Apparently Peloton had a very bad year in 21…and started 22 with the wrong foot…
Is the cycling industry next?
Nope - 'cos Peloton isn’t cycling. It’s home fitness and only exists at all because of C-19.
Demand still exists for cycling kit and supply is holding the market back. Peloton is the reverse with little demand and big over supply.
I know is not…
but peloton was the first one to make it big during the pandemic…then the cycling industry as a whole…
Now peloton is coming down… so maybe the industry will come back to the ground?
I think the demand was amplified by the pandemic…
it is not sustainable.
I think the big issue is that supply issues are still strangling the cycling market and keeping demand high.
Sure, some people will find themselves with much less free time again now, or less flexible schedules, and some will leave their bikes, but nothing like the fall Peloton is seeing and the influx of cheaper competition.
I think it did for peloton and they just capped out on market share of the people that can afford one, have the time and have the space. The used market for these is huge right now and if you go on your local craigs list and ebay, its absurd how many used ones are out there.
That bad press did not help and you gotta think now that treadmill business is bleeding money off their top line. I’ve seen so many of those p-bikes in my kids friends houses where the parents use them more as a thing to hang clothes off of and stopped using them. I used think they were ok and for a training tool i’ve ridden one and they are fine, but even an old kicker is better. Now that i see the market flooded with these thing and the fact that they are riding on the coat tails of real cycling I’m kinda anti. They don’t support real cycling, yet are in the best position to support racing and events, in the US anyway. Cycling is fragile and needs support, even Zwift supports outdoor cycling as well as TR.
6 million loyal subscribers. But the growth story is gone so shares are falling as fast as CNN viewership
I see what you did there…
In any case… Yes I think the stock market is over reacting…
As you say they have a huge subscriber base and thata how they make money
From where I sit, Peloton brings the gym fitness class experience to your home. What happens when people start returning to the gym? And inflation eats into discretionary spending?
Gym and fitness classes were never the same as a Soul Cycle and other high end Spin studios never. Peloton is actually cheaper for those who went to a high end spin studio per class cost by leaps and bounds. Many of these studios had issues prior to the pandemic and others shut the doors during.
The market and stock price is not an indicator of a companies viability per say, as making a return for share holders is priority not necessarily doing what’s best for the company and core vision of that company. The PR debacles and supply chain logistics don’t help any.
Peloton has more active users than Zwift monthly and maybe close to Zwift and TR combined. It’s hard to beat the peloton options in the system, the instructors are on another level in every category than any gym or studio. Classes bring 30k at live rides. It’s not going down or away, it will have restructuring and evolve.
What?! You’re saying unlimited growth is unsustainable but we’re still going to make it our target!?
That is just wrong across a lot of ways.
Peloton was massively successful well before COVID. Clearly COVID caused it to blow up to massive levels, but to say it exists simply because of the pandemic of factually wrong.
To Joel’s question, we touched base on it in the Peloton stock thread, and yes, it absolutely could be the pointy end of a bubble burst about to happen.
Most people I know in the biz always believed the surge was a bubble and would burst at some point. It has certainly lasted longer than most expected, but at some point it is gonna burst. Peloton could well be a leading indicator of that.
Curious, do you mean the biz of cycling/indoor cycling or overall sports broadly.
No, because peloton and TR don’t serve the same market, not even close, the average spin classer is a fitness enthusiast, not a cyclist, certainly not a “serious” one, the number of “serious” cyclists that chose Peloton, fairly minimal at best (anecdotal, but I’ve met ONE ever, our club of several hundred has a LOT of indoor training users of all platforms, and one Peloton user).
Peloton is a really good package for fitness enthusiasts (arguably a much larger market than cycling die hards) and I’m not gonna say anything against the product other than “not for me”, but the markets are separate, it’s only because the pandemic boom in fitness products in general that we’re even talking about them together. They’ve grown fast they’ve run into issues of scale, competition and market expectations, literally nothing that impacts Peloton can be read over to the “pure” cycling market other than “people might not have much time now they’re back in the office”. Will that impact cycling? Sure, but it’s not the biggest issue facing Peloton by a long way, the idea that we should be doing Chicken Little about the future of the cycling market because of Peloton’s woes is frankly ludicrous. They’re two different markets and Peloton is having corporate growing pains, they’ll work through them and so will “we”.
I heard on a podcast today that if the average persons gym is 5 miles away, they’ll average 1 trip there a month. If the gym is 3.5 miles away, they’ll average 5 trips a month. It’s only 1.5 miles different, maybe 2-3 mins in a car…but distance is a huge barrier to people even showing up.
Proximity, ease of use and habit are still super important to exercising and Peloton has those covered.
People I know in the bike business.
It doesn’t matter if they Serve the same market….it is abiut similarities in the boom trends they experienced as a result of the pandemic.
Isn’t this the company who tried to claim sole rights to the use of an actual French word?
I get that, but my point was that their troubles are significantly exacerbated by typical VC/startup behaviours of over aggressive expansion and poor management of market expectations, the actual pandemic trends elements are, imo, a relatively minor factor for Peloton, so there is limited read across we can take that we couldn’t reasonably look to other industries that had a pandemic boost such as (for example) the DIY trade for a guide.
No. They had some overzealous lawyers, and when told so, they backed down. It was just blown out of proportion for clicks. Which is fine.
BOOM

It was just blown out of proportion for clicks
It all is my friend…EVERYTHING IS.