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At a motorcycle exhibition in Stuttgart, deep discounts on new models are the turmoil shaking the industry now that the pandemic-driven cycling craze has faded.
Price cuts of 20 to 30 percent were not unheard of at this month’s event in the southwestern German city, where sellers sought to offload surplus stock in the face of falling demand.
Long gone are the days when Covid-related shutdowns inspired a surge in bicycle sales in 2020-2022, as people looked for more outdoor recreation or tried to avoid using public transport.
At Electrolyte, a company that makes traditional e-bikes in southern Germany, orders increased by 50% during the pandemic and consumers faced months-long wait times due to global supply chain disruptions.
But the temperament is very different.
“The war between Russia and Ukraine has played a role, with high inflation leading people to think twice before spending their money,” said Oliver Arlt, sales manager at Electrolyte.
The company’s sales were down 15% last year.
“The market is changing a lot right now,” said Burkhard Stork, president of the German bicycle industry association ZIV.
In Germany, Europe’s largest economy, sales of traditional motorcycles fell 20% in the first five months of 2023 from the same period a year earlier, according to ZIV.
E-bike sales fell 12 percent.
Stork expects 2024 to be a “challenging” year for the industry. Fewer new launches are also expected as brands look to extend the lifespan of unsold models.
– Discounts, bankruptcies –
Fueled by cycling’s rapid growth during the pandemic and eager to get ahead of any long-term supply chain issues, many in the industry ramped up their orders during the boom.
The drop in demand has inevitably led to overstocking, leaving brands and stores with no options yet to book discounts.
Andreas Gutacker, who runs a motorcycle shop and an online sales website, said the site uses a set of price review rules that analyzes competitors’ offers and “automatically lowers our prices,” he said.
Price reductions of up to 20 percent are possible for electric motorcycles and even 30 percent for traditional motorcycles, he told AFP at the industry meeting in Stuttgart.
Swiss e-bike maker Flyer, also attending the fair, has lowered prices 10 to 15 percent over the past six months.
The downturn in the industry has already claimed lives, compounded by last year’s high-profile bankruptcy of Dutch e-bike maker VanMoof.
The young company, sometimes dubbed the “Tesla of e-bikes”, was never profitable, Stork pointed out. “Then when the crisis hit, the banks refused to keep going along,” he told AFP.
German group Internetstores, major online retailers such as Fahrrad. de and France’s leading online motorcycle store Promotorcycleshop, filed for bankruptcy after parent company Signa Sports United ran into monetary difficulties.
German logo Ghost Bikes, owned by Dutch company Accell, announced late last year that it would close its factory in Bavaria and move production to plants in Turkey and Hungary.
However, industry experts are optimistic about the future.
“This is a transition era and it will take about a year to make stocks transparent,” said Manuel Marsilio, of the Confederation of the European Bicycle Industry (CONEBI).
“Sales are expected to recover very strongly by the end of 2024 or the beginning of 2025,” he told AFP, noting that “the market is even bigger than in 2019, before the pandemic. “
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