How’s Business
How’s Business? – March 2023
Welcome to our monthly chat with bicycle store owners and managers across Australia and New Zealand. We’ve been hearing reports of very large discounts being initiated nationwide by multiple bike brands as the industry faces a perfect storm of over-stock, demand returning to pre-Covid levels and consumers struggling from increased cost of living pressures. So…
How’s Business – February 2023
Welcome to our monthly round up across Australia and New Zealand, where we talk to independent bicycle dealers to ask them “How’s Business?”. The entire global bike supply chain has gone from famine to feast in most, but not all, bike categories, with manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers all struggling with high inventory levels. With that…
How’s Business – December 2022
Welcome to our monthly column in which we call a wide range of independent bike shops across Australia and NZ and start by simply asking “How’s business?”. We always ask a follow-up question. This month’s was: How do your sales figures since the Covid boom ended compare to your pre-Covid figures? Will Arnott from My…
How’s Business? – October 2022
Welcome to our monthly check-in with bicycle retailers across Australia and NZ.While sales trends varied slightly between this month’s featured businesses, the messaging on services was consistent – workshops have never been busier. As always, in addition to asking “How’s business?” we asked a follow up question. This month’s question was: “What is it your…
How’s Business? – September 2022
Welcome to our monthly check-in with bicycle retailers across Australia and NZ.As always, in addition to asking “How’s business?” we asked a follow up question. This month’s question was, “How are you preparing for a new summer season, now the days are starting to get warmer?” As Wollongong prepares to host the World Road Cycling…
How’s Business – A Berlin Special
Berlin, Germany Germany continues to be the biggest market for bicycles in the European Union and e-bikes are steadily growing towards claiming 50% of its total unit sales. However, it doesn’t take much searching in the nation’s capital, Berlin, to find examples that buck the trend completely. While major city commuting and e-bikes appear to…
How’s Business? – July 2022
Welcome to our monthly check-in with bicycle retailers across Australia and NZ.As always, in addition to asking “How’s business?” we asked a follow up question. This month’s question was, “How is your winter season shaping up compared to pre-covid winters?” Mark Wade from Pitcrew Bikes, who has two stores, to the north and south of…
How’s Business? – June 2022
Welcome to our monthly chat with dealers across Australia and NZ. COVID continues to be a consistent theme in the day-to-day operations of bike stores, as its impacts enter their next phase and retailers discuss their current challenges and forecasts. A hangover from the heady, COVID-driven sales highs of the past two years appears to…
How’s Business? – May 2022
Welcome to our monthly chat with dealers from across Australia and New Zealand. From a range of previous conversations we’ve been having with wholesalers and retailers over recent months, it seems the pendulum has been swinging in relation to which categories of bikes are now in shortest supply due to covid. The initial surge of…
How’s Business – April 2022
Welcome to our monthly chat with dealers across Australia and New Zealand. For this month’s follow up question, we returned to the elephant in the room that we’ve deliberately avoided for the past few months of How’s Business columns – stock. In some ways, it’s hard to believe that we’re now approaching two years since…