[HN Gopher] Peloton got trapped in its trillion-dollar fantasy
___________________________________________________________________
Peloton got trapped in its trillion-dollar fantasy
Author : pseudolus
Score : 30 points
Date : 2022-03-10 11:31 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bloomberg.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bloomberg.com)
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.ph/Ido3K
| kderbyma wrote:
| I must be one of the few who didn't know what peloton was really,
| heard it said once in a while but just thought it was nothing but
| a type of bike. apparently I am not their target demographic
| ChildOfChaos wrote:
| Well of course, Peloton is an extremely niche product available
| to a rich few.
|
| Trillion dollar company is a joke.
| gkoberger wrote:
| I am not surprised that it hit a post-COVID wall, but I don't
| think this is true at all.
|
| If you finance it, it's not significantly more than a gym
| membership every month. It's crazy to say fitness is a niche
| product; I think everyone's parents have a treadmill or
| nordictrack collecting dust in the basement. People have been
| buying home fitness equipment for decades.
| beAbU wrote:
| Does your gym membership give you access to only one exercise
| bike?
| icegreentea2 wrote:
| Peloton is price competitive with standalone (ie: not
| tacked onto a big-box gym membership) spin classes.
|
| I don't think Peloton is worth a trillion dollars, but the
| market is serves is real.
| LordDragonfang wrote:
| Maybe I'm out of touch with what working-class people do
| for fitness, but my understanding is that standalone spin
| classes _also_ mostly fall under the domain of "niche
| [service] available to a rich few." (Or at the very
| least, upper-middle class)
| browningstreet wrote:
| My 80,000 sq ft mega non-chain gym includes unlimited
| spin classes for $50/mo.
|
| Can we stop with the indiscriminate "privilege" thing for
| anything that costs money?
| SturgeonsLaw wrote:
| With around 60% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck,
| paying for things like spin class absolutely falls under
| the banner of privilege. Yeah, it's not a private jet,
| but paying to burn off the excess calories consumed over
| the month is surely at least a little bougie.
| gkoberger wrote:
| No, but my gym also doesn't do fun on-demand classes with
| well-known instructors that I can do with my friends.
| seanp2k2 wrote:
| "A rich few" maybe on a global scale. Out of people I know who
| have one, I think the person with the lowest-paying job is a
| bartender in the Midwest. It's comparable to a nice home
| weightlifting rack. It's half the price of a budget motorcycle.
| Railsify wrote:
| I friend of mine just bought a 1600 dollar model, you can get
| a flagship cell phone for about the same amount.
| [deleted]
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| Peloton has a great product and a surprisingly sticky following.
|
| If they can reel in the spending while keeping the same high
| quality I think they have a decent future.
| sys_64738 wrote:
| They were just the next Go Pro. A craze that eventually runs out
| of steam.
| plorkyeran wrote:
| Being the next Go Pro seems like a good goal for a company.
| Their stock crashed when it became clear that they weren't
| going to sustain crazy exponential growth indefinitely, but
| they didn't overinvest in trying to sustain their growth rate
| and have spent the last five years operating at a comfortable
| profit while still growing a bit.
| moltke wrote:
| The older Go Pro actually works pretty well if you don't own a
| phone. People love the pictures I take with mine while I'm out
| sailing.
| medymed wrote:
| It tapped a newish market and invested in a self-bubble. The
| market will stick around. Time for commoditization.
| usrusr wrote:
| Commoditization in this case would mean unbundling of hardware
| and service and that very much exists already, and is far from
| stealing Peloton's lunch. There's Zwift (an investment fantasy
| story for another time, as wild as Peloton's but with slightly
| less digits) and about half a dozen "baby zwifts" that might
| even be profitable or at least close but suffer hard from being
| outside of the brand lock-in of the big players.
| stathibus wrote:
| The Larry Page toothbrush principle seems applicable here.
| abrichr wrote:
| From https://medium.com/behavior-design/the-toothbrush-trick-
| used...:
|
| > Larry Page, CEO of Alphabet (the company formerly known as
| Google), has a quirky way of deciding which companies he likes.
| It's called "The Toothbrush Test." According to the New York
| Times, when Page looks at a potential company to acquire, he
| wants to know if the product is, like a toothbrush, "something
| you will use once or twice a day."
| MengerSponge wrote:
| I bought a Concept 2 BikeErg
| <https://www.concept2.com/bikeerg/concept2-bikeerg> two years
| ago, and have really enjoyed it. It's solidly built, it accepts
| standard cycling components (I replaced the stock pedals for some
| clipless ones), and the damper-flywheel is smooth and somewhat
| realistic.
|
| At $1k, it's both very expensive and much cheaper than a Peloton
| or NordicTrac bike. If you're looking for a home setup, I highly
| recommend it. It won't help you if you need classes or other
| social interactivity, but my exercise time is me time.
| Wojtkie wrote:
| My gym has all Concept 2 equipment and I really enjoy them.
| Simple to use, they feel really great, too.
| mcaravey wrote:
| We bought the Concept2 SkiErg and Rower a while back
| specifically because they were used in gyms in the area and
| held up to daily abuse well. The quality is fantastic
| considering we paid about $800 each. Highly recommend the
| Concept2 equipment.
| dboreham wrote:
| Drinking the Kool Aid. Very common.
| lowdose wrote:
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-03-11 23:02 UTC)