Among other things, Benjamin’s company, eCycleElectric, tracks imports of e-bikes.
The rise of sophisticated B2C brands selling at or near what has traditionally been bike ship price territory is a signal that more Americans are ready to make a quality e-bike purchase without benefit of a test ride, assembly or after-sale service from the supplier.
“The business continues to be very vigorous,” Benjamin says with characteristic understatement.
As far as I know, most D2C companies offer something in the bike shops’ price points,” he continues.
“Going to a brick and mortar store is no longer the obvious thing to do,” he states.
After all, bike shops only see D2C bikes when they have problems. The ones where everything goes well are effectively invisible to the channel.
“Bike shops have gotten a little better in the last 20 years, but the D2C people have become freaking awesome in terms of quality of the product, assembly, packaging and customer service,” Benjamin says.
Working on electric bike parts is harder and a lot of bike shops won’t work on bikes that weren’t purchased there.
Despite this, bike shops are becoming more flexible about repairing e-bikes.
Direct-to-consumer sales are booming, he points out, both in e-bikes and pedal-only models.
Wire spoke wheels will become rare and cast wheels are already becoming cheap and very accurate.
D2C brands have the profit margins to absorb the higher initial cost of low-maintenance components without raising retail prices, Benjamin says.
Consumers are expressing a preference for bikes shipped directly to them.
Quality batteries are now coming with a five-year warranty; there are e-bikes that have been ridden for the past ten years and the batteries are still going strong.
Over time, the lower-maintenance bicycle will come down in cost as manufacturing scales to meet demand, Benjamin says.
As we go to press with this story, Rad Power, the industry leader in D2C e-bike sales has just announced it will be opening five new physical retail locations in major US markets in 2022.