Bike demo day

I went to a couple of Evans stores when I was looking at my Giant Propel.  This admittedly is 8 years ago, but they were happy to let me loose on a couple of machines at both places.  I had to leave my credit card details, but that wasn't an issue.

I learned the Fuji aero bike at the time was way harsher than the Propel, and that the Cannondale Super Six was lovely but not massively different to the bike I already had. 

I don't understand how folk can buy a bike online; I tend to dismiss geo differences as marketing guff but the overall effect of a few mm here or there and half a degree at that junction can have a massive difference.

5-10% of the purchase price of the bike. Probably around £100 minimum for a full day. 

Interested to know what the experience is with an LBS or the factory-backed shops (Spesh, Trek, Giant etc). Do they let you leave a deposit and do a long demo ride? 

I'm in the market for a Defy or Revolt but I'm between sizes and can't decide which would best suit my needs. So that's potentially 4 demo rides and a good three hours of time. Not sure how many LBS are interested in that level of customer service for a bike they'll only make a few quid on. But it's essential for me if I'm going to end up spending £3-4k on a new bike. There's only so much you can determine from geo charts and reviews. 

There's also the element of sales pressure too, and some people might feel awkward about showrooming an LBS or wasting their time.

One of my local hire places does have the Revolt but it's the ally version so wouldn't be an exact demo experience. That would cost me £40 for the day.

Probably partnering with manufacturer's marketing departments would be the way to go - I know road.cc did this pre-COVID a couple of times. It works really well for high-end kit and you could act as a broker for local dealers to ensure they don't miss out on sales. Effectively you're offering them pre-sales support.

For example, Zeiss run a hire program for optics (similar cost to mid-range bikes). Hire is free for a short period and for longer periods you get your hire fee back if you make a purchase. They also provide a discount voucher which can be spent with select retailers - I ended up getting a pair of £2k bins for £1600. And I chose Zeiss simply because I could demo them over a weekend for free whereas Swarovski and LEICA only offered that service at local dealer demo days which weren't happening because COVID.

My LBS also ran demo days for certain brands which clearly they were being paid to do - as it was just Trek and not the other brands they sell.

Whilst you've got the space it does feel like it's quite capital-intensive and you'll also need mechanical support for the bikes, maybe have a chat with a local hire place to see how much. My local trail centre has about 50 bikes, and two full-time mechanics doing safety checks and adjustments. They flip their fleet every year which is good for finding a bargain.

Capital-wise you're probably looking at 3 of each bike (S,M,L) or maybe 4 or 5 so you've got a couple of each of the common sizes. You could branch out into used bike sales too - there's definitely an opportunity for a "bike supermarket" type approach. The trade is doing it to a certain extent (e.g cycletrade.com) but that market is ripe for disruption.