Firefox eyes semi-urban market for leisure bikes

Expanding its reach and considering the growing demand for cycles, leisure biking company Firefox Bikes is now eyeing tier-III cites along with metro cities and other urban areas. Recently, it has opened its 8th store in store in Pune.

"We have a very different business model. We do not ask for dealerships or market our brand. We always convert the existing cycle dealer into Firefox dealerships or dealer comes to us and we offer better margins to them. We are opening 25-20 outlets this year, mainly focusing on tier-II cities. Over the years we have noticed a huge demand for hi-end bikes from Pune city and our sales have strongly picked up,” Shiv Inder Singh, managing director Firefox Bikes said. The company is eyeing over 75 cities across India for dealership expansion.

He added, "The company sold over 50,000 bikes last year. As Indians are increasingly taking to the greener transport, we aim at selling 70,000 bikes by 2014 year-end.”

The Firefox bike range starts from Rs 5,000 to Rs 33,000 and Trek bike range starts from Rs 30,000 onward. The range will have more than 70 bike models, covering the entire spectrum of Mountain, All Terrain Bikes, Road Bikes, BMX, kid's bikes along with a wide range of accessories designed as per the international standards & specifications.

According to Singh, the leisure bicycle market has grown by four times.

The total market size is of 15 million units and the leisure bicycle contributes 3 per cent.  

In FY14, Firefox has made sales of Rs 75 crore.