KENT, Wash. — A flat market, a proliferation of niche lifestyle brands and the growing dominance of Trek, Specialized and Giant at specialty retail has led Accell North America to reposition its Raleigh brand in the marketplace.
"We've spent a significant amount of energy and investment on several different studies over the last six months to assess our business and to look for new growth opportunities for the brand and the IBD channel," said Chris Speyer, Accell North America's CEO.
"Based on the information we got, we took a hard look at each and every territory and who was best equipped to tell our story and how best to go to market," said Speyer. He was named CEO in May 2014 with the departure of Steve Meineke.
Among the changes has been a repositioning of Raleigh's sales force; it included layoffs in territories with either too few dealers or where sales were underperforming.
What had been a sales force of 24 has been expanded to 29 with the addition of independent reps and rep agencies. "This certainly wasn't a downsizing, but the need to approach the business differently in certain markets," Speyer said.
"It's very competitive out there — that's no secret. BPSA statistics point to a flat market and it's been that way for years. We've heard from our dealers and our brand agency that we need to focus on the Raleigh brand; that we need to focus on consumers who celebrate the pure fun of cycling and less on suffer-fests and words like 'gnarly' if we are to succeed with everyday customers. That's our growth opportunity," Speyer said.
The changes came — in part — after Breakaway Research, a Boulder, Colorado, company, surveyed Raleigh's approximately 1,000 dealers. It also hired Banter, Grace & Lollipop, a Vancouver, British Columbia, brand agency, to offer fresh insight into today's rapidly changing retail environment.
The survey confirmed that many dealers were dissatisfied with the company's B2B website and an internal management structure that dealers found confusing.
Speyer said the company reworked its IT system to make it easier for dealers to use and has made changes in management. "The market is changing for everybody, and the expectation from dealers is that we have a clarity of message, strong operational practices, and that doing business through our B2B site is more important than ever," he said.
Larry Pizzi, recently named vice president of sales and marketing for IBDs, said there is an expectation that dealers should be able to conduct business 24/7 on the company's site. "There were a lot of things lacking — ease of navigation, ease of placing an order, how to look at information, right on down to the invoice level of detail," he said.
"We also had a big tier of middle managers, and our dealers didn't know who to talk to. They were confused by how we deployed the team, and it wasn't easy to do business with us," Pizzi said.
"The old guard wants to the do business by calling and talking with a credit manager; the new guard wants to do it sitting on the couch watching TV while using a cellphone," he added.
Accell North American is a multi-brand company. Accell Group NV bought Raleigh USA and its Diamondback brand in May 2012 for $80 million. The Dutch company had bought Seattle Bike Supply in March 2006, and it bought Currie Technologies in January 2012. With the purchase of Raleigh USA, Accell also introduced its Haibike and Lapierre brands into the U.S. and Canadian markets.
Integrating these various businesses and brands is an ongoing challenge as executives work to refocus on the company's core brand, Raleigh, and its core business, Speyer said.
"Accell has put money and resources into our business. It's been a hard couple of months with the changes we have had to make so we could have a sustainable business and a solid structure in the IBD channel," he said.
Consumers and the industry will get a glimpse of some of the changes this week as Raleigh rolls out its new consumer website. Raleigh's dealer advisory board is also in Kent this week.
They will closely review the company's research data.
Besides changes in its sales force other changes include: Alan Rowland has been named senior director of IBD sales for bikes and P&A. Brian Foley, formerly with REI, takes on purchasing and planning for SBS. Dorothy Nichols left her role at SBS last month. Rob Kaplan is director of sales for the West Coast in addition to his role as vice president of sales at Currie. Dave Taylor, Canada's sales director, is also taking on responsibility for the East Coast. Tabi Adkins is brand marketing manager, replacing Dirk Sorenson, who left earlier in the year. Tim Rutledge, who oversaw development of SBS' cyclocross program for Redline, has also left the company. George Simone, formerly vice president of IBD sales, has left and joined ASI, where he is now vice president for global business development.
