News
Bike Society to Open New Flagship Store in Adelaide
Last month we ran a short story and photo saying that leading Adelaide retailer Bike Society were closing their Blair Athol Store. Soon after came an announcement to all of their customers and on their website that a new flagship store is opening somewhere within the Adelaide CBD. Although the announcement does not give an…
Wiggle Responds to Retail Pricing Claim
In our How’s Business column for October, one retailer made a comment about low retail pricing of Continental Tyres through Wiggle. Gina Ricardo, WiggleCRC Site Merchandiser & Marketing Manager for Australia and New Zealand wrote to us with the following reply: “I’ve got no idea how on earth how this customer of Wayne’s from Cyclemania…
How’s Business? October 2019
Welcome back to what was regularly the most popular item in my former trade newsletter. I simply ask bike shop owners and managers ‘How’s Business?’ I also ask a follow up question. Given that it has been a break of just over two years since my previous trade newsletter, this month I asked each person,…
What’s in the Future for Australian Ebike Sales?
Now that we have our first ever reasonably accurate number of ebike sales in Australia, how does this compare with other countries where they have been collecting sales data every year? Firstly, to be fair to Australia, we need to take the combined figure of the 22 companies who participated in the survey, 27,500, and…
Eurobike Numbers Up for 2019
After a failed experiment last year with a move to July and no public day, Eurobike returned to its traditional early September date and three trade days, one public day format. The change back appears to have worked. According to a press release, Eurobike trade attendance was up 6.6% this year with 39,834 trade visitors…
Australia’s Three Major Cycle Sport Bodies Working Towards Merger
Cycling Australia, Mountain Bike Australia and BMX Australia are well down the path of a plan to merge into a single structure called One Cycling. If the merger goes ahead, members will be able to participate in all disciplines under a single licence. The move will not only merge the three sporting bodies but also…
USA Based Private Equity Firm on Bike Brand Buying Spree
Iconic French brand Mavic, was sold in July 2019, completing a deal that was first announced on 15th March. Previous owner Amer Sports, a European based sporting conglomerate, sold Mavic to Regent, a USA based private equity firm. Amer also purchased ENVE wheels in 2016 for US$50 million (A$74 million), but ENVE was not part…
Sachs Brand Relaunches at Eurobike
Sachs is a century old bicycle component brand from Germany that also had a presence in Australia for many years, despite having a small market share here. In November 1997 American component company SRAM bought Sachs and took over its German factory as the centre for its internal geared hub manufacture. But due to declining…
Harley Davidson Enters the Bicycle Market
Four years after introducing their LiveWire electric motorcycle program, on 23rd August 2019 Harley Davidson presented three ebike prototypes. They released a photograph, but no technical information. The urban style pedalec bikes appear to have only one brake lever to operate both front and rear brakes.
Giant & Shimano Trading Strongly
Two of the cycling world’s best known manufacturers have released their latest financial reports showing strong sales and profits over recent months. On 19th March Giant announced that its sales for 2018 grew 9.1% over 2017 to NT60.24 billion (A$2.83 billion) with net profit up 46.3% to A$203 million. Giant said that strong ebike demand…