Market Research (please respond)

Rsearching the competitive cycling (including unicycling) industry for a college business project…

I’m trying to prove that there is a market for perfomance equipment in the minority aspects of cycling such as downhill, trials, and uni.

what i would like to know is how many people would you guess would be interested in purchasing a top of the line unicyle frame for either trials or mountain uniing…
also, what would you guess most people would feel is a reasonable price for such a product considering the availabillity of other such products on the market and their demand…

lets define “top of the line” as:
-6160 aluminum frame material
-wieght=just over one pound
-able to accept commom high end components such as profile hubs and the largest tires.
-powdercoated or anodized finish
-asthetically pleasing to the eye (cool looking)
-hydraulic brake mounts available
-versitile (flat crown and the like)

please combine mountain and trials frames as one number for your guess on a demand.
if possible, give what you think a fair cost would be in american dollars, if you don’t know the conversions i can figure it out…

thanks for you time,

matt moore

Fraims are a tricky one usualy people get complete unicycles or totaly custom fraims, BUT i would say about $500 for the trials and $600 for the MUni fraims. Thats just my though and im pritty tight with my money.

i dont think many pople would pay $5-600 for a frame… Most of the money goes into the wheelset. I use a $40 Yuni frame and it would be the last thing that I upgrade. I do think that a splined hub, or another rim like the dx32, or another seat design would sell well within the unicyclist community.

Re: Market Research (please respond)

Just a thought- might be much easier to re-phrase this question as a poll, because the data would be a lot easier to represent in your paper. Perhaps create a price range for unicycles (maybe 5 categories from <$200 to >$1000) and get people to vote on it

Kris

The frame “some guy” describes sounds alot like the Wilder.

If you compare the Wilder from unicycle.com with other unis with similar seats and wheels it seems that the frame is worth 400 - 450$

I wouldn’t pay that much, but I’m not looking for performance equipment, so I guess I shouldn’t be included in those statistics.

Morten

Sorry to change the topic a bit, but how did you come to put downhill mountain biking in the minorities category?

I personally wouldn’t pay more than $400 (Australian Dollars) for a frame. Sorry but I really couldn’t even guess how many people would buy those frames. They sound nice though.

Good luck,
Andrew

I would probably pay arround $150-200 for a high end frame for my unicyce.

Chex

Re: Market Research (please respond)

I will happily pay up to 200USD for that kind of decent uni frame.
I will unhappily pay up to 3000USD for that kind of decent uni frame.
I will not pay more than 400USD for the uni frame. Just will
use current KH 24’ continuously until it is failed.

£80 max, for me anyway.
frames dont realy break.

did anyone in the history of the universe ever brake a numbus ii / yuni frame?

and if you do grinds and crank grabs then a posh frame is a real bad idea, if you destroy your bearing holders, then its going to be expensive/impossible to replace them.

for this reason aluminium is a bad thing to make frames out of
especialy not the bearing holders.

use a nimbus ii frame and you can be sure of getting cheap compatible bearing holders anywhere in the world.

any more any your paying for things other than functionality.
its the titainium effect

people dont buy titanium unicycles because they “need” them
but some people have more monney than sense. and quite often titanium is the wrong material for the job.

there are a load of high end frames available that don’t even have good foot placement. thats o.k. if you only ride down hills, but to me it seem silly to make that sacrifice for 2mm of kneespace.

and thats why i havent bothered to bring a high end frame to market;)

Re: Market Research (please respond)

so far it seems as if your project may want to focus on the need for much more detailed needs analysis before creating even the ‘imagined’ product

the frame sounds very impressive
now sell me the sizzle?
what will it do for me?

Re: Market Research (please respond)

Competitive unicycling? Yes, we compete, but it’s got a long way to go before it can begin to be considered an industry. Even a generic “unicycling industry” is a very recent development, brought about only since Unicycle.com came onto the scene.

Performance market, yes. If people will buy Wilders and the original KH MUnis, that means they’re willing to spend a premium to get the best stuff.

The question is, how many of those people are there? Can the market support more makers of high-end stuff? I think yes, but it cannot be proven from this group of people (Unicyclist.com and rec.sport.unicycling) alone. We are the fanatics and early adopters, and we mostly either already have the gear we want, or can’t afford it.

But the market continues to expand…

That’s two questions, as I assume it refers to two different frames. At least different in size. How many? A pretty small percentage of the overall market, like 5% or less. Of course what percentage depends on the price, and perceived value of the product.

Price determines # of buyers, and vice-versa. But there are other factors in what makes a product desirable. Will it have the Kris Holm signature on it? That would make a huge difference. Will it be intelligently designed, or put out by a factory that forgot to find out what the unicyclists want? Examples:

  • Aluminum frame: Light, but more prone to denting and obviously not suited to any form of grinding. I already have an aluminum frame, and it’s very popular. A similar frame for lower price would have a market.

  • 1 pound: I don’t know how much my Wilder frame weighs. I know the heavy duty wheel kind of cancels out any huge weight savings though. I also have a carbon frame with aluminum lugs that’s way less than one pound.

-powdercoated or anodized finish: Mine’s powdercoated. But I would really dig anodized. That has me interested.

-asthetically pleasing: This could mean a lot to the buyers. The KH frame is not, to me, a great looker. It’s popular because we know Kris Holm helped design it, and on the $400 model because it’s a great bargain. The Wilder frame looks great, and people like it even though it isn’t good for one-footing. The Telford frame is probably the best-looking MUni frame of all (for non one-footers), but it’s not exactly on the market.

“Fair” is a function of how good the product is. To give a more detailed guess, we would need to know more about your product.

My conclusion is that is you’re looking to make lots of money, you’re in the wrong place. We are still very much a niche market. Not forever, though…

Like John, I have a Wilder, which I paid a fortune for (US $1420+ US$300 airfrieght). The powdercoated Yuni with profile hub and sun doublewide is US$639, so there is a huge difference in frame cost (I’m not sure if that comes with a KH saddle). I am glad my unicycle doesn’t have Kris Holm’s signature on it. It used to have one on the seat, but the seat snapped so I took it off. If anyones signature should be on it, it should be the owner of the Unicycle, not someone else (IMHO). The Wilder frame weighs 1.44 pounds, and the total Wilder weight is 15 pounds. I agree, it looks great, but my one is good for one footing too, who says you have to put your foot on the frame?

Sounds good, hydraulic brake mounts would be an improvement, but I don’t regret not having brakes on mine. Good luck in making these top of the line Aluminium frames, I’m sure someone will be foolish enough (like me) to buy one.

Re: Re: Market Research (please respond)

I notice that Roger said somewhere Onza are soon to release an aliminium frame for their trials unis and munis.

Given that before onza brought out their trials uni, splined cranks cost more than the whole onza unicycle, I’d suspect they’re aiming at a similarly low price point for the aluminium frame.

So you might be looking at closer to $100-$200 as a price to beat, or probably under $500 for a whole unicycle.

It’s beefy and over-engineered, but light, pretty practical and has foot space. The riding being done on it was silly and there’s no doubt it’s strong enough. The whole uni weighed not very much, loads less than my Gazz 26x2.3, suzue hub in a nimbus II frame+KH seat. Although it did have a CF seat etc. to make it nice and light.

Joe

Bump! With all the talk of frames lately this thread is a blast from the past.

Oh no!!! Everyone stop grinding at once on your aluminium frames, as they are obviously not suited to any form of grinding! :stuck_out_tongue:

You asked how many would be interested. Looking at Muni, the most I’ve seen together is in the 200+ range (at Moab). Haven’t been to Unicon, so you guys would know better. So there are not a ton of people doing this. That being said, there are always a core group in any sport that has to have the latest, most expensive stuff out there. I kiteboard also and my friend gets a new board and kite every year to the tune of a couple grand(good to get his hand me downs!). When you get KH making fantastic, complete Munis for under $600, not many would pay that for just a frame.

I would not be against something of this quality and price being available to the community, but seeing as how I am just learning and currently riding a less than $100 total price Uni and will be buying a $300 total price Uni I don’t really see a benefit for myself to own a frame like this at the moment.

Maybe once I become proficient and start demanding more from the uni and going through parts I may look into something like this.

The main selling points for my next uni are: Wheel, cranks, hub, bearing, seat and upgrade compatibility.

I think its great that you are doing a Uni themed project and are exposing more people to this sport.

People replying might want to take a quick look at the date of this post before they both with long explanations of their ideal frames.

Okay, I probably should have said aluminum bearing holders, but I don’t think there was a choice back in 2003 so neeyah. :stuck_out_tongue:

Otherwise that thread seems to hold up all right. And the market has grown considerably since then…