but with the economy the way it is people are choosing to run their kit for a bit longer.

[PastelNata]

dudleybloke said:

If you already have a decent bike there's usually not enough of a performance/tech increase with a new model to justify the expense.
Nice if you can afford it but with the economy the way it is people are choosing to run their kit for a bit longer.

Yep, very marginal gains at best. Ok if you are chasing a few seconds here or there but otherwise not much in it.

Difference between my new aero Pinarello and non-aero but lighter Wilier isn't much. The Dogma is faster overall but unless you really need those seconds - because it is seconds, not minutes - the expense is purely because 'nice'.

Having put 6500km on the Dogma I can say that if I could only have one bike, I'd likely choose the older Wilier because being less aero, it is less aggressive, more comfortable and very, very nearly as fast in terms of watt for watt.

[ChocolateFrog]

Salted_Peanut said:

Sadly, it seems bike sales have plummeted: https://road.cc/content/news/uk-bike-sales-fall-ev...

I can’t see things improving in the near-term, can you?

However, bike prices can’t help. Some bikes cost more than a motorcycle!

Not surprised at all.

It was utterly insane in lockdown.

[remedy]

Timely thread.
I've got a 2016 Giant Defy Advanced that I've added prime 50mm carbon wheels and Hope RX4+ brakes.

It's on 105 and it has done me well for 000s miles. During covid I almost bought an Orro Ventura STC Evo but bought a new car instead.

2 years later I'm still thinking of an upgrade but do like the look of a Giant Propel advanced 1. With SRAM it's about £4.2k. Similar price to the Orro.
I'll keenly watch the prices and see what drops there are.

I love the Defy and it does everything I need so it's just an itch to change at the moment. I might just upgrade the wheels as mine are bashed so far out of round it's untrue!

[ChocolateFrog]

To replace my bike basically like for like would cost 3x as much.

The equivalent point in the line up where you used to get a full 105 groupset now isn't even Tiagra it's Sora, fk that.

I'm not that desperate for 22 gears.

[tertius]

remedy said:

Timely thread.
I've got a 2016 Giant Defy Advanced that I've added prime 50mm carbon wheels and Hope RX4+ brakes.

It's on 105 and it has done me well for 000s miles. During covid I almost bought an Orro Ventura STC Evo but bought a new car instead.

2 years later I'm still thinking of an upgrade but do like the look of a Giant Propel advanced 1. With SRAM it's about £4.2k. Similar price to the Orro.
I'll keenly watch the prices and see what drops there are.

I love the Defy and it does everything I need so it's just an itch to change at the moment. I might just upgrade the wheels as mine are bashed so far out of round it's untrue!

Some great deals on Orro bikes at the moment. I’m sorely tempted by a Gold STC Ultegra (not Di2) on Merlin at just over £2k … looks a pretty fair price to me.

Problem is I suspect it would be substantially identical to my 2009 Storck with 6800 Ultegra … certainly I’m not good enough to make the most of the bike I already have!

[remedy]

This is my issue. To upgrade from 105 it has to be electric shift. Going to ultegra is pointless.
I hear good things about SRAM rival as fitted to this:

https://www.giant-bicycles.com/gb/bikes-propel-adv...

Or same spec Orro

https://www.orrobikes.com/product/venturi-stc-riva...

The SRAM force was fitted to the STC and I think it was this one that I was looking at. Was £4700 back then. Now £5500.

Will we see prices fall with this news?

[PastelNata]

12spd mechanical 105 has been released so that will make some models more affordable.

[tertius]

Merlin have the Venturi Ultegra Di2 for £3k:

https://www.merlincycles.com/orro-venturi-stc-ulte...

[Castrol for a knave]

The point about e bikes is a good one. The branded shops have switched focus and the Phasis is flogging ebikes. Most re margin.

One thing I have noticed is anyone vaguely handy with a spanner is buying a decent frame and building up a bike.

I have also noticed the Wiggle app has gone really st, they seem to have taken their eye off the ball.

Not a loaded question, but has Brexit impacted on costs?

[dave123456]

Castrol for a knave said:

The point about e bikes is a good one. The branded shops have switched focus and the Phasis is flogging ebikes. Most re margin.

One thing I have noticed is anyone vaguely handy with a spanner is buying a decent frame and building up a bike.

I have also noticed the Wiggle app has gone really st, they seem to have taken their eye off the ball.

Not a loaded question, but has Brexit impacted on costs?

Is it cheaper to build your own? I’d have thought cycle to work schemes mean not.

[Castrol for a knave]

dave123456 said:

Castrol for a knave said:

The point about e bikes is a good one. The branded shops have switched focus and the Phasis is flogging ebikes. Most re margin.

One thing I have noticed is anyone vaguely handy with a spanner is buying a decent frame and building up a bike.

I have also noticed the Wiggle app has gone really st, they seem to have taken their eye off the ball.

Not a loaded question, but has Brexit impacted on costs?

Is it cheaper to build your own? I’d have thought cycle to work schemes mean not.

Many schemes top out at 1500, so a few in my club just got 2nd hand decent frames and built up courtesy of eBay.

I got a Look 575, set of Reynolds Attack wheels and Ultegra for less than that. Part of the fun is tracking down the bits.