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The Wall Street Journal

September 28, 2007


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Custom Bikes for the Masses
Makers Push Limited-Edition Models to 'Aging Enthusiasts'
By NANCY KEATES
September 28, 2007; Page W1

It's no longer enough to have the best bicycle on the block. Now you have to have the best fleet.

Facing a declining number of riders and increasing competition from boutique makers offering $10,000 custom-built rides, bicycle-industry heavyweights are now pushing individuality. Most major manufacturers -- including Taiwan-based Giant, the world's largest bike maker, and Specialized Bicycles -- are offering some form of "limited edition" or personalized model this year, bikes that are produced in limited quantities, have frames signed by famous designers or come with custom paint jobs.
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The limited-edition strategy is the latest attempt by bike makers to extract more dollars from a shrinking pool of riders. "The opportunity now is the people buying multiple bikes," says Specialized Bicycles' founder and president, Mike Sinyard. Last year, commuter bikes, along with cyclocross bikes and all-carbon mountain bikes, got a big push.

The number of people riding bicycles fell 8.7% to 35.6 million between 2001 and 2006, according to the National Sporting Goods Association. Still, makers were able to keep up sales during that period, with units sold up 16%, dollar sales up 33% and the average sales price 26% higher at $297, according to the Bicycle Products Suppliers Association.

This year, Specialized has limited-run, city-specific Langster road bicycles, numbered according to their order of production. There are 300 of each of the five models, each designed for a specific city, which retail for $740 and are highly detailed. The New York version, for instance, is yellow and black like a taxi, with a decal that says "driver carries less than $20 cash."

DNA Cycles in Mesa, Ariz., stocked previous models of the Specialized Langster for four years, selling only about a bike a year. Since the new limited edition city-specific models arrived three months ago, the shop has sold 10 and received emails from cyclists around the country looking for a particular city in a certain size. "It is all about the look," says owner Don Eldridge, who ordered the Boston version for his personal collection of 11 bicycles, "purely for the graphics."

"We're totally changing our mindset here," says Tim Rutledge, a marketing manager for Seattle Bike Supply, a distributor of brands like Redline and Torker. Mr. Rutledge says that until this year, his company's most-expensive bike was $1,500. This year, the company did a limited edition of its 2008 Redline Team Cyclo-Cross bike, making fewer than 80 and selling them for $2,500. They quickly sold out, prompting the company to plan a 2009 version and to make 200 of the bikes for $2,700 apiece. The company will also have a limited edition LaPierre Tour Replica bike, making 50 to 100 for $5,300 each. "The sky's the limit now," Mr. Rutledge says.
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Even the largest bicycle maker in the world, Giant Bicycle Inc., kept U.S. imports of its 2008 City Storm models to 200. The mostly white bike, which retails for $1,300, carries the cachet of being created by British furniture and interior designer Michael Young. The result is, more or less, a fashion statement, with upright handlebars, saddlebags and a built-in light and cable lock. It's what an iPod would look like if it were a bike. The City Storms are already sold out, and no more are coming, partly because of their cost.

'Aging Enthusiasts'

Limited-edition bicycles have popped up before. Usually few and far between, they tended to be made in very small batches, staying only at the very high end ($5,000 and up) and commemorating a specific race or an anniversary, such as a Lance Armstrong Tour de France victory or Colnago founder Ernest Colnago's 50th wedding anniversary.

Many of the new bikes are aimed at what the industry calls "aging enthusiasts." The buyers, overwhelmingly, are married, white, older than 40 years old, with children and an average annual household income of $86,000, according to Boulder Sports Research's latest report on the bicycle industry. National Sporting Goods Association in Mount Prospect, Ill., says 7.2 million Americans ages 45 to 64 rode bicycles seven or more times last year, about 32% more than did five years earlier.

Greg Wimmer fits the profile. The 46-year-old from Palo Alto, Calif., who is vice president of finance at online photo company Photobucket Inc., has four bicycles, all designed specifically for him. He says his bikes meet different needs (soft frames for longer rides and stiff ones for hills) on weekend group rides. They're also a form of personal expression. "There are a ton of people out there on mass-produced frames," he says. "People always ask me about my bikes."

Lately, however, Mr. Wimmer has been eyeing one of those frames produced by a mass-maker: the Pinarello Prince Carbon that, fully built, retails for about $11,000. The bike first went on sale as a limited edition, with fewer than 50 made world-wide; its official release was at the 2007 Tour de France, ridden by Alejandro Valverde. Now consumers can log on to the Web site MyPrince to customize the way they want their own Prince to look.

Just Like Golf

Bicycles are appealing also to baby boomers who aren't running anymore but want to stay in shape. In parts of the country such as Silicon Valley, group rides are functioning somewhat as golf outings do: They're a way for colleagues to socialize and do business at the same time. Having a special bike definitely attracts attention, says San Francisco orthopedic surgeon Gordon Lundy, who has a custom-built bike built around an Ibis frame that he bought last year for about $5,000. Dr. Lundy rides Saturday mornings with a group of neurosurgeons and anesthesiologists, talking shop on his rides.

Growing competition from boutique makers also is fueling the customization drive. Five years ago, there were fewer than 100 independent custom-bicycle makers; that's up by half to 150 makers, estimates Don Walker, who runs the North American Hand Made Bicycle Show. He estimates sales of these companies have grown 25% in the past two years.

Until 2005, a bike sold by a mass manufacturer was unlikely to top the $5,000 mark. That was the year Trek introduced its $9,999 gold-leafed, signed Lance Armstrong model, producing 600 of them.

This year, Trek Bicycles revamped its Project One, a program that lets buyers customize the designs of their bicycles by choosing the colors, getting their names on the frames and picking accessories. Giant and Bianchi both hired a San Francisco store called Bike Nut, which takes stock frames and turns them into customized bicycles, to display their works at the industry trade show Interbike in Las Vegas this week. "They're trying to show that their bikes can be unique even when they're mass-produced," says Bike Nut owner Huseyin Guler.

Mr. Guler says almost all of his customers are male and over 40 years old; they see their bikes as status symbols, something they've worked hard to afford. He likens it to a midlife-crisis form of transportation, like a Porsche. The difference, says Greg Webber, Jamis Bicycle's vice president for product development, is that a high-end bicycle also shows continued vitality. He says, "It's pretty much the ultimate way to prove you're alive and kicking."

Write to Nancy Keates at nancy.keates@wsj.com4
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Interesting that a bike shop here (in Reno) is doing great going the other way. We have four or five pretty decent LBSes here, plus an REI with a good bike department. Most have been pushing high-end rides for several years, but a friend of mine who owns one of the shops has recently turned around. When non-cyclists come in and want something they can ride with their kids or hang off the back of the RV, he doesn't try to stun them with the high end. He asks a few questions, then if it's appropriate steers them to a $300-$450 comfort bike or hybrid. That's what they need, most of the time, and he says a lot of people buy two, because they've heard you can't get a decent bike at a real bike shop for less than $1500 or whatever. When they find out they can get what they need for less than a third of that, they'll buy one for their spouse, too. And he's jacked up his staff so they fix the $400 bikes as fast and carefully as the $1500 ones.

The bike shown in the article was fixed gear. Certainly not one for the masses.

City storm:
https://www.giant-bicycles.com/en-IN/news/12102/

Mentioned in the article:
-Aging boomer with disposable income................................check
-Attention grabbing price ($10,000 bikes, ZOMG!).................check
-Lance.........................................................................check
-The new golf................................................................check


Yep, I think I've read similar articles about 2-3 times in the last year.

Look at how few spokes it has, it must be awesome!