Sep
6
Bike Industry Adresses Major News Headlines
By Rich Kelly, Filed Under Advocacy, Industry News, Interbike
“This year’s Interbike coincides with a crucial time in our history. High fuel prices make for top news stories everyday, global warming and the environmental damages caused by fossil fuels have produced a feature film and our country’s abysmal health and obesity problems have not gone away for a minute. Industry manufactures are presently creating dynamic products that address all of these major news headlines. Having greater exhibitor presence this year, in addition to an 8 percent increase in pre-registration of retail stores, bodes well for the show and also indicates the industry is feeling positive about its health.”
About a week ago we put out a press release highlighting how the show is shaping up since we’re about 5 weeks out (yikes!). Something in the release really caught my eye and it was the above quote from Interbike’s Show Director, Lance Camisasca. I think he really captured the opportunity that the industry has right now with many of the major issues that are confronting our world.
Obviously, since it’s a press release, there’s a little self promotion in there about attendee registration numbers being up, but we’re honestly excited about the prospects of the industry and the bicycle as a means to do nothing less than change the world. Along with registration numbers being up, Mike Greehan, our advocacy director, said that we will have the largest number of advocacy groups present at this year’s show. You really owe it to yourself and our industry to stop by their booths in “Advocacy Row” in the lobby and get to know them and their missions better.
On a related topic to bikes changing the world, I had the pleasure of tagging along with Robert Roman, one of our Account Executives, and Andria Klinger, Interbike’s Sales Manager, on a lunch meeting with Dave Lawrance and Becky O’Hara of Shimano last Friday. The meeting (and tasty lunch) was mostly to talk about our new Interbike Media Center and how Shimano could take advantage of it. The MC is a great concept and we’re all super excited to see it take shape at the show, but the talk was pretty business-like. I wish our presentation could have done it, but Dave’s face finally lit up when we shifted to general bike talk and Shimano’s new “Coasting” concept. I’d heard the name “Coasting” before in the trade pubs, but hadn’t had a chance to grasp the concept before now. It sounds like a great idea that Shimano has invested alot of time and money on in researching the market and developing the components that will allow bike manufacturers to interpret the concept in their own way.
Bascially, what Shimano is trying to do is reach the non-cyclist. As Dave put it, not the person that walks into a bike shop and leaves intimated or confused and without a bike, but the person that hasn’t even considered buying a bike. He said that in researching the market, they found that we, as an industry, have solidified biking as a sport, not just a fun activity. Hence the name Coasting. No emphasis on going fast or fitness as the goal. Just fun. The Coasting bike should be “just a bike” as he put it. Not a cruiser, not a hybrid. Just a bike.
Without going into details, I really came away impressed by some of the research they conducted in trying to understand the image of bicycling through the eyes of the non-cyclist. If we’re really going to grow the pie for the bike industry (and change the world in the process), those are the people we need to be going after, right?
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4 Responses to “Bike Industry Adresses Major News Headlines”
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As an industry, we need to be pursuing each and every customer… but especially the recretional cyclists. The non-racers are where the future of the industry lies. Masi doesn’t exactly fit that category, but that doesn’t mean I don’t see the writing on the walls. The industry is facing a potential market of baby boomers who are getting older and don’t exactly have the lower back flexibilty they once did. Maybe even the really fit weekend warriors would simply like a nice comfortable bike for corner store trips or boardwalk cruises with the family. Whatever the driving need, they market exists and I salute Shimano for investing so heavily in “potential”. If more of us in the industry did the same, we’d all be a little healthier.
I couldn’t agree more. Sure I love seeing the latest cool new performance oriented bikes. Personally, I own several road bikes and mountain bikes as well as a cross bike and a track bike. Like a lot of people out there, my love for racing bikes will never change. Still, the products that excite me the most right now are the ones that target the general population rather than the same old core market of recreational cyclists. I think that is the area where innovative product design can best serve the bicycle industry right now.
Not only do I applaud Shimano for the coasting group, but also Trek for integrating that group into the design of the Lime. Trek already has a pretty full line of bikes in their “Lifestyle†catalog. In addition to the nice fitness bikes and hybrids, products like the Portland and the Soho target customers who are likely to use the bikes for transportation. The Lime goes one step further in targeting the people out there who do not currently think about bikes at all. I know that I sound like a broken record on my blog talking about the need for the industry to reach out to new customers, but I really think what Trek is doing is great. I hope to see more of the big bike companies making a real effort to create commuting bikes that appeal to “cool conscious†young people. Smaller companies like Biomega do a great job of that, but there is still plenty of room in the market place. I can’t wait to see what everyone is offering toward that end at this year’s Interbike.
[...] Rich Kelly of the Interbike Times has written an interesting post about the industry in which he notes: This year’s Interbike coincides with a crucial time in our history. High fuel prices make for top news stories everyday, global warming and the environmental damages caused by fossil fuels have produced a feature film and our country’s abysmal health and obesity problems have not gone away for a minute. Industry manufacturers are presently creating dynamic products that address all of these major news headlines. [...]
[...] the growth of the use and acceptability of the bicycle as a legitimate form of transportation and dynamic solution to many of these problems. (That last point also eloquently brought up by Interbike show director, Lance Camisasca, back in [...]