Motorbike market research - HELP !

Storm99

Hi,
I am looking at opening a motorbike & Accessories shop. I am currently drafting the business plan but I need market information. I dont want to spend a large amount of money with a marketing company, so can anyone advise how I find out the following either for free or on the cheap !!?

1: Total Bike & Accesory sales in Ireland for last 5 years (Growth/Size of Market)
2: Number of dealerships for specific area's
3: Volume of sales per dealership or Region. (Units and or revenue)
4: Product specific details (Catalogue of items sold)

Etc etc... !

Any help would be appreciated

Thanks !:

Interceptor

You need to start sleeping with someone who works in a bikeshop.

That level of detail will only be had through industrial espionage or personal research. Methinks you won't have much of a business plan if you know so little of your target market, but hey I'm only a pleb...

Perhaps sit in your car with a notebook and pen, outside as many bike shops as you can find and then go and look inside at what these shops sell. Make lots of notes.

#1 contact Motrax re: Irish sales volumes
#2 Golden Pages
#3 Vehicle registration stats
#4 skunkwork

good luck with your plans - pencil me in for 25% discount...

'cptr

murphaph

Individual dealers will be difficult but the distributors (whose customer you'd be if you are successful!) might be more willing to help with figures. You could also use the CRO website and simply pay (small amounts) for company returns for the last 5 years and see if they follow a trend. It is definitely worthwhile going into shops and just asking "how's business?".good luck. What part of the country are you thinking about?

shawnee

Biking in Ireland has a very short season, six months absolute max. You would need to have this as an add on to another business .

KTRIC

shawnee wrote: »

Biking in Ireland has a very short season, six months absolute max. You would need to have this as an add on to another business .

What the f*ck are you on about ? "biking season" !!

most irish bikers drive all year.

unclebill98

I'd say that there is a "Biking Season" but, It only accounts for about 10% of bikers, if even that high.

The aul lads that dust of there Bikes during the summer for touring etc...

I am not really a biker myself. I don't do much biking so I could be a seasonal driver! But in any of my experience with bike shops there are serious bikers working there. All the questions the OP is asking seems to give the impression there not. If there OP is, they could be taking on more than they can handle.

Good luck with it.

murphaph

Insurance is so costly in this country that very few people are fair-weather bikers. Most people who insure a bike or bikes ride them all year.

However! this leads me to believe that the biking scene in Ireland at least has potential to grow as traffic gets ever worse and insurance gets (slowly) cheaper....not a crazy business idea at all, just needs analysis like anything else. You'd probably need to offer servicing to make proper money as the accessories can be bought (usually cheaper) over the internet and people who buy a new or used bike from a dealer like to know that the dealer can actually fix it if there's a problem!

Oryx

First off, theres a saying among those in the bike industry in Ireland. If you want to make a million quid selling bikes, you better start with five million.

The cso will give you stats on bike sales in the country, but other than that I think youll find it nigh on impossible to find the detail you require.

You probably know this already, but the irish bike industry has been in a steep downturn for the past 5 years, mainly based on the insurance costs and the loss of the younger market. Its not at the moment a growth industry.

delop

Just setup in near that famous shop near the jail on the s circular rd and do business in an efficent manner you can still rip off ppl a bit and still take all their business

Storm99

Thanks for the info guys. I have been busy working away at this, The CSO were very helpfull and I got all the market info I need. In terms of the industry it was on a downward spiral since 2000 till 2005, but 2006 and 2007 have seen a new growth in the market with a 10% increase in sales from 2006 to 2007, figures for Jan and Feb of 2008 are also up on 2007 so it looks like it's coming back. The entire market is 35500 bikes in ireland and 65 to 70% of them are in Dublin. I just need 1% market share of yearly sales for the regions I am selling in, to make the business viable.

My next stage is sourcing suppliers for the accessories, and establishing some new customer needs to generate additional revenue.

Thanks again and I hope you can help me on some other posts I will be placing.

Bang Bang

Storm99 it's worth keeping in mind that the Irsh government add full tax to motorcycle safety wear, helmets for example. The UK government have a very much reduced and sometimes zero tax on motorcycle safety wear so many bikers, including myself who's at it a long time, will opt to purchase online or travel up North to Crosson or Heine Gericke.
Another example of the Irish consumer being screwed by the government. Charging VAT on a motorcycle helmet is akin to adding extra tax to have a roof on your car, but of course the roof on your car isn't taxed.... is it!!

FiSe

Ofcourse it is /you'd pay VRT through the roof, but once and for all/ and up till recently, you'd pay extra for your safety belts, airbags etc, them bastards are putting taxes on everything nowadays.

Bang Bang

FiSe wrote: »

Ofcourse it is /you'd pay VRT through the roof, but once and for all/ and up till recently, you'd pay extra for your safety belts, airbags etc, them bastards are putting taxes on everything nowadays.

You pay the VRT and Duty on the cost of the car, the same as we do when we buy our bikes. But you don't pay an extra tax on the roof of your car as we do when we buy a helmet.
You're right about taxing everything, basta*ds.
I now purchase all my biking requirements up north and on the internet, yes I know I'm not supporting the Irish consumers market but it's up to Irish suppliers to keep the pressure on the government. Internet and cross border shopping is so much easier now so we should avail of it.
Take a look at the amount of Irish that fly over to Birmingham on a day trip each year for the bike show purely to avail of the tax free protective equipment and overall lower tax. It's a stark reminder of the Christmas shopping trips to Newry and Liverpool back in the 1980's.
Take a spin up to Crosson's or heine Gericke on a fine Saturday and see the amount of southern registered bikes up for the shopping spin. These dealers also offer extra discounts to some biker forums.

Zico

After Mountjoy Cycles closed I assumed the arse was gone out of the tradional bikes/parts/accessories business. Breakers and Dealers were the way I thought it was going. Not that many breakers about even now though.

I think you're mad. Open a smoothie bar instead.:p

Interceptor

Zico wrote: »

I think you're mad. Open a smoothie bar instead.:p

After the FF/Greens have their way, most of the population won't be able to afford to run their cars and will turn to biking. And with recession looming most people are going to cop on to the stupidity of paying €5 for a slushie...

'cptr

MargeS

Good luck Storm99. Some parts of this country are poorly serviced by bike shops. (can we get more clothing choice for de wimen please!). Where you thinking of setting up?

Oryx

Bang Bang wrote: »

yes I know I'm not supporting the Irish consumers market but it's up to Irish suppliers to keep the pressure on the government.

At a wild guess there are 60 or so bike shops in the country. Allowing that none are huge you could average the staff in each at about 6-10. 600 people is not a huge lobby group, and the industry as a whole is tiny. Roughly the same amount of bikes here as say, the city of Manchester. (Cant back that up, its an example thats often used though).

The government wont listen to MAG, and they certainly wont listen to a miniscule few bike shops.

galwaytt

KtK wrote: »

At a wild guess there are 60 or so bike shops in the country. Allowing that none are huge you could average the staff in each at about 6-10. 600 people is not a huge lobby group, and the industry as a whole is tiny. Roughly the same amount of bikes here as say, the city of Manchester. (Cant back that up, its an example thats often used though).

The government wont listen to MAG, and they certainly wont listen to a miniscule few bike shops.

....and the no of importers is down to a handful - and they won't do diddly to upset the applecart, so won't lobby anyone, for anything, to protect their own turf..........a small pie is more than no-pie, if you see what I mean.........