How many bikes do you reckon were sold in the UK last year then?

Eh?

Closest guess wins a romantic, candle-lit dinner date with Hora. Flash grenades optional.

GO!

6 ?

Lots.

Next.

Don’t be daft.

106.

EDIT: Is this a trick question; do ‘bikes’ include motorised ones / date with loose ladies / 29ers?

Can i play devils advocate from the point of view of a 26er Pilot!?

They were all 650B. Giants marketing dept have assured me

650(b)?

edit: binners you bugger, beat me to it by 19 seconds!

3 million

Oooooooooo – close

3 million and two

They’re outselling cars, I know that. The link below gives the answer away somewhat.

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/10/24/new-passenger-car-and-bicycle-sales-2012-_chartbuilder_custom-52ce0e51cc669b1c7267930f2f65dda1c5ceb3ba-s3-c85.png

Well I’ve cheated and read @honourabe’s link – impressed I would have guessed 1 million

I imagine kids bike sales are pretty significant in that number

Hora accounts for 67% of new frame sales. But I don’t know if that contributes to the total

Closest guess wins a romantic, candle-lit dinner date with Hora.

In that case, my answer is radiator.

In that case, my answer is radiator.

gah! I was going to say that.

:looks over shoulder:
:looks over other shoulder:
:looks under desk:
:checks ears for mind probe:
:checks other ear:

3.6 million bikes.

20% VAT, so 20% of, say £200 is £40.

£40 *3.6 million= £144 million.

So the £107 million “record investement” in cycling by the government over the next however (3?) many years is less than the VAT from just bikes in one year…..

Lets apply some logic to this and not cheat, in conjunction with the clue that it is close to 3 million

60ish million people in the uk, say 20% are kids and quarter of them get new bikes then say 150 sold to STWers and another 150 to the crazy cats on pink bike. that gives a grand total of 3 million 300

Therefore I will say
3 million 301

done, how’d I do?

[edit]Damnit now someone has gone and given the proper answer, out by a few hundred thousand. Rubish [/edit]

So bails gets hora… 😯

Wonder how many of the 3.6 million actually get used.

And how many more changed hands on the SH market…

Good old bradders wiggins I LOVE HIM …..every one went out and brought nice bikes then rode em once or twice then stuck them in the garage and never ride them again……GREAT in a way means theres lots and lots and lots of really nice second hand but imaculate bikes out there for sale at a fraction of the original purchase price….

So are people really going out still and buying brand new ……….

3.6 million bikes.

20% VAT, so 20% of, say £200 is £40.

£40 *3.6 million= £144 million.

So the £107 million “record investement” in cycling by the government over the next however (3?) many years is less than the VAT from just bikes in one year….
Assuming none were bought on C2W schemes, which seems unlikely.

Looking healthy

Ive got a nice S Works Tarmac SL3 with dura ace in my garage for sale at a fraction of the price; but i buy and sell bikes like my kids eat sweets so ive probably accounted for a good chunk of sales.

so the number of units sold hasn’t increased massively in the past 10 years, but people are spending more on bikes? is that because they’re a rip off now, or because people are buying higher spec bikes?

Dagnabit. I NEED just one more! Think of the kiddies and N+1 rule!

Edited because I’m thick.

Interesting thing on that graph Shermer is the sudden jump in average price 2009-2010.
Any idea why people are suddenly buying more expensive bikes?

.
[EDIT] Brakes appears to have noticed it too.

Good old bradders wiggins I LOVE HIM …..every one went out and brought nice bikes then rode em once or twice then stuck them in the garage and never ride them again……GREAT

Apart from the fact that the number of bikes sold annually has not increased in the last ten years obviously 😉

See thats how I got my specialized RockHopper SL Pro (2010) the gent brought it under the C2W thing and then never used it so basicly I got a brand new bike for a quarter of the shop price and its imaculate. So I love the C2W scheame and Bradders Wiggins as he got every one buying bikes….So I got a upgrade from a rusty heap to a nice bike and can put far more effort now in to my biking…

Who buys a spanking new bike especialy a pricey one ????? (except the C2W scheame people)….Its like who buys a brand new car as soon as it leaves the show room it looses a bomb in value….

Well the number of sales may not of incresed (NEW sales) but I know so many people who went and got bikes after his win who prob wouldnt have and poss his win may of encoraged people who were elagable for the C2W scheame to actualy take advantage of that who knows ….Im just chuffed I got a nice bike now lol

W’appen between 02 and 03?

It would be intresting to see a chart of the years weather against the sales chart to see if good summer weather is related to sales at all was 02-03 a really nice summer and mild winter maybe….

Used classic consultancy interview technique to make guesstimate but underestimated by 1/2m

This figure above ate nominal figures, so sales are declining in real terms. No wonder we have to endure so much marketing BS and spurious innovation amongst the genuine improvements!

Woohay!!

I Pay Tax..since I bought two road bikes last year can I call it Road tax?

No wonder we have to endure so much marketing BS and spurious innovation amongst the genuine improvements!

But how many of the bikes are at the ‘innovative’ end of the market. I’d have thought most are fairly cheap ‘established technology’ ones.

And Rusty, fair point on C2W.

But the grpah with € values on it shows about €1150m, or £1bn of bike sales two years ago, so the VAT on that would be £200m, so the cycling investment still looks a bit less generous.

So the £107 million “record investement” in cycling by the government over the next however (3?) many years is less than the VAT from just bikes in one year…..

True, but we’re doing better that the Halloween and novelty masks industry. They’re rightfully pssed off at the lack of government investment vs VAT gains.

if you see all those new [ ? ] riders within the context of all the accidents where cyclists are hurt or killed and I think we might have a bit of an issue

Increased bicycle sales can only be a good thing, nothing challenges the “outlier status” of cycling like those comparative sales figures…

People still seem to think I’m nuts for riding more than 10 miles to work though…

Personally I think its sticking, I’m seeing more regular cycle commuters along my route to work than I did this time last year… a good proportion are sticking it out through winter…

“Jonny come lately”, “fairweather” types or not, I can’t view greater popularisation of cycling as a bad thing TBH…

From that chart it looks like average bike price about £335 in 2011 then (I suspect some on here are propping that up!) Interestingly it looks like the average amount spent per bike has gone up significantly, up from about £220 in 2009. Maybe this is due to an increase in sales of adult bikes vs kids bikes?

Edit: Wonder what happened in 2003? Cycle to work scheme?

if you see all those new [ ? ] riders within the context of all the accidents where cyclists are hurt or killed and I think we might have a bit of an issue

So who are all these “new” riders that people keep talking about then ?

They don’t seem to appear in the sales figures graph over the last 10 years …. ?

Are they fictional or just “under the radar” types that don’t appear on graphs.

Neal, graph shows very little. Could be that 10 years ago 75% of sales were kids bikes, those kids stuck with bikes as they grew up and now the majority of sales are to adults hence we see more people out on bikes on the roads.

Wonder what happened in 2003?

London Congestion Charge was introduced. London bike shops have seen a massive increase in sales since that date, which probably account for much of the increase in new bicycle sales nationwide. Other factors such as the 7/7 bombings and a steep rise in public transport costs inLondon have contributed to the growth in bike sales.

London Congestion Charge was introduced.

Blimey that is quite a hike. Over 1M extra bikes on the streets of London in a year then! Interesting that the increase seems to have been sustained too. I wonder if Boris bikes will hit bike sales? Or are the users likely people who wouldn’t have brought bikes anyway?