I’ve been a trainerroad user numerous times over the years and the current pricing is simply not value for me, so I won’t come back.
If it was $100-120 odd dollars for the year I’d probably drop that year on year and dip in and out of plans as the year goes… With the current pricing I simply won’t pay it either per month for a few months or for the year upfront.
It’s as simple as if I use TR from January to August, I have to pay 4 or 5 months for something I dont use, since I can build by myself the offseason and base period, also part of the season I’ve adapted the polarised plans with more interesting workouts, so not pay and forget, for me, and I believe most experienced and old users too. Still is worth, sure.
The thing is this grandfathering thing provides a steady cash flow for TR all over the year. This bussiness is seasonal by nature, so keeping subscriptions active it’s important even if implies loosing little of margin, because costs, salaries, R&D, marketing, whatever can’t ease because its September and most users don’t wan’t go that serious until January.
So if that is positive for me. Like outdoors workouts, that help a lot with keeping subscriptions when weather is good.
For the value that TR provides me, lots of FTP gains and a quality training program over the year, I think it’s dirt cheap.
I’ve had other coaching services that come in at ca half of the price per month. easy to pay much more than that.
Not quite sure who you were replying to here.
If me my assertion is that TR is overpriced for the market, just an assumption that it could be hurting the uptake of new subscribers.
I don’t care what anyone else pays, but if it’s artificially inflating the price of the product and making people look elsewhere then everyone should care.
But the market should bear this out….as I noted above, back when I was a member of a training center, for a long time demand outstripped supply so the owners kept raising the monthly fee (as they should have). Finally they reached a breaking point where the cost outweighed what the market would sustain.
If the price of TR is being inflated, artificially or not, the numbers will bear it out and then you now where the breaking point is and adjustments can be made. At this point, the evidence which we are privy to indicates that their pricing model is working.
That would be nice, I live in South Africa and TR is quite expensive here. But to be honest so is anything that we pay for in US$.
For me TR is a no-brainer when you calculate the watts gained/ $ spent. However I do understand everyone is in different situations but this is what worked for me. The annual subscription is the same cost as a decent bottom bracket.
Let’s look at the alternative, we can call it the “Energy Provider Approach” or the “Credit Card Approach”. Which is that new customers are offered special and often fairly long term deals which are much better than the rate being charged to long-term subscribers.
In this scenario you’re being penalised for loyalty (and in fact is something there’s rules for UK energy companies about). I know which I prefer!
I wasn’t replying to any one in particular (I usually quote people directly when that is the case), and was just commenting on the general sentiment that was shown in the thread.
As to how Legacy Pricing affects the price for others, who knows? We can only speculate (most likely badly at that 
). But I would guess that the actual percentage of Legacy Pricing customers is a relatively small percentage of the overall TR user population. I can’t remember how many actual price steps there were (3 or 4 now?), but considering the typical churn where people leave and return, I would guess its well less than 25% and maybe 10% or so? (again, worthless guess, but trying to consider the more practical reality of the situation vs just broad strokes).
Ultimately, I would expect the actual impact on the bottom line to be minimal in the grand scheme, but I really have no idea.
People leaving and returning (in presumably fluctuating numbers) will be a major headache for TR (which is why you have discounted annual pricing in the first place). I would suggest that the benefit to TR of guaranteed revenue streams year-round is likely to be a significant driver for them trying to keep their legacy users like this - any company would want a guaranteed recurring revenue over an uncertain one-off revenue, even if the one-off revenues might be a bit bigger.
(certainly we spend a lot of time trying to convert our one-off customers into recurring revenue…)
How does eveyone feel when promotions are “offered to only new subscribers?” That is the opposite of loyalty. Cable and telephone companies have done that for decades. Or, how do you feel when you buy something, only to find out it went on sale right after you bought it, or even before it arrives?
25 years ago, a local gym did a deal where it was like $50 to join, and then $1/day for life. Alternatively you could join for something like $300 all up per year, but the rate would change each year.
Now it’s probably about $1000+/year, and all the $1/day customers are getting a bargain. But, the number of them is absolutely tiny. Life <1% of customers have been there continuously for 25 years.
I suspect that TR has a good retention rate, but not 100%. So the total number of grandfathered members decreases each year, and the percentage of total membership goes down too. And you have a percentage of the $99 grandfathered members who have stopped using TR, but just keep the subscription going in case they want to pick it up again. So whilst the long term members who use it heavily are getting a cheap deal, the others are paying into TR and not even doing workouts, so they’re helping keep costs down for new members.
Great point. Also, price discrimination (charging people differently depending on how much they want your product) is a legitimate strategy. Not sure if this is what Trainerroad is doing, but the possible rationale: TR has been changing. Quite a lot actually. They’re selling today’s product, not the product of 3 years ago. New users apparently like the new features (or else they wouldn’t consider signing up), old users may like them a little less (by which I mean they just might not need them) and not always be willing to pay up. Like, I wouldn’t pay $189 a year but I’m fine with $99 for now.
I started up again on TR two years ago. I would pay the same if I joined now as I was then, i.e. a zero percent increase yet here in the UK we’ve had a nominal* 3 & 4% increase per annum so I’m effectively paying less. For the moment at least, grandfathering is not a benefit to me yet I’m getting more features for what I’m paying.
*I say “nominal” as many grocery items have increased quite markedly, in some cases by 30% or more.
I pay $129 p.a
I like TR but $189 is quite a lot… not sure I’d be willing to pay that.
I know we’re all different and have different comfort levels and life situations, but that’s $5 a month. I wouldn’t leave anything I really enjoy and use multiple times a week over $5.
A couple of points occurred to me after posting the above…
Our local gym costs £20/month compared to the $20 (£12 approx)/month I pay for TR - I pay monthly not yearly. For that £20 I get use of the equipment but there’s no plan provided for me or feedback on how I’m doing.
Zwift is around $180 a year , TR is $9 more than that. Zwift plans are very basic and only offer 1 volume For their plans.
Looking at fascat plans they have lots of options and they’re all around $50 each, from what I saw. Plus you’d have to purchase multiple plans for other disciplines and “in season intervals”, maybe I’m wrong. Fascat you also need training peaks? Not sure but that’s another $20 a month. That all starts adding up.
So basically with TR, I get multiple discipline plans for just under $200 a year (full season) and with the AT now in affect I definitely think TR is worth it.
I’m jealous of grandfathered people paying $100 a month, I have a close friend that got rid of his TR account just before AT. He said his was $75 a year 
.
I’m sick of subsidising all of the free trials. 
Other aspect of this that I don’t think has been mentioned is the benefit to TR of having data all year round for subscribers. I.e. capturing the data when people are in their off season, training sporadically without much structure, or doing base training following their own plan instead of TR plans. If riders were only subscribing to TR when they were motivated to follow a TR plan and get value for money, and then suspended their account the rest of the time, TR would get a much more one-dimensional view of how people are training. That more comprehensive data set has to be a benefit in terms of modelling new features.