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Pure speculation… I could see Gwin riding/partnering with a bike manufacturer that will benefit him outside of just racing. I.e deals on Rental bikes at Windrock and other potential ventures. The southeast gravity scene only seems to be growing, I could see him helping to open/owning other parks. With Gwin’s history of being fairly business savvy, I be surprised to see him riding for a brand purely for racing purposes.

When you see it! 😉

That’s Gwin in a wig.

"There are CEOs, CFOs, fund managers & capital allocators that have built their entire career on a net-zero interest rate environment." This is well said, and pretty scary to think about. People who have only ever thought in terms of high risk, long-runway projects and now have to learn to live within their means and make money the boring, slow, old fashioned way- selling physical products to actual customers. Makes me think about Silicon Valley, where seemingly any and every idea was getting funded and the revenue model was "sometime we'll make tons of money, somehow, in the future." I...

I never thought I'd get to talk about the interest rate environment, capital allocation & what the past can teach us about the present/future in a mountain bike forum. First, Robot is right in the big picture that its not business Armageddon and rates have certainly been higher most of history. Funny enough, I think BofA released a chart showing the history of interest rates from ~3,000 BC to now (or at least it was circulating on Twitter/X recently). Turns out, for most of the period following the time of Jesus & the Roman Empire to now rates were somewhere...

The "free money machine" is turned off, kinda, but it's not like it's business armageddon because the Fed raised the interest rate. The current Fed Rate is 5.5% and, historically, that's not crazy. For reference, Paul Volcker bumped the fed rate all the way up to 20% in the 80's, which really is rough. For anyone who cares, I've included a graph below of the fed rate since 1954. For about half of the graph the fed rate is at or above 5%. The fed interest rate has been bananas since 2008 when it dropped all the way down to...

This is a good synopsis of "how did we get here" if anyone doesn't want to parse through a bunch of other posts. I think the fun part is to look to the future being I can broadly agree with Dave's recap (few quibbles, but not important for this conversation). Here are the keys to consider when peering into your crystal ball/magic 8 ball. 1) Mountain biking went through a phase of increased demand during COVID. This demand is better thought as "pulling future demand to the present". This means higher than average demand was followed by lower than average...

As a CFO (outside of the bike industry), and a lifelong mountain biker, I've been following the current boom/bust cycle in the bike industry. I have very reliable sources at GG and banker friends who lend to multiple bike companies or their parent companies. @whitesq comments on GG are basically correct, they sold a majority equity position to a private individual investor. Initially they believed that investor had a shared vision for the company which included developing high end bikes and ebikes, in addition to growing their in house domestic revved carbon manufacturing as a contract manufacturer to other bike...

I guess I should've put a caveat in there that Sales and Marketing folks don't count. They live in a different reality. I once visited a friend who worked for a large bike company that starts with 'T'. He invited us to ride their trails and had us meet him at the HQ so we could get a quick tour. Ready for the ride, I was wearing my clipless shoes and was click-clacking my way into the front door - when he saw that my shoes had a big red 'S' on it he actually told me I had to...

"I'm hesitant to paint everyone else in the industry as idiots" I was forced to sit through a multi-hour presentation where the management of a very large bike brand starting with T explained to us that it was'nt a bike boom caused by the virus. It was the result of all THEIR hard work making everything sooo awesome and it was our duty not to let them down. Anyone who voiced anything approaching common sense was roundly chastised for a 'negative attitude'. When the downturn bit and the 50% increased target turnover was consistently missed, it was due to our...

Without getting really in the weeds on "what is a company", for the purposes of this discussion a bike company is any purveyor of components, accessories, soft goods, frames or complete bicycles for sale to the specialty bicycle market. (IE, not Huffy). As to the decision of how vertically integrated you really are (IE, how much do you do "in house"), its any management team's choice where they want to draw that line. No matter what company you are talking about, there is always going to be some farming out of something to make what they make happen. When we...

I don't see Forbidden going anywhere in the short term. They seem to be doing okay from my insider eye on them. I do know some larger companies are in a world of hurt and there will be a lot more consolidation in the market. I see a few clothing brands being eaten up by larger component or bike brands, and maybe a shoe line or two becoming part of a larger group also. We've seen QBP consolidate its house brands and I expect that to continue as well. 2024 is going to be rough. Q4 of 23 has already...

You would think that planning for that bubble burst would be a no-brainer, but I worked for a bike manufacturer during 2021-22 and the talks of growth just didn’t stop. “We’re gonna double our team size.” “We’re gonna double our output.” All the leadership bought fancy trucks in advance. When I left, the shelves were full of inventory that wasn’t moving. The employee turnover was ridiculous. Every one of us actually getting our hands dirty knew that bubble was gonna pop long before it actually did. The leadership just refused to accept it. The idea of increased profits really can...

The best case study in our world (sort of) for this is Peloton. They were the goldenchild of the pandemic, only to realize they literally made enough stationary bikes for the entire market and stopped production (fully). Stock was at $150 at the peak. $5.00 (not a typo) today. Point I'm trying to make, most people in a position of management at any company wants to believe it is their operating ability, not market beta, that is the real cause for success. Add to this bonuses and incentives that keep the gravy train going and its hard to see why...

One thing I'm having a hard time understanding is how this "...some people got a little too optimistic in the last 3 years and partied like it was gonna be 2020 forever." happened. What kind of CFO/money person thought the boom was going to continue and was able to convince private investors, people who's whole job is figuring out market cycles, that it was worth taking a chance on? Why/how?

Just to add a little more broad business nerd color and context to what Robot is saying, there are two ways to raise capital for any business. Take a loan (debt) or sell "part of your company" to investors (equity). TBH, I don't know if many companies were really ever able to take on much debt, being banks usually secure their long term notes in one way or another. Maybe a handful of companies are way out over their skis with respect to their credit facilities, but I'd bet this is not the contagion in the bike industry we'll see...

looks like a decoy is ready to rip as soon as the snow is gone

if he didn’t win a world champs when he was completely dominating the sport, I’m not sure he’ll be able to win one now. I’d love him to prove me wrong though. I’d like to hear more of him in the booth. Aaron’s input last year improved the whole broadcast. He’s a natural on the mic.

Agreed, he is an announcer. His job is to speak clearly so everyone listening understands what he is saying. Claudio has a pretty thick accent and English is not his first language but we could understand him. I don't know Ric, I bet he's a nice guy. However, he wasn't very good at announcing. AG came in with zero experience and did a better job of preparing (researching the athletes, asking them questions about the track, their season, their health, etc.) and a much better job speaking. Aaron was easy to understand and much more informative, all without stepping on...

Hosted by Ric McLaughin.....for me that's reason enough not to listen to it, based off the terrible commentary we've had to endure during the world cups in 2023 Next...