Since the early part of 2020, the world has been changing at a more rapid pace than ever before. The COVID-19 global pandemic has caused unprecedented struggles for various industries, companies, and customers around the globe. One silver lining, however, has been a surge in the demand for new bikes as countless individuals discover the joy of cycling for the first time or rekindle the wonder of pedaling a bike that they first experienced as kids. Having more people riding bikes is a wonderful thing.
However, with the demand for bikes at historic highs, the bicycle industry is facing challenges. In the interest of transparency, we want you to know exactly what’s going on with our industry and with us, in particular, as well as what we’re doing to meet those challenges.
Where We’re At
The record demand for bikes has kept our current inventory levels low. We are receiving bikes, but the supply isn’t keeping up with all who want to get a new bike. Typically, as we enter the end of the year, we’d start shipping our latest collections of bikes to retail partners around the world. But, due to the supply chain issues affecting everyone, we anticipate availability delays and an under-supply of bikes into 2022. Here’s why.
Historical Demand on Component Manufacturers
Due to the demand for new bikes, component and bicycle manufacturers—our business partners who produce items like wheels, brakes, shifters, completed bicycles, and more—have simply not been able to keep up. Many are valiantly adjusting their business models to expand and/or adapt in order to meet this demand, but we anticipate delays in receiving new components well into 2022 as these partners face similar availability issues with the small parts and raw materials they themselves need. Without all of the necessary components, we aren’t able to obtain bicycles and bicycle parts/accessories in a typical fashion.
Factory Closures and/or Reduced Capacities
We rely on a complex and comprehensive network of manufacturing partners around the world. Various regions across the globe, however, are operating at varying levels of safety, containment, and capability in terms of their response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This means that in some countries where our bikes’ components are manufactured, factories are temporarily closed or production capacities are greatly reduced due to local regulations. These measures are causing further delays in receiving new bikes into our network.
Limited Ocean Freight Availability
The majority of our bikes are produced in the United States; however, some of those bicycle parts, components, and accessories are made in Southeast Asia and are then shipped via ocean containers to regions across the globe. Due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic—including historically high demand for all sorts of goods beyond just bicycles—ocean container shipping is in high demand, as well. This has put a strain on the global shipping industry, which adds massive costs and further delays to the low-inventory situation that the bicycle industry is facing.
Staffing Shortages
Unfortunately, even the bicycle industry, and Routes, have been affected by staffing shortages as we try to compete with the rest of the workforce for team members. The surge and popularity of bicycling in New Mexico has grown exponentially creating a larger demand for bicycle maintenance services. This has added extra strain on the amazing and patient mechanics we currently employ. Coupled with shipping issues, this has added extra time delays within our maintenance department.
What We’re Doing
We want nothing more than to get new bikes to all of our customers, Sandian’s and non-alike, but the reality of expected delays extends far beyond us and the bicycle industry, at large. As such, unfortunately, many factors remain beyond our control—which is especially frustrating for a small local company like us that takes immense pride in sweating over the details to deliver a superlative experience and bike range for our customers.
All that said, we’re maintaining daily contact with our business partners and shipping associates in order to have as clear a perspective on when new bikes, parts, and accessories will get to our customers. Luckily, as a small business, we are able to obtain bikes and parts at a much smaller scale and have been able to track down items for SNL at a much higher rate than many other bike shops in the area.
Both bicycle/parts orders and bicycle maintenance are experiencing a delay.
- We are running at a 2-3 week turn-around on new maintenance orders, we’re about a month out (or longer) sometimes with specialty items (i.e. parts that aren’t in stock);
- Currently, standard turn-around on new bicycles is about a month (this, of course, sometimes varies);
- Some bikes or parts may take longer than that due to these pandemic-related issues above; we will always advise you re: timelines (per usual) and keep you in the loop throughout.
We can’t thank you enough for your patience and understanding during this challenging time, and we’re looking for some incredible rides together in the near future.
Sincerely,
The entire team at Routes Bicycles and the Sandia Bicycle Lab
