Endura posts huge £14m loss after “large reduction in sales” and inventory “impairment” – first time Scottish cycling brand has been in the red since 2019

The hummvee shorts are great, I just wear them with bibs underneath rather than the liner that came with them.

I've got the Humvee shorts as well - best bit of cycling apparel I've got actually - excellent quality.

I'm not sure your experience is echoed by many. Our club clothing is made by Endura and seems popular (I've not bought any of the current iteration as I have quite a few items in the old design at the moment). We had great feedback when finalising the design but part of the reason we chose the brand was that they are a reliable, established UK-based company with good products.

I suspect that the company's difficulties are yet another victim of the boom-and-bust situation in cycling since 2020. I wonder whether the disappearance of Wiggle's dhb brand might help a little. It's difficult to see when or whether there will be an upturn and the doom and gloom talked about the Budget won't help retailers. According to this article in Bikebiz:

British Independent Retailers Association (BIRA) and the Association of Cycle Traders (ACT) have criticised today’s Budget as “the most damaging for independent retailers in recent memory”.

Local bike shops are struggling. They must wonder when sales will begin to improve (and whether they will at all). Meanwhile central government gives active travel some crumbs while doing nothing to get people to drive less so there will be no significant change in transport patterns.

I actually thought they'd got out of the game years back when they stopped sponsoring cycle teams claiming UCI rules were too restrictive.

The consequences being they've no USP anymore & there's a stack of other companies making equally comparable generic kit taking their slice of the market.

Did Endura have a strong USP in the first place? They seemed to manage to do a good job of both MTB and road oriented clothing, decent quality and distinctive enough without being pretentious or overpriced.

I suspect that working with Movistar didn't do a lot for the brand while more recently what noise I've seen has been about expensive TT skinsuits (a very small and shrinking market over the last decade).

I'd suggest that the pro team thing was more Rapha's marketing style (Condor then Sky, for example).

Id argue they had decent brand recognition via the Movistar link up (didnt they sponsor Bigla too ?) and could use that to show they were leading the way on technical advances and aero kit as well, it was a big thing they prototype developed Dowsetts hour record kit, now every aero bit of kit looks like what they made.

but then they stopped doing that, shortly after they got taken over by that same group who own JD Sports, refocussed on what they thought was their niche, and up pop the Le Cols & NoPinz to fit the aero kit market, and the Pas Normal, Gobiks, PedalEds, Velobici for the high cost kit market, and the Chapeaus and Velochimps, Attaquer and all the rest of them that have flooded the market since the mid 20teens.

and now it is such a crowded market of course Endura are going to lose market share big style if theyve not really got anything other than hey remember us we're Scottish, as their main selling point.

It would be interesting to know but don't think that the rise of expensive brands necessarily impacted on Endura that much. Would people who buy Le Col or Pas Normal have worn Endura instead or before?

Yes it seems a crowded market but flashy marketing is not the same as multi-year turnover. I'm not sure Endura's woes are really due to market share otherwise why are a string of other clothing brands all publishing eye-watering losses?

And today's Live Blog has another pair of relevant headlines:

"The post-Covid bike market remains very challenging, particularly for standalone bike stores".

and

Bike subscription pioneer Buzzbike set to close at the end of the week due to "escalating costs and difficult economic conditions that have impacted the whole bike industry"

That's not due to competition from online sales and similarly priced brands, these things are all part of an industry segment struggling to make any money.

Simon E wrote:

It would be interesting to know but don't think that the rise of expensive brands necessarily impacted on Endura that much. Would people who buy Le Col or Pas Normal have worn Endura instead or before?

While consumers can be divided into different market segments, the boundaries are blurred. I considered every quality brand (including Le Col) before plumping for Endura when I bought my most recent kit.

Endura has a decent brand positioning—it's good quality, but without the tasteless flexing associated with some other brands. However, Endura's website undersells its products and needs an overhaul.

I hope Endura maintains its clothing quality, as it's vital for retaining its customers long term. Rapha's drop in quality—much discussed online—damaged the brand and lost customers like me.

Their overshoe sizing table is completely wrong.  My feet are not particularly big and I needed the XXL size to fit over some specialized BG shoes.  Anyone with larger feet needs to shop elsewhere.