Not This Year.

Are we really practicing the consumer-centric approach we talk so much about, or are we still mostly talking to ourselves?

Over the past few weeks, many colleagues have asked me the same question:

“Are you going to Eurobike this year?”

My answer was usually the same.

“Maybe.”

I was considering spending just one day in Frankfurt. No booth, no meetings scheduled, no commercial agenda. Just walking the halls, seeing people I had not met in a while and getting a feel for the atmosphere.

But the closer we get to the event, the clearer the answer has become.

No.

This year, I will not be attending Eurobike.

And interestingly, that decision has very little to do with Eurobike itself.

I still believe trade shows have a role to play. People matter. Relationships matter. Face-to-face conversations matter.

The problem is that I increasingly find myself asking a different question:

Where are the conversations that will actually shape the future of our industry taking place?

For years, we have talked endlessly about consumer centricity.

It has become one of those concepts everybody agrees with. One of those expressions that appears in presentations, strategy decks, keynote speeches and annual reports. Everybody talks about being consumer-centric. Everybody talks about community. Everybody talks about putting the customer first.

The problem is that saying something and doing something are not necessarily the same thing.

Many of us, myself included, have spent years talking about consumers while still looking at the industry through an industry lens. We spend enormous amounts of time talking to each other, listening to each other, benchmarking each other and comparing ourselves to each other.

Meanwhile, entire communities of potential cyclists remain largely invisible.

People who do not read cycling media.

People who do not visit bicycle trade shows.

People who do not follow industry debates.

People who have no relationship whatsoever with what we call “the bicycle industry”.

And yet, they are precisely the people who will determine whether cycling grows or stagnates over the next decade.

Ironically, while Eurobike approaches, I have been invited to attend a different event.

The more I learned about it, the more I realised something.

The questions being discussed there are much closer to the questions I am currently interested in than anything I expected to find in Frankfurt.

Not because the people involved know more about bicycles.

Far from it.

But because they seem more interested in people than in bicycles.

And I increasingly believe that distinction matters.

For years, our industry has become exceptionally good at discussing products, technology, performance, specifications and market dynamics. We can debate motor systems, battery capacities, geometries, suspension platforms, distribution models and market shares for hours.

Yet many of the questions that will ultimately determine the future of cycling have very little to do with bicycles themselves.

Why do some people ride while others never even consider it?

Why do certain communities embrace cycling while others remain untouched by it?

Why does cycling become part of somebody’s identity in one environment while remaining completely irrelevant in another?

What prevents millions of people from seeing a bicycle as a meaningful part of their daily lives?

And perhaps most importantly, how do we build meaningful relationships with people who do not read cycling media, do not visit bicycle shops and do not attend bicycle trade shows?

Because if we are serious about consumer centricity, sooner or later we need to stop treating it as a slogan and start treating it as a responsibility.

That means spending less time talking to ourselves and more time understanding the people we claim to be serving.

It means leaving the comfort of our industry’s echo chamber.

It means listening to people who may never have heard of the brands, products, athletes, media outlets and debates that we consider important.

It means accepting that the future growth of cycling may depend less on convincing existing cyclists to buy their next bike and more on making cycling relevant to people who currently see no reason to engage with it at all.

So while many friends and colleagues will be heading to Frankfurt, I will be heading somewhere else.

Not because Eurobike has become irrelevant.

Not because the people attending are asking the wrong questions.

But because, for me, the most interesting questions in cycling right now are no longer about the bicycle industry itself.

They are about the people outside it.

The people we rarely hear from.

The people we rarely design for.

The people we rarely invite into the conversation.

The people who may ultimately determine whether cycling’s next chapter is one of growth or one of gradual irrelevance.

Perhaps that is where the most important conversations are waiting to happen.