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“If you voted for Brexit, please realise this is 90% because of your decision”: UK cycle distributor FLi ceases trading

“I’m done with the red tape and the barriers to trade,” FLi Distribution’s director Colin Williams said

Brexit’s impact on the UK’s cycling industry is once again under the spotlight after FLi Distribution’s director blamed the “red tape and barriers to trade” currently affecting businesses as the Huddersfield-based distributor ceased trading with immediate effect.

FLi – which began life in 2008 as FLi Race Team Management, before transitioning to distribution – was known for supplying KTM bikes to the UK for over a decade, a relationship which ended in April this year.

The distributor notified dealers and suppliers of its decision to cease trading earlier this month, with director Colin Williams citing the impact of Brexit, the complexities and restrictions surrounding UK and EU trading, and the difficulties facing the bike industry in the post-Covid lockdown period as the main reasons behind FLi’s demise.

> The rising price of cycling — why are bikes more expensive and how is the industry coping?

Confirming the news, Williams posted on LinkedIn: “That’s it, FLi is done. Thank you to everyone who’s supported FLi over the past 15-plus years… it would not have been possible without all of you who’ve helped out in thousands of ways, making 99 percent of my time running FLi so much fun. So if you’ve helped in any way, thank you, it’s been a great ride.

“But if you voted for Brexit, please realise this is 90 percent because of your decision back in 2016. I have no idea what will be next, but as the people close to me know, whatever it is, it’ll be better than the last 18 months.

“I’m done fighting, I’m done with the red tape and the barriers to trade. It hadn’t been fun for some time, so the time was right to end it now, life is too short. The relief now the decision is made is amazing, but I am so sorry for any negative impacts it will have on anyone and I’m doing my best to resolve any and all of them where I can.”

> Will Shimano CUES ease future bike industry supply chain dilemmas? Unified groupsets will “reduce inventory needs and simplifies the servicing process” says components giant

Earlier this year, Williams told the road.cc Podcast that the bottom line of companies in the UK bike industry is being squeezed like never before, thanks to the supply chain and manufacturing disruption brought on by the pandemic, as well as the impact of Brexit on trade.

He explained that because many brands service the European market through distribution operations within the EU, this means that typically products will arrive in the UK from the bloc – adding on not just administrative burdens but also costs for distributors and retailers here.

> Bike industry turmoil continues as UK cycle distributor 2pure enters administration

Those additional costs have had a crippling effect on the UK’s cycling distributors, with FLi the latest in a growing line of distribution companies to cease trading this year alone.

In May, Livingston-based distributor 2pure entered administration, just months after the company announced that it was restructuring to focus solely on the cycling industry, following what it described as a “highly volatile” 2022 caused by macro-economic events in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

And in March, Moore Large, the leading UK distributor for well-known brands such as Tern Bicycles, Lake, Forme, ETC, Emmelle, and MeThree, entered liquidation, leading to its £35 million product inventory being auctioned off.

> Forme bikes and Lake cycling shoes distributor enters liquidation

Formed from the bike shop opened by John Moore in 1947, the Derby-based distributor was founded 30 years later and owned by the Moore family up until last year when, following growth since the pandemic, the board’s directors bought ownership from the family.

Dale Vanderplank, Adam Garner, Adam Biggs, and Andrew Walker acquired the business on 19 April 2022, with retiring chairman Nigel Moore at the time saying that the “last few years have been particularly successful and it is now the right time for me to hand over the company to the existing management team”.

However, four months ago the company confirmed its closure, adding to an increasingly bleak time for a UK cycle industry beset by inflation, changing consumer habits, overstock, and a challenging economic climate.

Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.

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153 comments

Avatar
David9694 | 1 year ago
1 like

CE marks - the long predicted Brexit fuck up has now arrived 

Avatar
Bigfoz | 1 year ago
3 likes

Ah Brexit, the gift that keeps on giving. 

Pre-EU the UK was "The sick man of Europe", nostalgia being what it is, we're now rushing headlong back to that (un)enviable state... 

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David9694 | 1 year ago
4 likes

"Aha - Brexit benefit spotted!" I thought as we had the annual run of  "Britons holidaying at home" news stories.  It's hard to put a trend or long-term numbers on this one as this is one instance where Covid really has distorted the picture (not sure how long brexiters are going to keep this one up in other areas, though).  It is really that long ago that a June week in a holiday cottage in June was £500?

Cost and chaos: what’s driving Britons to holiday at home
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/17/cost-and-chaos-whats-dr...

And yet, as Wetherspoons pubs close down (the owner forgot that Brexit would deprive him of paying customers, make it hard to recruit and retain staff and would in fact put up many costs) we see, right at the start of the peak holiday time, things like this: 

Dulverton pub The Bridge Inn needs new landlord to take on cost of living crisis
https://www.wsfp.co.uk/news/dulverton-pub-the-bridge-inn-needs-new-landl...

or

Popular Exmoor country pub closes due to rising costs
https://www.devonlive.com/news/cost-of-living/popular-devon-country-pub-...

It feels like a "make it make sense" moment.  

Around my way, you are hard-put to get a drink on a Monday, in a few cases even on a Tuesday. The obsession with Sunday roast dinner continues apace, though.  

The dangerously-wrong-about-everything Torygraph take:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travel-truths/why-britons-see-holiday... (Paywall - headline only). I have met people in the past who live a sizeable chunk of their life for the next holiday in the sun, of which we had plenty in May and June this year.

Off topic, but for your "none of this will matter when..." folder, my new fave climate phrase is from the Rhodes evacuation:

Rhodes wildfires: British tourist says trying to escape the flames 'was literally like the end of the world'  By the end of this summer, every Brit will know someone who cancelled, curtailed, or endured a break in the sun. 

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stonojnr replied to David9694 | 1 year ago
1 like

Pubs are closing because they're being hit by sky high energy costs, it's not uncommon to see their bills have risen £10k-20k, and that's before you add in the increases in rent and inflationary prices impacting sales.

As for Wetherspoons, one of the few pubcos making a profit in this current climate, they regularly for many many years have closed pubs in areas where they are over represented, and expand into areas where they aren't, it usually coincides with property rent terms ending and a renegotiation required.

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levestane replied to David9694 | 1 year ago
3 likes

David9694 wrote:

Rhodes wildfires: British tourist says trying to escape the flames 'was literally like the end of the world'  By the end of this summer, every Brit will know someone who cancelled, curtailed, or endured a break in the sun. 

 

No really Brexit but the UK has certainly contributed. Is there irony in jetting to the sun?

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David9694 replied to levestane | 1 year ago
6 likes

yes, yes there is.  We just need a version of this where the man has a suitcase and perhaps a sombrero.  I guess if you're a Brexiter, you have no concept of facts, or The Future anyway, so this will fall on stony ground. 

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Roulereo replied to David9694 | 1 year ago
1 like

So wildfires are climate change now? Good to know

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Rendel Harris replied to Roulereo | 1 year ago
7 likes

Roulereo wrote:

So wildfires are climate change now? Good to know

Yes. Research has found that the wildfire season across the globe has extended by 20%+ due to warmer springs, higher temperatures and longer and more intense drought periods. When forests dry out, they're more likely to catch fire, not that difficult a concept to understand. In the western USA the amount of forest destroyed by wildfires was 10x greater in 2003-12 than in 1973-82. In Alaska, which has suffered hugely from wildfires over the last decade, fires are 45% more likely to occur now than thirty years ago due to conditions changing as a result of climate change. Modelling has shown that at the current rate of climate-change-influenced increase catastrophic wildfire incidents that were previously once-a-century events will be occurring once every 5-10 years in Europe by 2100. Not so much good to know as somewhat terrifying to know. 

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Roulereo replied to Rendel Harris | 1 year ago
1 like

Ok Boomer. "Modelling has shown..." is that like "Trust the science", "Safe and effective" "Get vaccinated and you won't transmit it"etc etc.?

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Rendel Harris replied to Roulereo | 1 year ago
8 likes

Roulereo wrote:

Ok Boomer. 

Ooh look, he said that thing, like that thing that young people say, that's got me....

Apart from the fact that I am not of the Boomer generation, for your interest and education the phrase is used to dismiss older people who deny issues that are generally of concern to young people such as climate change, minority oppression and so forth, so it would appear to apply far more to yourself than to me.

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Roulereo replied to Rendel Harris | 1 year ago
0 likes

Yes, you're so right. We need a Climate Lockdown urgently. Otherwise how will we ever get to Net Zero?

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jaymack replied to Roulereo | 1 year ago
3 likes

Our grandchildren will never forgive us if the planet we bequeathed them is a ruin. Perhaps you think it's all something of a joke, shame on you.

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essexian replied to Roulereo | 1 year ago
2 likes

Its not often that I agree with you but yes, we need a Climate Lockdown urgently. 

Time to ban all private cars, stop flights and invest only in actual green solutions. Without such, the planet will carry on burning. Fifteen minute cities are the way forward. 

And yes, I am a Boomer and proud. 

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essexian replied to chrisonabike | 1 year ago
1 like

Thanks for the suggestions but I already have 4kw hour solar system plus a solar hot water system on my roof, so the few watts I use on the computer is ofset against that.

I could do more I agree but then should we all. 

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hairyairey | 1 year ago
1 like

Having read the article it's clear the issues aren't just down to Brexit. The lockdowns that were put in place across Europe were in the most part ridiculous. The fact we allowed our politicians to do this to our economies was a huge mistake. There was for example no evidence of the virus spreading outdoors but exercise was curtailed or banned. (I intend to make my feelings known about this to the covid enquiry). Professor Tim Spector of the Zoe covid symptom study (epidemiologist) doesn't believe lockdowns work. I don't doubt that trade with the EU is difficult but so was trade outside the EU before. We couldn't make separate trade agreements. I do feel sorry for this guy though, especially if he thinks it's all because of Brexit.

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jaymack replied to hairyairey | 1 year ago
10 likes

It wasn't that we couldn't make separate trade agreements but that we didn't have to make them because, being part of the largest free trade block, we had far greater collective clout to get the very best terms as part of the EU. There's a reason that the USA isn't prioritising a UK deal, we're just too small a market on our own. Whatever the politics, and economics is just the obverse of the political coin, you can't escape geography.

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Rich_cb replied to jaymack | 1 year ago
2 likes

A country can't do full trade deals as part of the EU.

France, for example, couldn't sign a tariff free deal with China as once goods were in France they'd be able to enter any part of the EU without further checks thus rendering the customs union a bit moot.

The UK is a largely service based economy, EU trade deals predominantly favour goods so whilst they would benefit the UK they aren't anywhere near as beneficial as trade deals which play to the strengths of our economy.

The UK is still one of the biggest economies in the world, 5th or 6th depending on which method you use.

The idea that the 6th biggest economy on the planet is too small to bother with is patently absurd.

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jaymack replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
8 likes

'Patently absurd'? If it were the US would be all over a UK trade deal like a rash. And I know that we 'couldn't' negotiate separate trade deals, we shared that power with our partners in the EU. Why? Because collective EU deals were better deals for the UK. The EU has 448 million citizens, the UK has just under 68 million. It doesn't matter which way you slice the economic pie, the EU slice is always going to be larger. And being the World's butler isn't anyway to run an economy, it merely puts the nation and our politicians in the pocket of kleptocrats & multinationals. Just look at the bribe, sorry 'incentives', we're having to fork out to have an electric car battery plant built in Somerset!

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Rich_cb replied to jaymack | 1 year ago
3 likes

Trade deals aren't just about the economics.

If they were the US and China would have signed a blockbuster deal years ago.

The current political leadership in Washington isn't interested in a trade deal with the UK. They are however pursuing trade agreements with India which has an economy almost the exact same size as the UK's.

Everybody is offering incentives to battery plants right now, ours are actually less generous than the US and on a par with the EU's.

As I said before a deal that focuses on goods is never going to benefit the UK economy as much as a deal focused on services. EU trade deals predominantly cover goods so predominantly benefit other countries.

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jaymack replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
6 likes

EU trade deals favour goods because many EU nations were sensible enough to nurture their manufacturing sectors while the UK Gov't threw ours under the economic bus of sado-monetarism. That's not to say that the French and Germans for example lack international financial centres, bankers in Paris and Frankfurt no doubt rubbed their hands with glee at the prospect of the City of London's influence being curtailed. The US favours a trade deal with India because it's a market with vast growth potential having a population of over a billion as well as India acting as something of a bulwark against China, we're neither of those things. They may even ride more bikes in India than we do here in dear old Blighty. 

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Rich_cb replied to jaymack | 1 year ago
0 likes

So EU deals aren't necessarily in our best interests.

We are one of the world leaders in services, why stay in a trading bloc that doesn't prioritise our strengths in trade negotiations?

I agree that India has vast potential, so too do many of the developing countries in the CPTPP. The UK is in fairly advanced talks with India about a FTA so hopefully we'll be able to finalise that soon.

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RDaneel replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
3 likes

How many new (or amended) U.K. specific services agreements have we done since leaving. It's very important so it must have been a priority to get as many done as possible I assume? You may want to roll them over but re-negotiate them tout suite right? I mean we could've just been Norway or Switzerland as per Nige Farage's hearty endorsement. Best of all worlds. 

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Rich_cb replied to RDaneel | 1 year ago
0 likes

Lots of renegotiations and new negotiations going on.

We have a new service specific trade agreement with Singapore.

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9314/

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RDaneel replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
2 likes

Considering how important Services are to the U.K. economy that to be frank is a pretty pathetic list of new/renegotiations of the terrible not fit for the U.K. EU deals. It's also notable that we became a Services Super power and 5th largest economy while in the EU. 

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Rich_cb replied to RDaneel | 1 year ago
0 likes

How many simultaneous trade negotiations do you actually want?

The India deal has the potential to be transformative, it was apparently very close to being signed last autumn so hopefully the remaining differences can be thrashed out soon.

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David9694 replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
6 likes

Loyal Brexiters must be getting something out of it. Spite, a twisted revenge on a world in which they have been disappointed, a super right-wing ideology (same things really). There's nothing materially better in our lives for Brexit, is there - spite on the world is all that remains and all it ever was. 

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Rich_cb replied to David9694 | 1 year ago
1 like

We are now negotiating independent trade deals.

There hasn't been a 'blockbuster' deal yet but the India negotiations have massive potential.

Personally I think we should be going much further with cutting tariffs independently but things are getting better from a free trade perspective.

I'm sure that nothing I say will change your mind however.

We've lost the ability to easily import Taiwanese made bicycles from, um, France which is obviously a disaster. I can't think where we could possibly import them from instead.

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David9694 replied to Rich_cb | 1 year ago
1 like

So tell me a Brexit benefit. Can you? 

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Rich_cb replied to David9694 | 1 year ago
0 likes

Independent trade deals and tariff setting.

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