Bicycle Association launches NEW Market Data Service

The Bicycle Association of Great Britain today announced the soft-launch of its market data service, offering UK sales data covering bikes, parts, accessories, and services for the first time. Insight from the data will underpin the industry’s new advocacy programme to grow cycling whilst also supporting and strengthening UK bike businesses for the road ahead.

Users will be able to compare their own data to market and sector averages down to category, sub-category, and even SKU level in some areas. Data can also be filtered by price band, by channel, by region or retailer-type.

BA Exec Director Steve Garidis said: “Customers, trading conditions, and market trends in cycling have never evolved faster. And the cycling industry has never been more diverse and competitive. Cycling is changing and growing: for sport, for leisure, for health and for transport. Now our industry needs accurate market data more than ever – to underpin our advocacy work, and to strengthen UK cycling businesses. That’s why the Bicycle Association has developed this service – on a not-for-profit basis – designed to be as low cost and accessible as possible.”

The total cost, underwritten by the Association on behalf of the industry, will be recouped through BA members subscribing to the service, with the more members subscribing, the lower the costs. It will be free to bike shops with a turnover of under £5m.

The BA has spent 8 months building the support and infrastructure needed to offer the service. It has recruited by competitive tender a specialist data partner, SPORTS MARKETING SURVEYS INC, who will produce a high quality, detailed monthly reporting service available via a dynamic on-line dashboard. SMS Inc will handle all the raw data on behalf of the Association and ensure with a wide range of measures that all data will remain anonymous, accurate, and reliable.

BA Associate Director, Simon Irons, who was previously Group Cycling Director at Halfords and has led the project, said: “We have developed the service taking the best of what we have seen from other sectors like UK Grocery, where market data has long been established as an essential bench-marking tool to help businesses improve their sales and profitability performance, but also most importantly by working closely with a number of our members including independent bike shops, brands and large multi-store retailers so we can ensure that the Service is both high quality and completely tailored to their needs.”

The service already has the support of leading retailers, brands, and distributors within BA membership, and the soft-launch period, January to March, will be used to recruit further afield. The service will be free during the soft launch period and anyone who signs up to the reporting service prior to 31st March will get a lifetime free upgrade to the silver level version of the dashboard. The Association is targeting 70% coverage of the market by the end of the first year.

Please click on https://www.bicycle-association.org.uk/market-data for more details and to sign up to the service.