BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
Will Lockie, the Evans Cycles web wrangler, has posted an article to the company blog about what’s hot and what’s not in cycling. The stats for the piece were culled from Google search terms.
"What trends are happening in the cycling world?" asked Lockie.
"We all know that cycling has exploded in the last few years, and that the industry as a whole is doing well for itself – you can see this on the high street with many new bike shops opening, cool bike cafes opening up, the creation of the Sky pro tour team and of course who can forget the rise of the MAMIL!
"So, what is fuelling this growth?"
According to Google, says Lockie, interest in road bikes has exploded, partly by the increasing popularity of sportive events.
"Folding bikes and single speed bikes are relatively flat in comparison," posits Lockie.
Extrapolating forwards, Lockie said: "We expect to see continued growth of road and hybrid bike sales. In hybrid it seems that we’re looking at an ever increasing variety of bikes, perhaps the most interesting factors being Boris bikes and whether we’ll see more upright equipped bikes and 29′er light.
"Also perhaps we’ll see a bit more diversification in these categories as people start to push the envelope again. We’ve had the retro and singlespeed theme for a while, and cyclocross has been growing at a rate. Over the next few years I’d expect to see touring and audax make a resurgence also. Steel’s been very cool over the last few years so we are looking forward to seeing whether this develops further.
"In the MTB world the biggest topic is definitely 29′ers. It does seem like 2011 will be their year – the product and the market has now developed. Simply put, there’ll be even more great ways to get out and cycle next year – let’s just hope we get some support from the weather!"
