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Decoding the Peloton

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Re: Decoding the Peloton

#71

Post by kevstev »

ramphastidae wrote: post #58
kevstev wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I said that exact same thing, and passed on an offer from them- 4 years ago. I am not exactly kicking myself- at the time I was not an exercise bike enthusiast, and my few trips to Soul Cycle with my wife really turned me off- and regardless, I ended up landing a more lucrative role, even factoring in what stock grants would have been worth. About a year and a half ago, the wife bought a Peloton, and I rolled my eyes…

SoulCycle basically collapsed and is just starting to come back from the brink: https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22195549/soulcycle-decline-reo... Its success was mostly due to its novelty and exclusivity. After a while, copycats and their push for growth did them in. Peloton is the same. They are first to market and have cultivated a level of exclusivity, but there is nothing unique about them that other businesses can…

Interestingly, I have something of an inside view on this- my wife was one of the early enthusiasts, and I guess you could accuse her of being one of the "cliques" discussed- I have been to an instructor's house, a friend of ours is a publicist of sorts for someone prominently mentioned in the article, she will be in the wedding of someone she met at Soul that used to work the front desk (and I guess not coincidentally loves bright red lipstick) and would frequently have her bike moved to the front row.

She used to spend a jaw dropping amount on Soul- it was her favorite activity to take her clients to. Around the time they IPO'ed, she felt a change- the expansion took her favorite instructors out of her favorite studios, and often even out of the area as they helped open up locations in LA, Miami, etc. The new ones never had quite the same magnetism- which is of course subjective- most people have their personal favorites, and while there was some overlap, this could differ substantially from person to person. They used to give gifts to their top riders at the end of the year in the form of free classes, that went away, replaced with "charitable donations" and eventually just dropped altogether. Top instructors tried to branch out on their own, some successful, some not, but the point being is that really it was over expansion and IMHO brand dilution, which I guess you could call exclusivity (though I personally feel its a bit different than just exclusivity) that really sent them into a downward trajectory. She went from taking 4-5 classes a week, to mixing in Cycle Bar and other studios, to finally in October 2019 just deciding to get a Peloton.

All that said, they still had 1.62 million rides in 2019... which while down from ~1.8, that's not exactly a fad or a dead business- I actually thought their drop would be far bigger to be honest. Personally though I feel this was less of an effect of a fad, than the more typical story of the bean counters moving in and pursuing growth and next quarter's numbers at the cost of the quality of the brand.

To be honest that article was quite eye opening- I guess what I thought was a unique experience and fandom by my wife was something that the culture carefully cultivated.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#72

Post by alisonkisk »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #47
cowsandmilk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By games, I assume parent was talking about things like zwift, which is even called out in the article. Most exercise bikes that cost similar to peloton support working with external software so you can do things like race on a virtual course. And gamification through badges is pretty standard exercise fair. My parent’s senior community even has gamification via small prizes for how many days you go to the gym.

FWIW Peloton does have some of that gamification stuff, at least for the standalone offering (no bike etc). You get badges for taking different numbers of each type of class, daily/weekly streaks, total minutes, special events etc. They also send a summary email each month showing which days you worked out, badges earned, number of classes/minutes, and deltas from the previous month.

Those are all engagement metrics to make you spend money, not exercise metrics to make you achieve fitness.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#73

Post by alisonkisk »

rkangel wrote: post #14
hombre_fatal wrote: post #6

I was floored when I realized the Peloton has no games and it's closed to third-party developers. It seems to just have group classes which couldn't be less interesting to me. I'd ask "what were they thinking?" but it apparently sells like hotcakes, so it's me who's out of touch.

I'd guess that it's actually a classic razorblades model - the real product is the classes and the bike is just a way to be able to do the classes from home. It's probably not surprising that a group of tech people tends more towards introversion and exercising alone, whereas the general population likes the group aspect for motivation.

Much more importantly, the bike is a way to lock you into one single provider of classes.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#74

Post by mikestew »

ubermonkey wrote: post #54

I'm a pretty serious road cyclist, so I get LOTS of questions about training, and about Peloton in particular, which is weird because serious outdoor riders are not really Peloton's market AT ALL. It's always been for spin people, and spin classes are their own thing entirely. Certainly SOME of my riding pals do spin during the week, but most of them are doing structured workouts using TrainerRoad or TrainingPeaks or…

The Peloton, as I understand, doesn't dynamically adjust its resistance.

On a $4K machine? The $800 NordicTrack rower we bought automatically adjusts resistance with their iFit programs. So people were just paying for an exercise bike with a big LCD screen? I'm astounded that they stayed in business long enough to release a second version that fixes this. VC money can fix that problem, but I'm also astounded that anyone actually bought one.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#75

Post by usrusr »

somedude895 wrote: post #26
hombre_fatal wrote: post #6

I was floored when I realized the Peloton has no games and it's closed to third-party developers. It seems to just have group classes which couldn't be less interesting to me. I'd ask "what were they thinking?" but it apparently sells like hotcakes, so it's me who's out of touch.

Seriously, if they created an ecosystem and allowed 3rd party apps on there, that could sprout some really cool stuff like games that might even convince me to get one of those bikes. But yeah, it'd be a challenge to make that as profitable as their current business model.

Just get an indoor bike with ANT+ FEC if you want to avoid the real bike + trainer form factor, plenty of those available (e.g. the Wahoo Kickr Bike).

Peloton isn't a hardware company, it's a company that sells streamed sessions with hot spin instructors. The hardware is merely tool for them and creating an ecosystem of competitors on top of the hardware is a definitive non-goal for them. But hardware companies do exist.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#76

Post by nwsm »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #6

I was floored when I realized the Peloton has no games and it's closed to third-party developers. It seems to just have group classes which couldn't be less interesting to me. I'd ask "what were they thinking?" but it apparently sells like hotcakes, so it's me who's out of touch.

Their demographic is people who do "Spin" (SoulCycle, Orangetheory are good examples), which are (usually) intense group sessions led by an instructor.

So they are mostly emulating that experience.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#77

Post by _ihaque »

matsemann wrote: post #61
ghaff wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the mainstream exercise gear seems to be pretty locked down AFAIK. In the rowing area, even the latest Concept2 controllers look to be pretty old school though they do seem to have a way to connect to phone apps these days. (Though there still isn't a lot there.) Hydrow goes for the more immersive experience--haven't used one; don't know if it has any third-party support or not.

> All the mainstream exercise gear Most stuff I use for cycling speak ANT+, so it can be combined as one wants. My indoor trainer, my cadance sensor, power meter, speed sensor, HR monitor, watch, head unit, phone, computer all can send or receive through ANT+. That's why you will find most cyclists oppose the Peloton bikes, they are impossible to combine with existing gear.

(Author here)

And that's why this exists! (Though it's BLE, not ANT+.)

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#78

Post by FreedomToCreate »

mikestew wrote: post #74
ubermonkey wrote: post #54

I'm a pretty serious road cyclist, so I get LOTS of questions about training, and about Peloton in particular, which is weird because serious outdoor riders are not really Peloton's market AT ALL. It's always been for spin people, and spin classes are their own thing entirely. Certainly SOME of my riding pals do spin during the week, but most of them are doing structured workouts using TrainerRoad or TrainingPeaks or…

The Peloton, as I understand, doesn't dynamically adjust its resistance. On a $4K machine? The $800 NordicTrack rower we bought automatically adjusts resistance with their iFit programs. So people were just paying for an exercise bike with a big LCD screen? I'm astounded that they stayed in business long enough to release a second version that fixes this. VC money can fix that problem, but I'm also astounded that any…

The bike is 2K for the one without a motorized resistance knob and I bought one despite this feature because it takes me 1 second to turn the knob to the dynamically adjusted value on the display.

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#79

Post by quercusa »

cam0 wrote: post #68
liminal wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sex appeal. Peloton is built on sex appeal. The instructors lead workouts wearing makeup, jewelry and bikini tops (well, the female ones anyway). Vox has an article [1] looking at SoulCycle and it sounds similar: instructors were good looking and exhorted to be incredibly thin. That said, it's a great way to get a good 30 minute cardio workout in. [1] https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22195549/soulcycle-decline-reo...

The Peloton instructors are also universally the best spin instructors I've ever encountered, and I've been to countless spin class in every large US city over the past decade. Some have come close, but being able to have world class spin instructors in my living room has been the huge selling/sticking point for me.

What makes a good spin instructor?

Re: Decoding the Peloton

#80

Post by cols »

Avid mountain biker here. I like to ride outside 4-5 days a week in good weather when I can. I only own a mountain bike and had been looking all summer for a way to get hard core cardio during the winter months. Also, as a resident of the PNW, this year we experienced horrific fires, oppressive smoke, and awful air quality for a significant chunk of September. This meant no cycling.

Mountain bikes generally don't work too well with trainers so I started looking at spin bikes. I researched the Peloton and honestly, it's kind of a rip off. Huge upfront cost, limited classes for West Coasters (when I looked, anyway), and that pesky monthly fee. You are paying for brand exclusivity, IMO.

I ended up getting a Schwinn IC4 for < $1,000 and no monthly fee. I hook it up to Zwift and an iPad or my TV for structured riding. Overall, I'm very happy with my decision. I would still have preferred the Peloton's integrated screen but at literally twice the price of the IC4 (plus ongoing fees for classes if you choose to utilize them), I just couldn't justify it.

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