Low inventory in local bike shops

[Gkk2001]

I don’t know if I am ready to say I see a pattern, but after visiting 2 bike shops near me, I find ebike inventories are very low. Relative to manual pedal bikes, the ratio is near 1 Ebike : 100 pedal bikes on the display floor. I will keep looking but I heard twice now, “yes, we can get them”. Well that ain’t going to work if you want a test drive.

Maybe it is the part of the country type of thing. I visited shops near Atlanta. I will keep looking. Just curious what others have seen?

 

[Nova Haibike]

There is a lot of risk for the bike shops to stock a lot of e-bikes. The main one being the price. Attached to that is the fact that online companies can sell "generic" e-bikes for much lower prices than name-brand e-bikes at brick and mortar stores. There is a good chance people would ride an e-bike at a shop and then just buy one online, because they don't care so much about the brand.

 

[Deleted member 4210]

Typical of a lot of regular bike shops. As primarily an ebike shop, and not regular bike shop, the goal is to have a lot of models in Stock, and ready to test ride so people can compare.

The regular bike shops are both missing a tremendous opportunity, and watching the demise of regular bikes happen fairly rapidly. The declines and percentages are shocking to me, as an entrepreneur and lifelong sales professional.

How can they hang in there and tolerate ANY decline ? This hasn't been for just 1 year, or even just a few.

A warmer area like Atlanta (Versus up here in the 'north' ) should be booming for ebikes sales.

(The industry is very analogous to what I observed of the printing industry. Digital clobbered many shops almost overnight...less than a decade for many to fold and go belly up). What they are completely missing, is there will be a time, not too far off, where the go to will be an ebike, and regular bikes will be viewed as 'why would I ever want that ?'. Its like having a PC and Word, with a printer. Who needs a typewriter ? They are living in denial and just refuse to believe that could possibly ever happen. I visited many shops 5-6 years ago, and was utterly stunned by the lack of vision and complete backwardness. It was like time traveling back to the 70's.

 

[Gkk2001]

Mikes E-bikes......Thanks so much for your thoughts and observations. I have been looking or shopping for ebikes about 1 month now. A steep learning process. But I see a very strong parallel with ‘ e cars’ . The primary driver on cost is the battery for both cars and bikes. The technology for both is on a steep trajectory. And maybe because of that, both depreciate like a rock. It makes very little sense to buy new unless forced to go that route due to self imposed constraints. Assuming you are in the business, sorry for that comment but I think you must admit to the unbelievably high value depreciation.

In reference to your comments about the future of the bike business. I will take a wild guess and say bike shops inventory is based on what the customers are asking for. How many customers are savvy in the ways and options of ebikes? My bet, not many. It really is a complicated subject with a myriad of options. This takes much study to just begin to understand the market. Nevertheless, I remain disappointed in what I have seen so far and do not discount what you predict. Ebikes are the future. I sure hope so.

 

[Nova Haibike]

there will be a time, not too far off, where the go to will be an ebike, and regular bikes will be viewed as 'why would I ever want that ?

Even a shop like yours may need to adapt in the future. If and when e-bikes become that prevalent, they will be more of a commodity. Most people will not need to test ride an e-bike; they will be buying them from Wally World because they will be cheap and plentiful.

 

[bonefish101]

Exactly the same situation in my area of Northern Virginia (Winchester & Shen Valley). I visited my local Specialized dealer to talk about a Levo or Kenevo and it's like they had no interest. My closest Rocky Mountain e-dealer is very nearly 100 miles away from me in PA so I feel your pain. My first (current) e-mtb was a direct order from M2S and the experience was painless and I saved a few bucks in overall cost, I think I may just end up ordering a YT Decoy and have it shipped as I cant see the advantage of buying local if they have no interest in the product.

 

[Scooteretti]

@Gkk2001 this is not uncommon. Many bike shops are concerned about the inventory levels and the huge financial commitment it takes to have a large selection of ebikes.

At the present time many shops don’t really understand what it takes and are struggling to take the leap into the category. This is why you will see dedicated ebike specific shops around certain parts of Canada and the USA who dominate this segment. The owners and their staff are passionate about the technologies and quite often you are better off even buying a bike online from such a retailer than buying one from a local shop who doesn’t really know the product that well, has no idea how to set it up or maintain it properly even if you had a great test ride. Test riding is just a small step in the overall purchase and support cycle.

A great ebike shop will have tons of experience with many brands (not just one or possibly 2 in most bike shops) and will have the expertise to talk with you and recommend a great product based on your needs even though they may be a 1000 miles away from you.

Support these days on a good quality electric bicycle is no more difficult than a standard bicycle and having a solid ebike retailer to support you in the future is typically not an issue even if you are far away.

We get questions all the time for people and quite often traditional bike shops calling us when doing a tune up to one of our customers who purchased a bike online a few years back. A simple explanation of what to do (tune up and general maintenance is easy). Many people just make it out to be more complicated than it has to.

The only recommendation I would have is to get something from the big brands if you want to comfort of knowing you will always have support and parts availability in the future. A high quality electric bicycle that’s equipped with major branded electronics, that’s well maintained will last you 10,15 to 20 years.

Suggest reaching out to a well known online retailer who sells multiple brands and I think you may well be surprised of how knowledgeable they are. I personally have the opportunity to meet other great retailers (competitors) on a fairly regular basis and they like us really know their stuff and care about their customers during the sale and most importantly years after the sale!

This is not meant to be a plug for our company but also for the other ebike shops like us who truly want the industry to grow and this can only be done when people have a great experience with their products and the retailers they purchased from.

Hope this helps,



Will
Shop.scooteretti.com

 

[DDBB]

The business at the small e-bike store where I bought my Haibike and my wife's Gazelle is booming from what I can gather having visited a few times. Other regular bike shops were unaccomodating when I inquired about e-bikes (from major brands, Trek, specialized etc.).. I was even told by one bike shop that they would not sell me an e-mtb because "we don't want them tearing up our trails"

 

[TForan]

Who cares if an Ebikes last 10 to 20 years ? I sure don't. Give me 5 and I'm cool.

 

[Scooteretti]

@DDBB unfortunately some shops simply don’t get it. Glad you were able to find a shop that supported you and who actually get what ebikes are about.

Enjoy your new ride!

 

[Alex M]

E If and when e-bikes become that prevalent, they will be more of a commodity. Most people will not need to test ride an e-bike; they will be buying them from Wally World because they will be cheap and plentiful.

Yep. Welcome to the era of China.
Mind-boggling number of laborers (can you even visualize 2,000,000,000 of anything?), with similarly mind-boggling productivity on sweat factories - they work like robots, you need to see it to believe it. I would shoot myself if I had to work a single day like this. With blatant disrespect to any intellectual rights either domestic of foreign, anything new immediately gets cloned in mind-boggling numbers. All this at mind-boggling wages (i.e. very low).

 

[Alex M]

Who cares if an Ebikes last 10 to 20 years ? I sure don't. Give me 5 and I'm cool.

Give me a money print press, brother.

 

[Alex M]

{because of fast depreciation} It makes very little sense to buy new unless forced to go that route due to self imposed constraints.

This would seem a logical outcome but I don't see this working for buyers.

There are precious few used ebikes from decent brands sold shortly after the purchase - most people do some research (to whatever best they can, some can't because they don't know how), so they TAD know what to expect and don't sell it in a month or two. What you normally see is god awful nameless junk from Walmart or Ebay that people sell because it's falling apart and/or didn't work as it should from the day one. Or you see 2-3 years old models from better brands - owners sell it cheap, but there is a big question of condition of battery and motor.

The most crucial and expensive parts - battery and motor - are less fool-proof than gasoline cars, more "fragile", so to speak. You don't know how the previous owner treated it - especially with ebike. I also wouldn't buy a showroom "floor model" unless it was discounted $400-500 more than the price of a battery alone.

 

[TForan]

Give me a money print press, brother.

You don't think in ten years today's e-bikes won't be woefully outdated ?

 

[DavidBer]

Mikes E-bikes......Thanks so much for your thoughts and observations. I have been looking or shopping for ebikes about 1 month now. A steep learning process. But I see a very strong parallel with ‘ e cars’ . The primary driver on cost is the battery for both cars and bikes. The technology for both is on a steep trajectory. And maybe because of that, both depreciate like a rock. It makes very little sense to buy new unless forced to go that route due to self imposed constraints. Assuming you are in the business, sorry for that comment but I think you must admit to the unbelievably high value depreciation.

In reference to your comments about the future of the bike business. I will take a wild guess and say bike shops inventory is based on what the customers are asking for. How many customers are savvy in the ways and options of ebikes? My bet, not many. It really is a complicated subject with a myriad of options. This takes much study to just begin to understand the market. Nevertheless, I remain disappointed in what I have seen so far and do not discount what you predict. Ebikes are the future. I sure hope so.

Actually, that is incorrect.

It took me a while to learn this as I am new as well.

All bikes are the same. You have rims with tires on it, cranks, pedals, a chain, gears and brakes. Notice I said bikes and not e-bikes? What makes a Cervelo P3 a 5k bike? It has all the same things as a bike that you can get at Walmart. It has to do with components. Bikes cost more to save weight and have better components. Ebikes are the same, but . . . you now add in a motor, controller, display and a battery. Are there better batteries? Sure, there are better cells. Are there better motors? Now we are getting into a near-religious level war. So when you spend money, you are buying better components, better motor, better battery, etc.

It is also a misnomer that electric cars depreciate faster than ICE cars. They actually do not. If you want to look at Tesla Model S's and compare it to the same class cars, they do not depreciate faster than a Mercedes S550, or a BMW 7/8 series or a Lexus LS series. Go down to the Model 3 and it's the same issue. If you want to use a Volt as an issue, well there were a few things . . . one, people depreciate from list price, not from list price minus the 7500 tax credit someone got. That was almost 20% off the top of the Volt! Then there was a model year change. There are two electric cars that have taken it on the chin big time, the BMW I3 and the Nissan Leaf. Why? Because they suck.

The Ebike world is not much different than the motorcycle or bicycle world. Each year, there may be some decent size changes that make people want the latest. Cars, as they are a lot more complex, a 2018, 2019, and 2020 may be the same car, just different year and less mileage. That is a stable and mature market. Ebikes are in the growth stage.

I do not know the margins on ebikes that the dealers are getting. If I had to guess, it's probably in the 20 to 30% range. Much more than that, I don't think the margin exists. So let's do some quick math.

Specialized has, what, about 15 different ebikes? What is the cheapest? $2500 at list? If the dealer had 15 of just the cheapest bikes, the dealer would have 30k tied up in inventory. To have those 15 different ebikes, that is probably close to 50k in inventory, just for you to test drive. Now let's do some more math Assuming that they will let you ride the parking lot in the bike and classify it as new. On a 4k bike, they made $1000. They need to sell FIFTY of those just to pay for that inventory of demo models. Is there 50 of those to be sold in a year? That is a question that is hard to answer.

If you want to see an interesting business model and I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THEM - look at Propel bikes. They have a store in Brooklyn and in Long Beach. They also do mail order. The store in Long Beach has EVERY Riesse and Mueller model on the floor as DEMOS. These are not CHEAP bikes. The cheapest is close to 5k. He labels his bikes as demos and I think what he does is sell them discounted at the end of the model year but sells new bikes he has in stock/orders. That took a LOT of capital.


In regards to trying the bike, I'd look around and see if there are any rental companies. Rent one for a day or two and see if you like it.

I'd also strongly suggest that you determine what kind of riding you plan on using it for and buy accordingly. Do not try and make something work for you. You will regret it.

Good luck

 

[Gkk2001]

Excellent comments from many, David, Alex. Thank you. I needed this discussion.
I was thinking of the Nissan Leaf when I made the comment about e car depreciation. I have more homework to do and will try to do the test drive as recommended. Thanks so much.

 

[drewberz]

You don't think in ten years today's e-bikes won't be woefully outdated ?

outdated, but not junked. i'd be disappointed if i only got 5 years from an e-bike for the sake of my wallet and environment. that'd be about 15k miles for me. but i would expect a major service. i think there are some great bikes from the 80s still riding around. their shifting is not perfect and they weigh a little more, but they are still 90% of the bike today.

as for bike shops, Talbots in San Mateo CA is going out of business. i supported them some and they did have e-bikes. in parts of CA, rents are just too high to compete with an alternative business in that spot and mobile services such as beeline or velofix are picking up traction. mobile services don't need a traditional brick and mortar so would have lower costs.

 

[DavidBer]

Excellent comments from many, David, Alex. Thank you. I needed this discussion.
I was thinking of the Nissan Leaf when I made the comment about e car depreciation. I have more homework to do and will try to do the test drive as recommended. Thanks so much.

Just adding a little more.

What I learned is that there really are categories for ebikes.

Are you going to spend all of your time on asphalt? Is this a bike that will let you commute from home to work and only be on roads?

Are you going to see dirt on occasion?

Are you going to be mountain biking?

Once you figure that out, that will tell you the style/type of bike to get. Then you start looking at elevation gains, degree grade of hills, and distance. That will tell you a lot about the motor and battery.

As an example, I went and got a EGlide ST. For all intensive discussion, it is actually a VERY good bike. I would highly recommend it to people. I am not sure I'd buy it again for my needs. Why? My commute is a 5 mile one way from home to office. It is on the road, half on a 4 lane, the other half on a 8 lane road. All with nice bike lanes. I have a 400 foot elevation change. I thought I needed front suspension, nope. It made the ride mushy, so I turned the suspension off. I thought I'd want some nice tires to handle the dirt. Nope, I really need something smoother. I thought I would want straight handlebars, nope, I really need something a little swept back. I thought I would need a gearset to go up and over hills. Nope, I need more speed on the top end. People complain on my bike that it has a 13.6ah battery and thus a shorter range. That makes no difference to me. I don't go far enough for it to be a concern. I am considering a topeak rear rack system that has a cart that comes off to carry my backpack. I carry a laptop, 12" ipad and a bunch of other stuff and want it off my back. I should have gotten a step thru instead of a solid bar. Getting my leg over the basket in the back is going to be an interesting adventure!

This is why I mentioned, find what you want the bike to do, then find the bike. It's your butt that is going to be on the saddle, you want to make sure that it is the correct one for you.

Good luck.