This morning Halfords said that sales for the year had surpassed £1bn for the first time and the company’s chairman Dennis Millard revealed later that it had sold 1.3 million bikes in the year, which works out at more than 3,500 a day.

😯

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/how-popularity-cycling-giving-bike-retailers-like-halfords-boost-1504703

If this forum was representative of UK cyclists then all IBDs would have gone bust years ago 😀

Most of those bikes will be 26 inch wheeled hardtails.

They will have inner tubes.

They will have normal sized tyres.

They won’t have dropper posts.

They will have double or triple chainsets.

They will be 9 or 10 speed.

Typical MTB users are very casual users who ride along towpaths, cycle to the local park with mates, cycle round the lanes close to where they live, cycle occasionally off road on common land/national trust/forestry commission type stuff.

It’s only bike geeks and enthusiasts that fret over the change to 11 speed, whether to go 1x, 140mm or 160mm frame for the new trail bike build, what brand of dropper post, tyres for every occasion, strava, plus size tyres, 650b or 29er, carbon or titanium, etc etc…..we are but a small collective niche in a massive sea of short travel Alu hardtails!

I don’t know why anyone would think this forum is representative. But I do own 3 halfords bikes… Probably quite a few of ’em on here.

@deviant- just had a quick look, while 26 is still their most common wheelsize it’s not by much and it won’t be for long- the apollo range is moving to 650b, all their quality lines have already changed, they offer a £150 29er too. Though I understand their best seller is still a trax URT. Looks like everything but the very bottom of the barrel is going to make the jump shortly.

They even sell a fatbike. A shit one, mind. And a universally acclaimed 29er.

Just selling my daughters Halfords bike on Ebay (24″ Carerra Luna). I think this forum is representative of mountain bikers and enthusiastic cycling generalists. It is not representative of the average person in the UK who buys a bike.

I’ve never thought this forum was representative of UK cycling.
It’s representative of middle aged, middle class mountain bike owners (like myself).
I meet plenty of mountain bike riders who’ve never heard of this place let alone cyclists in general.

Why would you want it to be representative?

If it was it would be people asking questions on which is the best sub £300 FS bike to buy from Halfords and other topics I can’t even really imagine from people who solely use a bike to get from A to B and take it to a bike shop to get a puncture fixed.

Nothing wrong at all with those people or how they use their bikes and there may even be forums for them but not one I have any interest in at all.

I have to say the the two Apollo bike my folks bought to eternally sit in the shed are actually very good quality considering the £100 paid. Not a bad bike for half an XX1 cassette 🙂

“It’s representative of middle aged, middle class mountain bike owners“

Nail. Head.

Depending on how the next couple of months work out, I’m quite likely to buy a bike from halfords.

Right bike, right price, right place.

I wonder how much of there growth has been driven by Boardman. Who seem to be quite good at knocking out decent bikes at affordable prices that are widely available in nearby easy to acces stores.

“It’s representative of middle aged, middle class mountain bike owners”

Nail. Head.

How very dare you.

I’m not middle aged. Just. Yet.

Oh dear , I think I just joined the wrong forum . I’m only working class but I do have a nice bike and I’m middle aged so two out of three ?. Can I stay please ???

as long as you aspire to be middle class you should be fine

who’ve never heard of this place

First rule of STW, never talk about STW 🙂

“It’s representative of middle aged, middle class mountain bike owners”
Nail. Head.

lol, and the downtrodden working class and the aspirational golfer types and whatever else is being flung round.

Representative of anything?Not really

I dunno.. I reckon it’s a fair representation of insecure, bicycle obsessed, mildly narcissistic types 🙂

Has it ever been? Would it want to be?

I’ll try my best . I only stumbled across this site last week and only joined because someone was looking for a large transition patrol. Trouble was he found one before I was allowed to make a comment

I’ll try my best . I only stumbled across this site last week and only joined because someone was looking for a large transition patrol. Trouble was he found one before I was allowed to make a comment

Don’t worry, you’ll be timing your Iberital grind with a Patek before the week’s over.

Lol Scapegoat . Had to Google your last comment. Think I’m going to like it here . It’s even educational ?

‘Jimob’ its not to late to escape, bet you can feel the beard growing already, do you own a Skoda or Audi? if not you will soon as you will need it to pick up your Ground Coffee machine from John Lewis 😀

It’s representative of middle aged, middle class mountain bike owners

… and ride road bikes mainly.

Half of them at least 😉

(runs and hides 😈 😛 )

I own a halfords bike my previous mtb was a halfords one aswell.

This forum is representative of, this kind of cyclist

Good wording choice 😉

Sorry unovolo . I’ve already have a beard and drive a T5 . Maybe I am middle class but never knew it 🙂

I’ve never thought this forum was representative of UK cycling.

Agreed. It’s not in any way representative. What it is, is a certain kind of affluent, experimental and not especially rad cutting edge. It’s packed with people whose riding motto is “don’t knock it until you’ve tried it, but definitely try it”.

When I first joined, it seemed as though everyone was singlespeeding. Then, slightly later, people had fixed wheel MTBs (at least several people did). Then people started getting into 29ers in a big way. Then we started seeing the fatbikes. All through that, people have been pushing their bike-packing game, trying to make hub gears and belt-drives work, playing with touring and CX bikes and generally picking up, or perhaps leading, trends.

I know there’s loads and loads and loads of people who aren’t on that particular leading edge and have followed all of those fads with something between wry amusement and barely-suppressed rage (and that’s only to be expected!). But it’s the inventiveness, the willingness to give stuff a go, the absolute refusal to reject eccentric ideas and the willingness to play with niche ideas about what mountainbiking is that makes this place so delightful.

🙂

…It’s not in any way representative

I doubt the posts are even representative of the forum users – would guess at 95% of the posts by 5% of the members, if that….

Have never thought this site represented the average UK cyclist in any way.

… and ride road bikes mainly.

Half of them at least

Hey! You’ve forgotten those of us who have pretty much given up bikes for running 🙁

I never thought this forum was representative of UK cyclists, pretty narrow section (middle class whiney cockbags) of an already narrow section of cycling (dandyhorse riders).
But from another angle who are you classing as cyclists? Any one who has ever ridden a bike? Anyone who owns one? Or someone who rides atleast a couple of times a year? I assume we’ll have more in common with the last group. I’m guessing a lot of halfords sales are kids bikes, extrapolating, their parents aren’t cyclists, they’re just going to a shop they know and buying something that is the right price*, I don’t think this is a glowing reference for cyclists liking halfords and their bikes.
The kids probably wanted bronsons 🙂

Just discussing, I’m happy to hear bikes sales are up…with the priviso:

Though I understand their best seller is still a trax URT.

God that’s a depressing thought, one of the UK’s biggest bike shops’ biggest seller is a heavy horrible POS. Not very conducive to people continuing to do a lot of cycling is it?

*tho not the right size, if my parents are anything to go by it’ll be something too big “so they can grow into it”