With this years Interbike promising to be one of the largest ever, manufacturers and retailers have been scrambling to get their final preparations in place. This year, the show will have 305,700 net-sold, square-feet of exhibit space, which is the largest footprint in Interbikes history.
Interbike said that 25 countries will be represented this year, ranging “from Andorra to the United Kingdom.” While the bicycle industry has been growing over the past few years, driven in part by different youth-market fads as well as “the Lance effect,” it is now beginning to see some challenges.
Recent doping scandals in professional cycling, rising commodity costs, and rising gas prices eating into the average expendable income all contribute to the macro-economic trends that could impact independent bicycle retailers in the year to come.
At the same time, there is a shift taking place in the cycling market as the pendulum is beginning to swing back to the mountain bike and possibly away from road riding. The main fuel behind this swing is mountain bike resorts. A movement that started as a fringe activity for an elite few has turned into a mainstream, destination travel activity. Nearly every ski resort with ride-able terrain is opening its lifts to downhill and free-ride mountain bikers.
Intrawest, the parent company of Whistler Blackcomb and several other ski resorts in North America, has said — on several occasions — that lift-serviced mountain biking is the primary driver of growth in their summer resort activities.
While mountain biking is gaining popularity, the road market is far from stagnant, even though it has seen some challenges recently. There is still a good deal of innovation and energy in several sectors of the road riding community. In particular, SRAM will introduce their new road group this year. The company held a pre-release event at this years Sea Otter, but according to SRAMs spokesperson, Michael Zellman, Interbike will be the official launch for the industry.
“This is the true introduction of the road group to dealers,” he said. “We have instituted a number of programs leading up to this with select dealer visits, showcasing the group at events and our neutral road support team at races. At Eurobike, this work brought a tremendous amount of energy it was overwhelming. We were surrounded by dealers and the press for the entire show.”
Currently, SRAM has over 90 manufacturing customers who will be using the new road group in their OEM spec. this year. In connection with this, the company will run a contest for dealers to identify ten bikes with the new SRAM group. The only down-side for the company at the show is that the SRAM girls may not make an appearance this year. “I think we have our hands full right now,” said Zellman. “Im still waiting on a few things, but it doesnt look like the SRAM girls will be there.”
The show itself is rolling along and should break the attendance and exhibitor records set last year. “Our footprint in the expo is going to be larger, not a heck of a lot larger, but about 1500 square feet more than last year,” said Lance Camisasca, Interbike show director. “We should have, when its all said and done, about 3,100 occupied exhibitors booths, which will be a record for us Our pre-registration is up about 10% from this time last year, which we are very excited about. The Outdoor Demo is slightly larger than last year and again for the demo, pre-registration numbers are up about 10%.”
In addition, Interbike management felt that the annual schedule of show-sponsored parties was actually a hindrance to exhibitors, so the show will be pouring its resources into on-bike events and a new media center this year. “Probably the largest change going into 2006 is rather than throwing parties we decided to put our resources, our time, and our energy into this media center,” said Camisasca. “Being in Las Vegas with a very tight schedule where a lot of our customers are taking their own initiatives and throwing their own fundraisers or parties or whatever it may be, we began to realize we were getting in the way sometimes.”
The final pre-show development this year is the return of Trek and Gary Fischer to the Outdoor Demo, although the brands will still have no presence on the show floor. Commenting on the decision to return, Trek brand manager, Zap Espinoza, said that the company is using the demo to create some hype around their new line of mountain bikes for the two brands.
“The majority of our dealers worldwide who come to Waterloo get to experience the whole Trek phenomenon in terms of factory visits, watching them build bikes, we get to ride on the roads and test our road bikes, we have a private trail system here that we ride on and test our mountain bikes, so they get to come out and do that as well,” Espinoza said. “We pulled out of Interbike because by the time all of the costs were accounted for in terms of flying our dealers out here, and doing everything here – our interviews with the dealers afterwards they were all categorically, far and away were more impressed and had a better time and learned more at Trek than they did milling about the bikes at the Las Vegas show. However, for this year, both Trek and Gary Fischer have unveiled a whole new platform of mountain bikes Thats the opportunity the Dirt Demo can provide. There is a wide range of people out there that can spend two days riding the bikes and see how they work.”
With manufacturers becoming more territorial with their dealers, and increasing the number of vendor-owned and branded retail shops, and some tough macro-economic trends in the forecast, it could be a very challenging year ahead. However, with challenges come opportunity and many IBDs will be able to capitalize on the emerging lift-served, free-ride trend, and a renewed interest in mountain biking, while maintaining their road-riding customers.
>>> Judging by the pre-show excitement, there wont be a lack of innovation and the new niche companies are what keep IBDs alive…
