[Hilltopperny]

Let's be honest...it's not just the bike business that is suffering and society as a whole has been used to over consumption for at least 20 years. Marketing has already begun circling back to trends from around 7-10 years ago, but now with integrated cockpits that most of us luddites don't really like.

Those of us who like analog bicycles will continue to ride them. Some folks from the analog bike world may dip their toe into the e-bikes market as they age or for other reasons, but that market is more for folks which gave up on analog bikes a long time ago and could use a little boost. The folks riding throttle equipped e-bikes were never going to ride an analog bike in the first place and they are by far the e-bike market here in upstate NY. The shop I help out at can't sell the pedal assist bikes that have now been sitting for two years. We have sold less than 10 with special orders in the past year.

The big companies over produced after the unlimited free money had already been spent. The average US household is in tremendous debt with no end in sight, so expendable income is a thing of the past when food, fuel, housing and utilities are around 30-50% higher than they were in 2019-2020. The average age of home ownership is well above 40 now which is indicative of the economic woes of younger folks and families.

If I were a company producing bikes I would be looking at possibly finding some other means to create revenue as eventually there just aren't enough folks that can afford to buy them outright and most aren't willing to finance a bicycle. Add to that all the bikes that are still around on the used market and there is and will be a surplus of bicycles for a very long time.

I have three brand new bicycles that I bought over the winter. They are all carbon with two being full suspension mtb's and one gravel with a combined retail price of over $15,000. I picked up all three shipped to my door for under $6,000 brand new with full warranties. That is less than the original retail of the Rocky Mountain Instinct. Things have only gotten worse since then.

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