German consumers more reluctant to buy

The German e-bike and bicycle market performed very strong in 2022 with a 10% increase in e-bike sales, the national industry organisation ZIV reported. Perhaps sales could have been much higher as ZIV CEO Burkhard Stork refers to a “general reluctance of consumers to buy in the second half of the year.”

Sales to consumers of e-bikes and bicycles combined were characterized by a slight decrease from 4.7 million units in 2021 to 4.6 million in 2022. Compared with the pre-corona year 2019, this is still 300,000 units higher. The sales increase of e-bikes is consistently strong with an increase of 10% to 2.2 million units. With the ‘general reluctance to buy’, Stork referred to the rising inflation and growing uncertainty around the Ukraine war in the second half of the year.

E-bikes in the fast lane

“E-bikes are clearly in the fast lane in Germany with a market share of 48%. We expect e-bikes to overtake non-motorised bicycles in terms of unit sales for the first time in the course of this year,” said Stork. “In some product categories, such as mountain bikes or cargo bikes, the e-bike dominates.” Nearly one million mountain bikes (931,600 units) were sold in 2022, 836,000 of which were e-mountain bikes.

With 2.6 million bicycles and e-bikes produced, production was at an all-time high. The bicycle production remained unchanged at 900,000 units, while the e-bike production increased by 20% to 1.72 million units. Germany is gaining a growing market share on the European e-bike market. In many other countries the growth of e-bike production automatically results in a decline of bicycle assembly and sales. That’s not the case in Germany. The German industry has seen its e-bike and bicycle production combined increase from 2.2 million in 2012 to 2.6 million last year.

Inventory levels

For the ZIV the supply chain problems related to the pandemic are a thing of the past. “The days of high level of pre-production costs, including raw materials, parts and transportation costs, are over and the price advantages are being passed on to customers. Now is exactly the right moment to buy a new bicycle or e-bike,” emphasised Burkhard Stork. He did not mention whether consumers could expect to find lower retail priced bikes in the shops.