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Not sure why the downvotes are coming in. This year, a brand at their Canadian dealer event brought all their A-level dealers into a meeting and asked them "our ~130mm trial bike that we're really proud of isn't selling, what gives and what do we do with the next one?" and the dealers, nearly unanimously said "it can't be 37 pounds in that category". While it's true the demands on trail bikes have never been higher, if I'm going to be pushing a bike that weighs the same as a 160mm bike, pedals the same as a 160mm bike, and descends really well but not as well as a 160mm bike... why the hell didn't I just buy a 160mm bike?
KP is on point that it's likely the pendulum will start to swing the other way, and at least in that 140mm and below category, we're going to see companies pushing back on the weight scale (further, KP is... deeply entrenched in a significant bike brand, so if he's sending a message along the lines of "hey guys the industry is going to start focusing on lighter bikes again".... I know I'll listen).
Are any bikes other than e-bikes selling at close to historical numbers? I think this dealer might be mis-diagnosing what's going on. Looking at who's out on the trails, the ~130mm bike's sweet spot has always been the casual rider who wants a chill experience. These days those riders are on eebs.
This kind of goes back to Jeff's monster analogy. I have a different take than he does. Human-powered MTB has become niche and ebikes are where the market has moved to. The market is fine, the monster is still there, it's just changed.
At least around here. Most e bikers are long time mtbers. Most the new people I see are on budget analog Mtbs.
(I don't really want to comment on California cuz it's such an outlier, despite being a huge part of the MTBing industry... but I would not describe many of the e-bikers here as veteran enthusiasts. If anything, the reverse is true. But we're also getting to a point where EVERYONE is on an e-bike.)
I agree - that's what I see in affluent areas of California too. Casual but affluent riders are almost all on ebikes. I do see other casual/beginner riders on "lower end" aluminum bikes from Santa Cruz, Specialized, etc, but for this group it seems like once MSRP gets above 5 or 6k they want the motor.
I definitely don't see a lot of super high end shorter travel trail bikes. XC bikes yes for the racer crowd, and boutique long travel bikes still have a presence.
I can only relay to this thread what was relayed to me, although apparently it was the stance of multiple dealers that the new, heavier but more capable platform had lost some of the charm of the predecessor and a large part of that was that it just didn't feel like a little bike anymore.
Maybe the interior of BC is an anomaly, but yeah, the shop sells an absolute ton of ebikes. Sure. Are regular bikes still selling? Absolutely. The shift has actually been away from what we would have considered as great first full-suspension bikes for people (2500-4500 CAD) - those guys pony up a bit more coin and walk out with something like a Rail 5 or similar. Even a good chunk of people who'd traditionally shop stuff like the Talon or Marlin are moving to electric despite those bikes being 5-10 times the price. Both of those segments have taken significant hits, and it anecdotally seems to be bigger than just the market slowdown. What seems to be relatively fine is high end trail bikes.
The customers who have been enjoying MTBing for a long time and have the disposable income to spend north of 7k CAD every 1-3 years on a bike are chugging along as normal. A solid chunk of them also own ebikes now too, but they aren't ready to give up the feeling of a quality regular MTB. If they're shopping that 120-140mm segment, some are going to be swayed by a bike that comes in a bit lighter than the competition, especially because our trails tend to be smooth, fast, and less travel-sensitive than other riding areas. The true XC "Racer Crowd" doesn't really exist here in comparison to other parts of Canada, or it's limited to a handful of people, it's all high end 120mm+ bikes for the most part.
ya almost never in like OC/SD but since being closer to Santa Monica it's interesting to see all the XC MTBs. I mean, not interesting because we know these are XC trails and there is barely anything black/tech/gnarly by here (you REALLY gotta look for it).
i like to steal my GFs ebike in order to ride all the way to the north side of the mountains, and I'll see XC die hards PASS me at times. like these are strava CORE lords. also LA is very 'gravel bikey' naturally. very gimmicky and fashionable.
but every other trailhead I visit, outside of LA, is up to the ears in ebikes. and it makes even more sense with a YT mill nearby in SoCal selling Decoys for less than most peoples analog bikes.
i think any conversation around ebikes position in the industry is a solved equation by now. i need to run a trailhead survey to see what people are riding lol. at least motorized vs non motorized. i know a lot of people still have both... but we all know which one has become garage furniture
Found this somewhat interesting: DVO selling off excess OE-spec suspension components from their collab with GasGas & WP.
https://bikerumor.com/dvo-wp-suspension-collab-puts-moto-damper-tech-in…
Great comment.
I realize all of us bike nerds on here with multiple bikes represent a small segment of the market and the following is a privileged, first-world comment of the highest order, but:
- I've got a RAAW Madonna as my big bike and a 160/150 Fuel EXe.
- My daily driver is an MX 5010.
I built up the 5010 figuring that if I built up a real-bike trail bike that rode too much like my ebike, I'd be too tempted by the ebike.
With how burly enduro bikes have gotten and the rise of ebikes, I'm even more focused on my 130-140mm fork real bike being poppy and playful so it delivers a different ride experience and entices me to ride it more. Along with geo, tire size, etc., etc., weight does play into that, especially at the slower speeds bikes with that amount of travel are typically ridden.
All that is to say I think there is an opening for lighter, poppier 130-140mm fork bikes that aren't trying to be short-travel enduro bikes.
Damn I hope they're not in trouble. I love my new Jade X Prime coil.
If time allows, I’ll try to put together a Giant + Shimano + limited Canyon analysis since they all reported recently. At first glance its more of the same. Things are stagnant. The problem we’ve discussed aren't getting worse, but the industry isn’t suddenly waking up from the hangover all at once, either.
It’s a bit frustrating to watch how some media outlets and “Substack/social media analysts” are spinning the headlines. I get it, attention economy and all, but I’m seeing people mash up different profitability KPIs that should never be compared, lean on percent-change numbers to make things look worse than they are, and paint it as a raging dumpster fire when that’s just not reality.
Things aren’t great in a “lets all rush out and buy bike equities”, but that’s never been the point of this thread. Giant, Canyon, Shimano... they’re doing well enough to keep operating as-is. Which, honestly, is all most of us bike nerds really care about.
More to come (I hope)
I'm going to guess the Gas Gas order got reduced so DVO has product to get rid of...
I'll double down on saying "this is correct". When they go into restructuring, I think you can effectively walk from all prior obligations to buy product from vendors. Again, no expert on bankruptcy proceedings, especially in Austria, but this smells of "oh crap, Pierer isn't buying!".
Regardless, DVO is unfortunately the type of company I'd be worried about right now. They feel caught in no-mans-land, but maybe they have much tighter deals with OEMs than I realize with a more dedicated user base than I see around here.
So there's a bunch of cheap suspension with Cone valve dampers you say....
Yes. Don't believe DVO themselves are in financial duress (AFAIK), but GasGas is part of Pierer Mobility (much discussed here before) & the Pierer restructuring seems to have put an end to that special-edition line of GasGas ebikes.
But in 205x65 trunion only for shocks...
Just how many ebikes was Gasgas planning to sell that they justified spinning up tools on bespoke dampers in forks and shocks for this collab? It just strikes me as a bit strange.
Found this interesting and wanted to share. From Shimano's H2 release. Hopefully I'll find time to unpack Shimano, Canyon and Giant's releases later. Initial read through was very similar to Fox, though Fox is doing better (I think) on a quarterly basis. None of these businesses strike me as likely contenders to go out of business, though canyon posting a negative EBITDA number is never good.
(Any insight what happened between 2015 and 2016?)
Also do you think their 2025 estimate is valid? I could imagine further downward trend such that it at least aligns more so with 2015 or 2020 (before the chaos) Orrr would that just be like... Inflation numbers because its tracking money directly and not a non-monetary unit. Unless its always accounting for inflation year to year.
I'd guess they were planning on at least a 3 year run...
I think the chassis was unchanged, that the differences were in the piston/shim/cone-valve parts and the knobs were anodized red. You could view it as a very custom tune.
Those damper parts are CNC machined whether you follow the existing DVO design or make the cone-valve parts. Making new CNC parts just means you start with a different program on the CNC. Designing and tuning those parts might've been little more than a fun distraction for WP's damper design/tuning guy if he was tinkering with his own ebike prototype.
Following on from this, the Cone Valve parts are literally just a different architecture for the HSC circuit plugged into an existing DVO damper. These pics are straight from the fork service manual, the two lower ones are showing the entire Cone Valve assembly once it's removed from the fork damper.
It may not be the best of times for them, given that the OE world continues to muddle along, but their tight relationship with SR Suntour likely helpsa lot.
Does a similar histogram exists for SRAM? Because it would be really interesting to see what is their growth compared to the Shimano...
RE: 2016: People may not remember this, but it was not a good year in the bike industry. Europe had terrible weather in March and April, Brexit was happening, there was an unforeseen glut of inventory (at the wholesale/distribor) level in the USA and China saw a big slowdown that caused their market to contract. If you go dig around you'll see stories on this stuff.
As to the future, while I don't have a crystal ball, I do believe they'll hit their 2025 numbers. This is not inflation adjusted, just raw sales numbers.
One thing I learned in working around financial news for a decade was how easy it is to focus on a headwind and how hard it is to call out a tailwind. There is a constant bias in the media to gravitate toward "doom and gloom".
I'm going to try and do the opposite with this comment - I just went and checked out the local NICA course for the race this weekend. There will be 500 kids racing. I don't live in California, I live in Victor, Idaho. While every one of those kids may not stick with it, the explosion of racing at the youth ranks because of NICA surely doesn't hurt the sport now, or into the future.
Bikes are cool. They work. They are fun to ride. So long as that is true, and people need new parts/bikes/clothes/etc, the industry will find equilibrium, even if it has to write down a bunch of product from 2022 nobody wants.
I'm sure it does. Unfortunately, its highly unlikely we'll ever see it. They are privately held.
Regarding Shimano in 2016, that was the debacle of the launch of R9100 Dura Ace, quantities were very limited for the first 6-9 month even for complete bikes and aftermarket parts were almost impossible to get at least in Canada and since it was officially launched nobody wanted to buy new 9000 series dura ace so overall sales for top end road bikes were much lower during that period. Pretty much a paper launch for the first year of R9100.
Thanks Jeff for the graph, it's interesting how regions share have changed after COVID. China share looks to have almost doubled, a reason is most likely Taiwanese assembly that moved to mainland china during that time but I also think actual sales to Chinese cyclist is up too. I remember Giant saying during some slower quarter that the only region still being up was china. NA sales are almost all aftermarket sales via Shimano USA and Shimano Canada and seems to have stabilized to pre COVID levels. So at least for aftermarket, NA ridership doesn't seem to have grown after COVID. But Europe, South America and Oceania (SA and OCE are most likely the big driver of the other region share) riders seems to have kept some of the new riders from COVID.
Canada is at pre Covid levels? That feels very hard to believe.
Could be possible that Canada is up by 10-20% but USA is down by 5-10% and since USA is 60-75% of Shimano NA sales, overall number are similar pre COVID and post COVID. Pre COVID NA average yearly sales is 220 & post COVID average is 198.6
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