A few weeks ago, I glared at my peloton in frustration. The last time I used my bike was last year, before I moved to this apartment. Now it takes up space and collects dust in the spare room. (Sometimes it can also be used as a clothesline.) I decided to put it up for sale.
Or, at least, I tried: The resale market is crowded, with bikes selling for 50% of the original price on Craigslist and Facebook marketplaces, priced at $1,895 ($2,245 depending on when purchased). ). In New York City, where I live, a recent Craigslist search turned up 106 pages of results for bikes for sale. Most of it is Peloton. “I just want it gone,” said one seller’s post.A similar story in Austin, Texas, with some people pricing the Peloton at $600 to $700. In Chicago, a seller posted his seven-word short story.of The pandemic may not be over, but it looks like this pandemic-era trend will continue.
It wasn’t always like this. In September 2020, around the time I bought his Peloton, the company said he had over 1.09 million connected fitness subscribers, up 113% year-over-year, for a total of about 3.1 million. said that there are members of Like many others, I bought a bike and quickly joined a cult. I started the day with a 30 minute ride taught by instructors (Cody, Alex, Ally, Robin!) who ended up having a one-sided first-name-based relationship. After work I did a 30 minute “Club Banger’s Ride”. I was riding 60 minutes on the weekend. What else was I doing, anyway?
Like many others, I bought a bike and quickly joined a cult.
However, in the spring of 2021, I was vaccinated. I went back to bars and restaurants, went on vacation, and started working out on a strength trainer instead of focusing on cardio. As I quickly realized, it was a relief to walk away from a bike that tended to be overly obsessed with metrics and numbers rather than whether you were actually having a good workout and having fun. (But again, what else were you doing, anyway?)
As my own Peloton declined, so did the company’s numbers.As 2021 and 2022 progressed and the economy reopened, sales of connected fitness products like Peloton slowed. In January 2022, Peloton temporarily suspended product production due to low demand. A few weeks later, the company laid off his 2,800 employees. This represents approximately 20% of the company’s workforce. The company’s market capitalization is now at his $3 billion, a mere pittance compared to his all-time high of nearly $50 billion in January 2021. The company, which has lost six straight quarters, reported a loss of $1.2 billion per quarter in September.
In recent months, Peloton has been trying to win back customers, reopening an in-person studio in New York City this summer and adding a $3,195 rowing machine to its fitness equipment lineup this fall. The company has been trying to market its products on Amazon, and even tried to compete with the secondary market itself by conducting a brief test in August of a certified pre-owned bike program that allows users to buy used Pelotons through the company. Meanwhile, SoulCycle took a cheap shot by offering to bring in the peloton rider by trading in the bike in his SoulCycle class of his 47 in the studio. (That’s a fair deal. At $35 per pop, 47 SoulCycle classes are about as much as his current $1,445 bike itself costs.)
It all seems too late for many former fans.like a tie-dye sweatsuit instant pot, the Peloton can feel like a stalled trend in 2020 and who still wants to be there? It was my ticket to feeling human again for a few months. But she didn’t quite settle down in the end. “I started to associate it with the pain and isolation of the pandemic,” she said. I decided to join again.” (Earlier this year, Peloton changed its subscription pricing structure. Starting June 1st, the cost of membership increased from $39 to $44 per month.) In May 2022, Abby sold her bike.
“I almost started dating [the Peloton] With the pain and isolation of the pandemic. ”
Similarly, some once-avid users told us that they initially loved the Peloton in online communities, but eventually got sick of pedaling alone in their apartment. Ad agency strategy director Corey Kindberg sold his Peloton Bike+, a premium product for his brand, before moving from New York to Los Angeles in 2021. Its charm has really faded,” he said. “I actually got to hate people making fun of me just sitting in my apartment.” Solo riding just wasn’t for him. “The magic of spin classes for me wasn’t the workout, it was the energy in the room,” he said. “I didn’t get it on the bike. It wasn’t the same.”
To be fair, Peloton offers in-person classes at its New York studio, but apparently not all Peloton enthusiasts live in New York. has struggled to become a peloton person, even though she used to be a spin class person. “But really, no one forced me to be on my bike all the way through class or work hard.” In October 2021, she sold it for her $1,000.
Yael Berger, a New York City-based PR professional, purchased the Peloton in August 2020. Now she is considering selling. (She’s still a peloton person at heart, she says, but she’s currently training for the New York City Marathon and has a controlled fitness schedule focused on running with little room to spin. (I have one.) But she still hasn’t parted with the bike. rice field. “I bought the bike for about $2,000, so for $500 in return, I could just keep it and use it when I need it.”
Another reason people are crossing the peloton is that the tide of wellness thinking is changing. After all, the peloton isn’t the only one in trouble. Despite a recent Peloton survey, SoulCycle’s performance isn’t great. In August, the company announced it was closing his 25% of the studio. Many people I’ve spoken to who have decided to ditch the peloton haven’t returned to their punishing high-intensity workout classes. Instead, he mentioned embracing new forms of fitness such as hiking, weightlifting, yoga and Pilates. Overall, activities like hiking and yoga are less intense and more metric-based than popular pre-pandemic workouts like SoulCycle, OrangeTheory, or Peloton.
Here are some of the overall trends in fitness observed by journalist Lina Rafael in a recent newsletter. Generation Z is opposing the overproductive, “loud culture” elements of wellness and fitness that characterize millennials. Life is hard enough — why should our workouts be any harder?
Again, probably not that deep.Rafael, author of a new book, points out that it’s fairly common for people to abandon fitness tech once the novelty wears off. The Wellness Gospel: Gyms, Guru, Goop, and False Promises of Self-Care“We often hear the same thing about Fitbits: A good percentage of consumers got bored with their trackers and threw them in the drawer after six months,” she said. “At the end of the day, you have to love what your tech product has to offer in order to keep using it, or you’ll get bored and move on to the next big fitness fad.”
I don’t know what will happen to my peloton. I’ll give it away to a friend first. If that fails, sell it on Craigslist at a discounted price. Now that you have everything you need, it’s time to move on. As one New York seller said: I just want it gone.
