Canyon Bicycles aims for urban drivers, spotting cultural shift

Canyon, the German bicycle manufacturer that supplies some of its higher-end models for the WorldTour, is seeking to double sales of its urban bikes by the middle of this decade amid changes to mobility.

Why it matters

How people get around is big business, with brands such as Canyon and upstart Van Moof rethinking what they consider their competition and going after car buyers, mostly in urban locations.

From a marketing perspective, the automotive industry is a big spender on high-reach premium video and audio advertising, as well as the search advertising that befits high-involvement, deeply researched categories.

As people look to their own carbon footprint as part of a wider set of sustainability changes, bikes may well start to eat into a chunk of that spending.

What’s happening

In an interview with the Financial Times, Nicolas de Ros Wallace, CEO of Canyon, explains that one of the company’s key priorities now lies in urban cycling, an area where the brand sees “huge growth”. It aims to make this segment account for 20% of the firm's total sales.

The plan is to service this growth with chunkier models built for durability and cargo rather than speed or downhill performance.

With cities investing heavily in bike infrastructure, the CEO feels that urbanist trends fit in with sustainable transport. He also notes how even an extremely high-end bike is cheaper to run than a car – “you don’t pay insurance and you can park it anywhere”.

New techniques

E-bike growth is well documented, but the techniques to sell them appear to borrow increasingly from automotive. Canyon, for instance, nabs the term SUV for its €4,199 Pathlite SUV bicycle.

The new golf?

The SUV model differs from the kind of pared down racing machines favoured by middle-aged men in lycra (MAMILs) who have made the sport of cycling their new favourite, moneyed pastime. But the presence of a well-to-do audience of enthusiasts suggests there may yet be an opportunity to add more vehicles to these cyclists’ fleets.

Sourced from the Financial Times, Cycling.CC, WARC.

[Image: Canyon]