Bike industry turmoil: Shimano says global cycling market remains “weak” as segment sales fall by a quarter – and worse to come?

Shimano says demand is weak yet I wonder.  For instance some of my favorite bike brands are now only offering SRAM.  Why?  

Is SRAM preceived as better?  All the bikes I've bought in the last 35 years have been Shimano but now I see the possibility that my next one might be SRAM because it isn't available with Shimano.  

There is some key info missing from this article about the competition and its' effect on Shimano's hegemony in the bicycle component market.  

I have 2 decent but not ridiculous bikes plus a single speed commuter. I won't be buying another,,perhaps ever. Isn't that part  of the problem with new bike sales? Post the boom, everyone's got one. Or two.

I've owned 3 road bikes in my life. 
- trek 1000 (circa 2000) second hand with Sora group set. $400usd

- Merida Reacto ultegra (circa 2011) $2000 Australian Dollars

trek Emonda 2023 $7800 AUD

I look at my fancy new trek and love riding it, but realise at the same time how it was the worst decision to spend that kind of money on a bike that. Where does it end? I feel like I was caught up in the craze of chasing the super bike, lured into blowing money on a bike that I could still keep up with, on my 12 year old bike. 

Bike companies keep pushing the bs mantra of aero/watt savings and compliance etc to justify this nonsense.

next time I'm going back to basics and I guarantee I'll still love the ride, heck I'll probably get a second hand mountain bike too and still come out well under the price of my Emonda. 

Bike manufacturers have overreached and people are starting to see the picture. Only wish I had... 

What the hell is wrong going on in the bike industry?  This statement proves how out of touch the bike industry is with the average person.  They push bikes that $8,000 and a lot more, they push $1,000 wheel sets and more, really?  They think we're a bunch of millionaires out paying whatever price they think they can throw at us.  Even a simple mini pump costs over $50 if you want one that actually gets up to the pressure you need on a road bike; it's the same thing with tires, those to cost in excess of $60 each, a pair will cost about the same as car tire, and two bike tires don't have anywhere near the material used in it as a car tire does, nor does a bike tire have anywhere near the technology in it that a car tire has.  Or $80 for a bottle cage made of a tiny amount of carbon fiber that it shouldn't cost more than $20.

Even a $5,000 bike is nowhere near worth $5,000 in technology and gear, there are a lot of motorcycles you can buy brand new for that price, and there is no way that a bike has more technology than a motorcycle, not even close.  Those $5,000 bikes are only worth $2,000 at the most.

People are tired of finding out they have to spend $5,000 bicycles or more on a bicycle.  We don't need electronic shifting, we don't need disk brakes on a road bike.  We don't need bikes so fragile we have to use a torque wrench to prevent damaging the frame.   

The cycling industry has gone insane and then wants us to pay for that insanity.

The bike industry will burn then return with more thought to the working person rather than the corporate banker with x amount of disposable cash to blow on a 15k road bike with zero technology for the money..I can't really think of another sport that takes the piss so badly its sad really.. if you are a serious cyclist then you love the feel of a nice light bike but it costs more than the car on the drive !!!@ get real

I cannot really feel anxious about Shimano because it has an unprecedented advantage, it has an almost monopoly in a global market. It is good that Shimano exists because it gave us components and developed tech that was light, reliable and easy to operate, but now it has become I expensive compared with the equivalent chinese Sensah and L-Twoo and still can make huge profits. Why? Because most bikes have Shimano components.

Bikes will still continue to be sold, with most of them never to exceed 1000 miles ridden. And as more and more former developing countries have managed to improve their finances, billions of people can have the ability to buy a Shimano equiped bicycle.

I know that the latest Dura-Ace seems super expensive. But try imagining living in the 1980s riding with friction tube shifters and suddenly you ride a modern bike with Claris. You would be super-impressed, speaking about a miracle a technology, willing to spent a lot of money to buy this bike. Well now a Claris bike is maybe more expensive but much cheaper compared to a Dura-Ace one.

I believe few people are willing to buy top-end components from brands like Sensah and L-Twoo, as I find it hard for luxury frames like Moots, Colnago, Cervelo, Look etc to accept an "unbranded" part on their bikes, even if was possibly better (like Shimano was when it started). But in lower specs, such brands could make a difference.

For those saying "Its their own fault because they made everything too fancy now I won't buy it." You weren't buying anything anyway. If you refuse to upgrade to the next thing because its too fancy you sure as hell weren't going to replace a working drivetrain with the same thing again. 

They make products for people who are buying products, not people who are complaining on the internet. The people who are spending money want something new to justify spending that money. If Shimano didn't change their products (sometimes for change's sake) they would lose all of their sales to the competition who do change things up. 

Realistically, whatever your personal bias, bike products are a lot better now than they were 10 years ago because of this constant iterative development, disc brakes stop better than rim brakes, 12 speed shifts better and lasts just as long as 10 speed. 

bit off more than folks are willing to chew (or, something like that). yep; I don't want, need nor am I willing to purchase cf wheelsets for their disc brake tech. my rim brake wheelsets are still great and swapable; so, no sale shimano....buh bye

I think one of the biggest reasons for the drop, as highlighted by comments here, is the fact that the companies such as Shimano see their customers as cash rich fools. And in my opinion the single biggest mistake many manufacturers have made is to pursue electronic groupsets and stop making mechanical groupsets. I'll be honest, I've got lots of bikes, three of which cost me £5k, £4.5k and £7.5k. All of them have top end mechanical group sets, GRX, Record 12 speed and Super Record RS 11 speed. If I cannot buy a mechanical groupset in the future I will not buy another bike. My beloved Colnago C60 will never be upgraded, as the current Colnago C frame is electronic groupset only compatible. So Colnago have lost me as a customer if I decide to buy another bike. The industry is all about what the manufacturers want to sell the customer and how much profit they can make out of them, not about what the customer actually wants. Do any manufacturers actually think about how their customers actually feel about the situation? No. Because they just want to continuously shaft them, and, as has been reported here, its beginning to bite them on the backside. 
Take the current madness with concealed cables in forks, stems and bars. Yes, it may look sleek but do the manufacturers care that once the bike requires a new cable or headset bearings it entails a job taking bike shops hours, with a bill for fitting a new cable coming in at over £100 including Labour. 
Madness, absolute madness. 

The problem with cycling is the go faster part is your legs. You can't get away from the massive gains a training plan will give you over disc brakes and shifting easier or whatever.

You just can't sell them like motorbikes which will have a better engine, electronics, gadgets etc. I know people who will buy a new motorbike every year but there isn't the same hold over people in cycling. I have a carbon frame, a Sora groupset and some r501 wheels. It will do.

I don't think I'll help a lot in the future. The front derailleur I use has been scrapped, they don't do ten speed downtube shifters anymore, silver hubs are becoming a rare thing from them...

This is the trouble with chasing the big bucks that come with selling high-tech new geegaws to rich people. Sooner or later, they will move on to the next fad, and you'll have to go crawling back to your old customers, hoping you haven't completely alienated them. And the specialist journalists, who symbiotically have to stay close (but not too close) to the industry they cover, will likewise have to change their tune.

This news cannot be taking the manufacturers by surprise, at least if they have someone in their organisation with a vague grasp of economics. Prices have been skyrocketing over the past few years, well ahead of inflation, and people are now being squeezed to the extent that they cannot justify spending enormous amounts on over-priced kit and components. 

I put together an almost peloton-standard bike in 2016 for around £3,000 which, adjusting for inflation, would be around £4,000 today. However, a quick Google suggests that it would cost upwards of £8,000 to put together today's equivalent which is bonkers. 

In the UK what do expect, when the cost of stuff you can not do without, Food - a roof over your head is at just so expensive, people not spending on bikes kit or bits for bike, just making do with and fixing what they have is the only way forward, then it is no wonder that the bike industry is not in profit -when most people in the UK are far from being in profit in there dail lives - real wages are rubish today and when every thing cost to much this is no shock!!!