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Sounds like the rug is being pulled and this is going to get exponentially worse very quickly.
I have no sadness for VCs imploding. My thoughts go out to the staff who have been shafted by them like the rest of us
Neil SuperstarComponents
VC's always stick around when the going is good but the second the market turns they load the company up with debt then screw it over. Be a real shame to see CRC and Wiggle go as they have a long history catering for riders but I'm under no illusions that they are the same companies they were a few years ago. The core staff may be the same, and are the real victims of the VC's, but the company is no longer catering to the customers. They're just after the money and nothing else.
I’m also pleasantly surprising that ST are okay with us speculating on the demise of the company that they’ve just taken on as a major sponsor for the site…
I'm just hoping STW have had the payment up front or at least on a rolling basis!
My guilt level over not using a UK based reseller/dropshipper/distributor instead is very low.
My risk appetite for using direct sales from China is very low. I almost exclusively buy from UK based companies. I feel no patriotic duty, I just have no time for faff-on
Being from Portsmouth and a kid who was into mountain biking in the 90's, I have a soft spot for Wiggle, or old Wiggle at least.
Butlers Cycles used to be the only decent shop in Pompey and we would be down there evenings after school and every weekend we weren't at QECP or up on Portsdown Hill riding the chalk pits.
Mitch, the guy that owned Butlers used to let us hang around, give us discounts and even let us have access to the workshop and mechanic on occasions for free.
Mitch started Wiggle out of Butlers, he was a good guy that always treated us kids with respect and he spotted an opportunity that he built a good business on.
So from that point of view, I have a soft spot for the business even though he sold his share years ago. I use CRC/Wiggle a fair amount, as well as Brink, my now LBS and having the choice of both sources has been useful for me.
finbar
This is reminding me of Keller sports. Big euro sportswear retailer who went under at the end of last year due to mismanagement, and I’ve not found anyone better for running shoes since
I used startfitness recently for some new running shoes - good price & excellent service!
Regarding Wiggle, I'll be gutted if they disappear! A large proportion of my kit is either Lifeline or dhb - it performs well at a sensible price & I know the sizing of dhb clothing generally suits me.
Mike Ashley is probably on the blower to his accountant as we speak.
I'd suspect that's been in the works for a while and just hastened by the last few weeks (Probably not hurt the purchase price either!) it would fit with a web based focus for signa group and the High Street presence is in keeping with the other parts of Ashley's portfolio.
My risk appetite for using direct sales from China is very low. I almost exclusively buy from UK based companies. I feel no patriotic duty, I just have no time for faff-on
IME it's been less faff than UK based retail.
If there's an issue you just raise a dispute via Ali Express, the seller offers you ~30% off to cancel the dispute, you reject it (because a broken part isn't worth it) and you get a full refund in a few days.
Even the tax is now dealt with properly.
The only drawback is the shipping time, usually about 10 days. It's fine for building a bike when things will arrive in drips and drabs, or 'nice to have' stuff like matchmakers, things you'd buy in advance/bulk (brake olives, bleed kits). Not great if you're in a hurry and that part is stopping you riding though.
So do we think nukeproof / vitus warranties are potentially looking shaky?
A large proportion of my kit is either Lifeline or dhb
Are Lifeline a Chiggle brand? Sure I've seen there stuff on other websites. Yeah, I really rate Lifeline and would be sorry to see that go, in fact I was considering starting a thread the other day about brands that punch well above their weight, lifeline being just that brand for me.
Lifeline was basically a loss leader cheap brand to get you to buy other stuff at chiggle. Generic catalog stuff done on minimal margin.
I’m not sure there’s much value in any of the house brands. The ones with bought in heritage were just that, buy a long dead brand name to give your VC funded house brand a bit of bought in soul
now they have been abused and butchered for the corporate growth plan who is gonna want them? Maybe if they are free
cynical? Me? Never…
Neil SuperstarComponents
I read that 30% of ALL small packages going into the USA are shein and temu sales. This is utter insanity caused by low value import exemptions and state supported postage in China. The EU and eventually the U.K. solved the import exemption problem but they can still ship for less direct from China than within the U.K. to the U.K.
@superstarcomponents I meant to reply to this the other day but forgot. The Chinese state doesn't directly subsidise postage, it's subsidised under the world wide UPU agreement by 'richer' countries.
Essentially the in country postal company only needs to charge what it costs them to get it on a plane, then the delivery country postal company delivers it for free.
I agree with the principle of the UPU whereby the cost of sending an international letter is relative to the cost of living in each country, so it means somebody in say Africa can afford to send international mail without it costing them a significant amount of money, and the same does apply to a lot of Chinese citizens, however I do feel the likes of Aliexpress are abusing the system and severely disadvantaging retailers in richer countries.
and I’ve not found anyone better for running shoes since 🙁
sportshoes.com has always been the place to go for running shoes. It’s also a family run business based in Shipley, Yorkshire
TBH now that I have discovered that bike-discount are shipping to my region again, I can't imagine CRC/wiggle will be getting that much future business.
More bad news for Chiggle. This really feels like the death throws...
Sounds like recycled cycling news 😉
Sounds like recycled cycling news 😉
Just cycled surely?
Isn't it strange how this thread speculating about the demise of chiggle has been going on for days now yet the ones regarding planet x got binned in a matter of hours?
crc/wiggle brand will surely remain - and its likely the entire backend (warehouses etc) will as well. There's huge value in the brand, even if the parent company has run at a loss.
yet the ones regarding planet x got binned in a matter of hours?
I imagine they did what every PX thread did and degenerated into a pile on of "I bought a bike in nineteen ought six, the seat post wasn't standard and the customer service was terrible"
If there’s an issue you just raise a dispute via Ali Express, the seller offers you ~30% off to cancel the dispute, you reject it (because a broken part isn’t worth it) and you get a full refund in a few days.
Yeah that does sounds pretty easy I've got to admit. My version of that is; if there's an issue, I pick up the phone and talk to some-one and 9/10 they sort it out there and then which for me at least, makes me feel better. I get there's different ways of dong things and over the years you've doubtless paid less than me for parts, but then I don't have a fleet of bikes to look after and I can afford to use OEM bits and pieces. More than one way to skin a cat etc etc. 👍
I'm just building a war chest for the Wiggle fire sale, any day now...
Don’t get your hopes up about a sale. It’s been on for months now!
if they do go pop then either it will get sold as a going concern or the whole thing auctioned off to the trade. An administrator can’t be bothered faffing with end user sales
from looking at their public figures and what Signa has said they have been running as a huge loss maker to dominate the market. They have been successful at that but it’s not translated into a money maker, just a pass the parcel between VCs and unfortunately Signa has opened the last wrap the find a grenade with the pin out
neil SuperstarComponents
I’m just building a war chest for the Wiggle fire sale, any day now…
Given some of the prices they've been knocking stuff out at of late I'd be unsurprised to see that being more not less expensive than current prices.
crc/wiggle brand will surely remain – and its likely the entire backend (warehouses etc) will as well. There’s huge value in the brand, even if the parent company has run at a loss.
This financial situation does seem perilous, but there must be a fundamentally sound business underneath it all.
Maybe we need the gov't to step in and nationalise them.
#TooBigToFail
I imagine they did what every PX thread did and degenerated into a pile on of “I bought a bike in nineteen ought six, the seat post wasn’t standard and the customer service was terrible”
The PX thread got deleted because it was on here before it was official.
We're just discussing stuff already in the public domain here.
if they do go pop then either it will get sold as a going concern or the whole thing auctioned off to the trade. An administrator can’t be bothered faffing with end user sales
They did with Moore Large.
Isn’t it strange how this thread speculating about the demise of chiggle has been going on for days now yet the ones regarding planet x got binned in a matter of hours?
What this 8 page one that's still open?
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/planet-x-in-administration/
I think there was another one a few weeks before that with a rumour, but that's the difference between discussing news/facts and rumnours.
Given some of the prices they’ve been knocking stuff out at of late I’d be unsurprised to see that being more not less expensive than current prices.
I'd be surprised if their suppliers are supplying them with anything to put into a sale? Might explain why there's deals on own-brand stuff you'd expect them to have a lot stock of. And only the odd fork/dropper from elsewhere.
They did with Moore Large.
Order of magnitude difference in scale though. Chiggle has an enormous distribution center, Moore Large had a warehouse on an industrial estate.
Moore Large was a distributor, which would be a harder business to price up as a going concern as there's nothing to stop the potential buyers just bypassing them and going straight to the suppliers to start the business from scratch if there's a demand for the products.
And Moore Large was liquidated, which is the step after administration if a buyer can't be found or the administrator thinks the assets are worth more than potential buyers are offering. Someone will want to buy the business. Administrators are tasked with maximizing the return to creditors (which the administration process is intended to protect them/the business from) so once in administration they don't need to hold "sales" to generate short term cash flow (which might actually harm the companies value).
And only the odd fork/dropper from elsewhere.
I assume that's because they don't come in size xxxxl colour unicorn vomit.
There's plenty of stuff on wiggle in the "spend £200 get £50 off" which isn't an own brand.
I’d be surprised if their suppliers are supplying them with anything to put into a sale?
Given the scale of wiggle (world's biggest online retailer at one point iirc?) their warehouse will have a lot of kit in it to sell through. Some of it new but I suspect there will be huge volumes of old season and discontinued kit in there.
Been following this thread for a few days as well as hearing some things from mates in the bike trade. Key thing at the moment (just checked) is that both CRC/Wiggle are still trading so would still be solvent(no big warning messages sent out anywhere yet as far as I can see) , all of the issues at the moment seem to be at the very top level/parent company Signa Sports United.
Looking at the CW article on this, the issue at present appears to be that SSU has (had) a holding company above it that was providing financing/liquidity and this agreement was terminated. Could mean quite a few things but the most likely thing right now is that SSU has to seek urgent refinancing, restructuring and/or start selling off or closing parts of its business. IIRC SSU is also a German company so likely a lot of legal stuff going on there too (just note that German corporate business/bankruptcy/closure laws take effect and these are potentially a bit different to the UK law).
My own random guess here (and I really dont know anything except for previously working in two companies that went into bankruptcy/receivership...not fun) would be that CRC/Wiggle, being an established very large commercial operation that has shown it can run e-commerce pretty effectively and profitably (recent issues excepted), creating cashflow and shareholder value (thats the key here) may get spun off/sold on as a going concern/undergo some form of MBO/restructured or something else before anyone would consider moving to a full close down.
I do find it amazing that they managed to spend so long, and supposedly so much money, on updating their website but you still can't get it to reliably show you only items that are in stock (tyres, in stock only, 29 and it will show you models where only the 27.5 variant is in stock)
or simple as search by length for chain sets,
and the pricing is all over, last month SRAM Force Chainsets in a 172.5mm 46/33 were £80 quid, they are now £300
The Vitus gravel bike I got from Wiggle was great VFM, it would be a shame if they went under.
Last month I almost pulled the trigger on a Vitus eMTB that was down to £2300 from £3300, all OOS now. Can't decide whether I missed out or dodged a bullet.
Surely brexit has had a hand to play in CRC's demise.
Talking to a mate the other day. He ordered a new bar from CRC for 70€. Got stung by Italian customs for 180€.
Now he uses the German sites. I'm sure lots of other folks in Europe do the same now.
I used to use CRC a fair bit, but not once since brexit.
Was about to rant about their website being useless after looking for a light last week and not even being able to filter the hundreds of option down to rear lights. However, today, the first filter option is 'front', 'Rear', 'sets', etc. So it does appear there's recent work going on in the background of the site.
alpin
Surely brexit has had a hand to play in CRC’s demise.
Talking to a mate the other day. He ordered a new bar from CRC for 70€. Got stung by Italian customs for 180€.
Now he uses the German sites. I’m sure lots of other folks in Europe do the same now.
I certainly do, CRC aren't competitive on price, and they used to be quick delivery to me, now they are much slower. and they don't stock much other than their own brand stuff nowadays. Flick through theie "brands" section and see how many of them are empty.
Not sure I'd blame them for Italian customs, though - they should be doing the same for Italy as any other eu country, and works fine here. Italy do like a sneaky extra tax. I remember an uplift operator telling me he couldn't have a logo on his van as it meant paying an extra tax
My own random guess here ... would be that CRC/Wiggle, being an established very large commercial operation that has shown it can run e-commerce pretty effectively and profitably ... may get spun off/sold on as a going concern
This is what would seem obvious to me as well. They'd be insane to wrap it up, they're a household name and that is important.
Surely brexit has had a hand to play in CRC’s demise.
Talking to a mate the other day. He ordered a new bar from CRC for 70€. Got stung by Italian customs for 180€.
Now he uses the German sites. I’m sure lots of other folks in Europe do the same now.
I used to use CRC a fair bit, but not once since brexit.
The opposite is also true, buying from on the continent directly became a bit of a pita for folks in the UK, which would be the primary market for both crc and wiggle, especially for bigger ticket stuff. (and some sellers simply not selling into the UK at the lower end eg bike-components. de, or at all anymore eg rose.)
I know it's not the done thing here to say this but Brexit isn't the cause of all problems any more than the EU was the solution to all of them.
It's nuanced.
CRC/Wiggle, being an established very large commercial operation that has shown it can run e-commerce pretty effectively and profitably … may get spun off/sold on as a going concern
This going concern.......Wiggle Chain Reaction Cycles records £97 million loss
Not sure that anyone will want to sort that out
And how many of us have stopped buying from Chiggle cos they've lost their edge
I know I'm using Merlin, SigMa, Tredz now, and hardly go near them
VCs made a bet that subsidising market share for cycling supplies would force out their competitors and lead them to profit.
It hasn’t, and it’s a commodity business. They’ve got some small brands, but very little that can’t be easily replicated.
Being a household name is worth very little in a market where you’re competing on price.
I can’t really see where the value is.
They’re also a large part of the reason that so many LBSs have gone out of business or been bought by chains.
The opposite is also true, buying from on the continent directly became a bit of a pita for folks in the UK
Yup, for sure.... But a market of 60odd million in the UK vs 300m in Europe who previously weren't having to pay extra taxes on the items they bought from CRC.
I used to use CRC loads whilst in Germany, as did all my riding clique. Now no one uses CRC.