Who will be buying shares then?

http://road.cc/content/news/118628-wiggle-planning-stockmarket-float

30% Growth recently, 120 Road bikes built & sold a day, I would have thought it’s worth a punt, then again they’res an even better offer.. Saga

30% recent growth? Great can’t see another 30% though. If you want to invest just wait a couple of days for the drop.

Looks to me to be a way for the VCs to get their money back. I could of course be completely wrong but I’m not sure that there’s the growth of margin or sales that they’d need for shares to provide a big return compared to non bike-centric ones. If this had been a couple of years ago, I may have felt differently but hasn’t the market started to level off now and competition is increasing at the same time.

can’t see another 30% though

Broader international expansion? Brand acquisition and development? New product areas (For example, move in to skiing, sailing, equestrian, climbing, etc, etc.)

There’s plenty of potential there.

See, they’re already expanding in to selling motorbikes!
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/haibike-xduro-nduro-pro-ebike-26-inch-g2-2014/

New product areas (For example, move in to skiing, sailing, equestrian, climbing, etc, etc.)

Didn’t they try that for a bit already? (or was that CRC?)

nemesis – Member
Looks to me to be a way for the VCs to get their money back. I could of course be completely wrong

Agree to that statement…

CRC certainly tried snowboard stuff for a while.

(One advantage Wiggle has is the name. It doesn’t point to any specific industry/product range)

they already have a very broad international base delivering world wide and sponsoring out here in Australia. They ship loads over here but dropping the import tax threshold for personal imports (or a drop in the dollar) will cut into their market share. The german sites seem to have a much better price over some of the others in the UK.

They already cover a few other sports same as CRC but not sure how much you can get into others. Bikes and their kit has a great turn over rate and use rate, not many ski weekly for instance.

Both CRC & Wiggle tried Snowboarding unfortunately it coincided with bad weather years and the Snowboard market was on the slide (pardon the pun) and generally in a period of consolidation back then.

There are lots of opportunities for a web operation like Wiggle, they’re trying to woo brands back that have been bitten by CRC’s global discount operation which screws a brands international relations.

However right now the currency is back on the march, that will slow down all overseas web traffic from UK sites, unless like CRC they can amp up their own brands.

I still think it would be worth an in – out punt on the offer, most of the ‘analysts’ won’t have spotted what’s going on in the bike business nor will they for a while so it’ll get well subscribed imv.

Agree to that statement…

Which bit? 🙂

I was going to buy some shares, but could only find last year’s on their website in the wrong colour. Moot point really because I tried to order some and found it wasn’t in stock anyway.

UK consumer is not well off at the moment and unlikely to be so for quite a few more years yet. Plus, when interest rates go up (later this year/2015?) and mortgage repayments rise, expect all kinds of belt tightening, especially discretionary spend on stuff like mountain biking…

On the other hand, as people try and reduce transit spend they may cycle rather than drive or take the train, which could continue to boost demand for road bikes and associated kit

Who knows!

saga and wiggle will depend on valuation

With RM, whatever you thought about the business case, there was an 8% dividend yield to be had. No brainier, really.

Let’s see how they price the others. There have been a few disappointments recently so caveat emptor as always.