>Sometimes I’ll move the Peloton bike into our gallery so I can spend time with my half gay husband while he reads Architectural Digest wearing combat boots
I definitely lol'd. Half gayness notwithstanding, this is like an upscale caricature of a normal evening in my house and lot of households.
"Spend $2k on our bike and for just $40/mo you can get in shape while you ignore each other"
My sides. I have friends working there that have tried getting me to apply. Glassdoor reviews indicated their backend interview is unnecessarily difficult and I have little faith in their business model. How many people are willing to spend thousands on an exercise bike? Let alone one that requires a $40/month subscription? It feels the same as Blue Apron - the market is people rich and lazy enough that don't want do the first half of the work (go to the gym or the grocery store) but still want to do the hard part (actually cook and exercise).
This bike is for people that don't want to go to a gym and/or don't have lots of time to leave the house on a daily basis. You can also finance the bike so the hit isn't so bad. Additionally, there's no extra charge for multiple accounts (up to 10), so if everyone in the house uses it, the cost makes more sense.
I work out of home and this is the only way I get consistent exercise. My fitness has gone up tremendously as has my quality of life. It's all about what motivates you to take your health seriously... this bike does it for me and a lot of other people. It's really hard to put a price on that.
Semi-related, I just got a $400 Oculus Quest and burned 1900 calories playing Beat Saber yesterday (as calculated by Apple Watch's "Other" workout type).
Much cheaper purchase and fun enough that I can enjoy playing it for hours a day. I have an (admittedly shitty) exercise bike, and will probably be using that a lot less now.
If anyone's looking for a home fitness gadget, give that a look. I'm told BoxVR is a better workout than Beat Saber but I haven't bought that yet.
Everyone else is saying how absurd the 1900 calorie claim is, and comparing it to other types of exercise, but even if it is the much lower 360 calories, most sedentary gamers are more likely to do this multiple times per week than say, run a marathon, or even start doing a program like C25K. That's a huge win in my book...
I mentioned in other comments (and edited a bit with more accurate numbers), but I'll put it here too: the watch worked it out to 830 calories/hour and Runner's World says that's equivalent to me running at 11:30 minutes/mile based on my 210 lbs weight.
I've only gone running once this spring so I don't have a huge dataset (lots of walking and exercise bike instead), but the one run I did was a 10:30 mile. So I'm not especially fast, but 11:30 is a slow pace for me and feels reasonable as a beat saber equivalent workout.
Downside, the Quest's foam face-interface gets absolutely drenched in sweat. I need to get a sweatband and a wipeable pad replacement as soon as VRCover catches up on their backorders.
Even as an exercise bike owner who can hop on that for a workout whenever I want to, I've never gotten home from work and said "You know what I want to do? Exercise bike for more than two hours."
Compared to half an hour of exercise bike and two hours of Overwatch, I think this will be a huge deal for fitness.
I have a hunch that it's overestimating because you wave your arms around a lot, but 360 seems like an underestimate. Average heart rate in 70% to 80% range, and I'll have higher than average calorie expenditure because I'm overweight.
EDIT - did a comparison against Runner's World's calorie burn calculator, and the calories/hour burn rate lines up with a leisurely 11:30 minutes/mile pace based on my weight.
Gives back 159 calories for a 1 mile run, 829 calories per hour.
My Beat Saber workouts yesterday tally up at 830 calories per hour and the amount of sweating felt in the ballpark of running an 11 minute mile. I don't think the watch's estimates are that outlandish.
Again factoring in that I weigh 210 lbs, their calculator also says a marathon would be upwards of 4100 calories for me. 1900 calories clocks in at less than half of a marathon.
It’s certainly possible to burn 800+ calories per hour for a couple hours. Normal, actually, for someone doing athletic training. (E.g., anyone training semi-seriously for any kind road race is doing this at least once a week.)
But I’d pretty surprised if you did it without training to build up to it. You could have developed the aerobic capacity through other activities, but I’d have thought various muscles would be unprepared and would be giving you rather strong pain signals. If you nevertheless pushed through that, I’d think you’d be SORE AF today and barely able to move.
Or maybe your activity confused the calorie model your Apple Watch uses.
I exercise bike pretty much daily (typically 30-60 minutes), so my arms are flimsy but in terms of cardio capacity I'm not in awful shape. My arms are definitely sore today.
That's apples to oranges. A regular runner who runs a few times a week could do 11:30 minute miles just fine. Someone who just started running would have much difficulty doing an 11:30 mile period let alone sustaining that pace for two hours.
Found another reference that estimates 3600 at 210 lbs, so maybe somewhere in the middle:
>According to the Cleveland Clinic Center for Consumer Health, a runner who weighs 130 lb. will burn 2,224 calories during a marathon, a 165 lb. runner will burn 2,822 calories and a 210 lb. runner will burn 3,593 calories.
I've been playing "Space Pirate Trainer" on my new Quest and was shocked at how worked-out my legs felt afterwards from dodging incoming shots by squatting/leaning.
I broke this down in another comment, but trusting Runner's World for a calorie calculator, a half marathon would take me 2080 calories (at 210 lbs). So a little bit less than that.
Average calorie burn was 830 calories/hour, which they say is equivalent to me running at an 11:30 minutes/mile pace.
In terms of effort expended, important to note that this was three sessions over the course of the evening, adding up to 1900 calories and 2 hours 17 minutes.
So it was something like running 4 miles 3 times with an hour and change break in between, which is probably an easier feat than doing it in one shot.
My arms are still sore and I don't plan on doing that every day, but it was definitely a workout.
That was split over three sessions totaling 2:17, and is for me being 5' 10" and around 210 lbs. If you're skinnier than me you'll probably burn less.
It was a good chunk of my evening and my arms are pretty sore today, so I don't plan on doing that all the time. But I'll absolutely do it more often than I run/bike 1900 calories.
It's not realistic to expect the amount of fat lost from any kind of exercise to be anywhere near the total amount of calories expended, though. There are biological limits to fat metabolism that just can't be avoided.
Closest gym with spin classes is 30 minutes away. I also tend to do my classes between 11pm and 12pm, something not possible at any gym. The sessions are tightly controlled so I'm getting the workout I need. I don't have to deal with cars, humidity or any other variables riding on the road. To be honest, I don't understand why people bring that point up so much.
Fair enough, but I'm not sure that NYC would keep me in the house for exercise.
I live in the mountains of Colorado, but will always prefer exercising outdoors, even in winter. I tend to modify my exercise for the time of year and weather. In winter it tends towards running and skiing. Summer is for biking (and more running). I like to have variety of activities (helps to build up a diverse set of strength) and the simplicity of walking out my front door. (Without a monthly fee)
Previous years I've done running in the summer, but I hate it in the winter. Motivation to work out has been a hard enough barrier, so once the air gets too cold to breathe comfortably I'd pretty much stop.
Exercise bike was a game changer last winter in terms of getting me to stick with regular workouts.
New Yorkers just stop at the gym on their way home from work. The net time difference is close to zero. However you also have the opportunity to actually meet other people at a gym.
In the winter, putting on (and then taking off) the winter clothes plus rinsing the salt off the bike when I get home adds 10 - 15 minutes to the ride.
And while I don't really don't enjoy riding stationary bikes, there is some appeal to getting in a fake ride on a stationary bike in my living room when it's 35 degrees and raining outside. Or 90 degrees and high humidity.
Not leaving the house regularly is a serious quality of life issue. That is most certainly not going to be addressed by the purchase of a stationary bike.
I was just referring to the fact that I work from home and put in about 10 hours per day behind a computer. Sedentary life is hard to avoid for programmers even though I'm into athletic activities. The bike allows me to get in a class during lunch, after work or late into the evening. The rest of my free time is spent with my family- driving to the gym 30 minutes away to take their classes would take away an hour of my free time just in driving.
Because they are not as good. The Peloton bike uses earth magnets for the resistance so changing levels is seamless. Your bike is directly communicating with the class HUD and you can see how you are performing against your own stats and against others in the class, real time or historically. It's a completely different experience than messing with a trainer.
I've never used peloton but I would be very surprised if any of the mid-top end direct drive smart trainers weren't vastly better than an exercise bike. They also use magnetic resistance up to 2000w in some cases with seamless transitioning. There is nothing apart from greed that stops peloton from offering their classes to anyone with a smart trainer. You get all those stats on an ipad/laptop/phone with other smart trainers and according to reviews the power readings are not very accurate on a peloton bike. Really seems like a win for marketing over reality.
> How many people are willing to spend thousands on an exercise bike?
A lot, myself included. My wife and I gave it to each other for Christmas one year, right before our daughter was born.
At the time when we were new parents, it was perfect. We could exercise quietly without waking either the baby or each other, all without leaving the house.
Now that our daughter is older, we still use it albeit more infrequently in the summer when we both like to go out and run. However, the digital classes offered in the app are great for running & training. For me personally, it was easy to get stuck in a rut of just plodding along and not really improving my fitness. Having the coaches in your ear telling you what to do works well for me.
I know people who love spin classes. They're not just buying an exercise bike. They're buying a really nice bike, and membership in a global community of people who also love spin. It really does seem like getting to go to a spin class any time you want, in the privacy of your own home.
I have way more than $2k in outdoor gear, because my favorite exercise is trail running and climbing mountains. If riding an indoor bike was my thing, I would seriously consider a Peloton.
I didn't say there was zero market. Obviously people are buying the things. But this is an IPO we're talking about. I'm questioning the long term growth of what I see as an expensive niche product.
You made a pretty inflammatory comment: "the market is people rich and lazy enough that don't want do the first half of the work".
He's just explaining that there is a market. It's probably an enthusiast market as well as wealthy people that can make this an impulse buy, but the opportunity for growth is to convince a much more general market to finance the bike and justify the monthly costs like they do their cable/streaming bills.
I understand you didn't want to interview for the job, I get not wanting to work on a product you don't care for... I just think your other comments made little sense and seemed more inflammatory than anything.
Sorry it wasn't meant to be inflammatory, brevity is hard. But has any fitness fad ever threatened the cable industry? I don't see anyone cancelling their netflix subscription in order to afford this thing. But based on all the responses claiming there's "tons" of market I'm still inclined to disagree. The market seems to just be people already really into cycling (either outdoors or spin classes) and are currently pouring money into those hobbies. Maybe it's a wildly bigger market than I imagine but if I was putting my money on it, and we're talking about an IPO here, I'd say that Peloton's best growth will soon be behind them and they're trying to cash out while they can.
I wasn't suggesting that people cancel netflix or cable, I was just saying that this expense could fall into a similar category. I personally am willing to spend a certain amount of money towards my health each month if it's effective.
"The market seems to just be people already really into cycling"
This is not true, I see tons of people that are just getting into spin/cycling for the first time. I think the primary customers are people that don't mind using a bike, need to be motivated and have busy lives.
We'll see what happens, but I think there's a lot of growth to be had, especially if they try and compete with Tonal.
It's cheaper than a normal road bike...
This past weekend I witnessed hundreds of people compete in a triathlon, each of them riding a bike that probably had tires more expensive than my bike. The top men and women were riding $10,000+ bikes. And they all own multiple $$$ bikes, specialized to the particulars of the course they're racing.
A $2000 Peloton that you can train in for recovery or when the weather is bad? That's a bargain by comparison.
Those people aren't training using 30-45min spin classes. They're on a resistance trainer using TrainerRoad/Zwift workouts mostly based on time-in-saddle.
And yet the global market for high end bikes is pretty tiny. There's been huge consolidation of big name brands under private equity as they try to build full range lifestyle portfolios, none of which are big enough to go public independently, yet somehow this niche combining fitness, stationary biking and home subscription has a big enough market for an IPO? Maybe, but I'm skeptical.
Don't worry. Once the bike is a few years old they will release a new online training program that's incompatible with the bikes they have -- but compatible with the brand-new, $3500 retail Peloton model.
> How many people are willing to spend thousands on an exercise bike?
Tons of them.
I've had a bunch of setups where you could plug in your road bike into a stationary setup, with virtual screen and everything, but the hassle of setting it up was always just a little too much friction.
It'd be the logical N+1 addition to my stable of more expensive road, cross and mountain bikes.
You have no idea how much people are willing to spend on their cycling hobby.
If I want a one hour work-out, going to the gym adds 2 times 10 minutes to go back and from. The bikes may already be taken. Music is blaring out of loudspeakers. There's no training included.
This is not about being lazy, it's about being rich enough to trade time and convenience for money.
Twice, I had something like a Wahoo Kickr. Twice, after repeated use, the mounting mechanism to fasten my road bike to the trainer started to fail or became very cumbersome to use.
When it did work, the tires on the road bike slipped when putting on high power.
In the end, even if it wasn't a huge inconvenience, the hassle of using the system was sufficient friction to stop me from using it, just like the overhead of going to a gym.
There is a large market for tailor-made solutions that are perfect for just one application. (See also: iPad, bike GPS computers, 10 different categories of mountain bikes, ...)
Having to remove the rear wheel is definitely better from a slippage point of view, but now you still have the friction of removing your wheel and putting it back and getting your hands dirty in the process.
Maybe I'm just lazy after all...
But it still illustrates how something like Peleton can be appealing for many.
This is definitely not the common path for hard core cycling aficionados... They're far more likely to buy a decent trainer for their expensive road bike than a clunky exercise bike, then compete online not attend a virtual spin class. The people i know use a semi permanent setup for the off season so it's not really a hassle and far more realistic.
I agree with an earlier comment that their target market is the same as meal services, and the value proposition is debatable.
I am a fairly experienced road cyclist and even though I prefer to ride outside AND have a computer-controlled bike trainer, I would consider one if I had the space. I also have several friends who prefer this to all their other options.
1.) It's way easier to get started up without the faff of setting up your trainer. If you have a dedicated bike+trainer this is less of an issue, but that is going to cost a fair amount (something like $1-1.5K) and take up about as much space, and not be anywhere near as seamless.
2.) The coaching you get is extremely rich compared to TrainerRoad and Zwift, both costing $15/person/month. So if you have 2 people on the same account you pay a bit more per person and get better coaching. They are also branching out into strength and other types of video coaching as part of the package.
I initially thought it was useless if you had a trainer for the bike, but I see the appeal now. If the app worked with my wahoo trainer, then I'd very likely buy the service and have it work with my existing equipment.
I see your point that, for you, there's an appeal. But with so many comments disagreeing with me and saying there's "tons" of market I'm inclined to maintain my point. I think the market (and evidenced by the way it's _marketed_) as it stands is not the general public. It's either people who are already paying gobs of money for cycling classes à la SoulCycle or already dishing out money for their cycling hobby. On the topic of a looming IPO, I don't see their growth continuing to accelerate for much longer.
Generally the people that use HN are not the target market for Peloton.
In contrast to your POV, I know dozens of people who do already have Pelton subscriptions, or plan to get some. My office is planning to get 2 or 3 bikes for our exercise room.
Peloton is too expensive to see startup-type growth much longer, but they've got something better: actual revenue and a path to profitability (if they're not already there).
It's not "better" coaching, just directly engaged instruction. TrainerRoad/Zwift workouts are tailored to specific goals, whereas spin classes are aimed at general fitness... and I've never seen one that lasted over 45 minutes.
> How many people are willing to spend thousands on an exercise bike?
In an age when wealth is highly concentrated among a few people, you can make a lot of money selling those few people absurdly overpriced luxury goods.
Are there lots of them? Not really. But they have all the disposable income, so...
Maybe you can make a living at selling $50,000 jewelry to the very wealthy, but I'm not sure you can make much of a living selling a $3000 bike to the 1%.
You're not just selling the bike, you're also selling subscriptions. On top of that, there is the gamification of competing with other people/yourself.
People pay for gym memberships that they never use. They also buy home exercise equipment that collects dust for most of its life. Then you have active cyclists that will splurge $5K+ on a real bike and want a way to ride when the weather makes it troublesome. There is a market.
I built a website to serve the market that sits between and overlaps Peloton and Zwift. It's a human-curated aggregator/review site with a filter so you can quickly find content by type, duration, featured athlete, sport, recommended use. It's free and you can use your existing equipment or even a Peloton spin bike if you grow tired of paying a subscription.
The site is still at MVP stage so I welcome any feedback on viability, usability, copy, anything that can help me improve it. I want to make it easier, cheaper (free!) and more fun for people to get their workout done from pros to beginners. I also want to help promote the work of the athletes + producers and give kudos to the brands that support that content production instead of buying display ads based on behavioral tracking!
One cool feature apart from the filter is that if you sign up (free, just username/password) you can bookmark favorites onto a personal playlist page to return to later. Another attempt to reduce the friction between thinking about a workout and getting it done.
FYI there are quite a few free guided workout videos on YouTube (GCN is my favorite so far) that are great when you need to do interval training. They are super engaging and high quality. For aerobic base training (lower intensity but longer duration) I like inspiring documentaries or sports events and podcasts or audiobooks for runs outside. I'm adding more to Slipstream every day.
There is a definite market, but like gym memberships it is likely to contract during downturns. The folks I know with Pelotons are cycle infrequently and have a more general regime. As a cyclist I'd be interested to know how many get a Peloton versus sticking with traditional trainers?
Ignoring the all-weather cyclists it'd also be interesting to know how many ride into the shoulders of the season. Most of the folks I ride with have $5000 bikes and they may ride from March to November here in Philly depending on really bad conditions.
DC resident and cyclist. I ride year-round, but in winter I do scheduled indoor group sessions (currently, on Wahoo Kickrs) as the ground tends to be too squishy with the freeze/thaw for the mountain bike (which I prefer to the road bike).
I also own a Kickr at home. My spare mountain bike is mounted on it year-round. Through summer, I do the 30-minute workout program on TrainerRoad (rainy days or when I work late, but I try to do most riding outside).
My issue with Peloton isn't the money. As noted, like many cyclists, I have several expensive bikes. It's the lack of specificity for actual cycling. And the subscription is just ridiculous, when Zwift and TrainerRoad are $15/month for similar software.
There are numerous upscale gyms in my area that cost $200-400 per month. The demographic that is considering a Pelaton is probably buying in addition to a gym membership like that or comparing against it.
There's a huge difference between an exercise bike and the real thing. Sure you can add online gameplay, but it is a poor substitute.
I'm not sure how much staying power they have. More people seem to like the idea of excerise rather than the exercise itself. Maybe I'm missing something..
I'm surprised that they haven't expanded into rowing, seems like an even better fit. Personally, I think you're better off joining a gym and going to spin class if you don't have good roads near you.
Oh, and seeing that they have packages with bundled cycling shoes did make me cringe. That's when you need to go to a bike shop and get some that fit (cycling shoes are designed to be stiff so they don't 'wear in' to the same degree as other footwear.
> I'm surprised that they haven't expanded into rowing, seems like an even better fit.
I'm just gonna drop a shameless plug here and note that I recently joined the team at Hydrow; rowing is our business and our machine feels really good--the quality of the product was a nontrivial part of why I signed up.
I don't see the value proposition in this business model. You can have a full time membership at gym with in person cycling classes not to mention yoga classes, saunas, pools, weightlifting equipment and cardio equipment for the same price as their subscription.
I don't have a Peloton at home but I do have a treadmill, elliptical, and some weights and getting a stationary bike is on my list. It is really convenient not to have to go through the ceremony of going to the gym. I can go to the room across the hall and work out anytime in front of my TV. You really don't need a lot of different weightlifting equipment to stay in shape. Just an adjustable weight bench (which I have) and adjustable dumb bells.
You can stream Yoga classes if you want. I also don't have to be around germ infested sick people in the winter and wait on equipment.
+1. Honestly, if I go to the gym it's because I want someone else to tell me what to do, and for the social aspect, not because my home setup isn't sufficient (bench, adjustable DBs, stationary bike, rowing machine, medicine balls, slides, resistance bands, TRX, bosu).
The other part of the story is that I spent over a decade as a part time fitness instructor going around to over a dozen gyms during the course of a year and the energy of being in front of a class and the friendships I made were priceless.
But as $life_happened and I stopped teaching and moved away from my friends, I really started hating everything about the gym and having to work around the gym schedule. There are times I hang out with my wife until she goes to sleep and then work out after 9PM.
I could imagine getting one if I had some amount more money. I work from home and my gym is just far enough away that I can’t go there on a standard lunch break. In the summer I run or bike outside. A Pelaton for me would just be for lunchtime workouts in the winter... can’t justify that financially but I do see the appeal.
I think OP is saying the interview asked for a much greater skill level than is actually necessary to do the job. The equivalent of requiring a PhD for a job doing Bachelor's level grunt work.
They're not really unique in that though. If car commercials were real, everyone would be driving around either DUMBO, Brooklyn or peeling out on the Nevada Salt Flats.
SoulCycle is over $5k/year if you go 3 times a week. A Pelton is only $2,245 (plus a subscription; financing available), and comes with unlimited classes combined with great software/trainers/community who get people excited about riding.
You could say Pelton is SoulCycle for people who want to save money and time.
A friend of mine got a Peloton, and I as a good friend razzed him about it a couple times. Like a $2k stationary bike, come on!
But now I get it. He is a busy professional who would not always have time to go to the gym. He is also a bit of a special case as he legally blind and could walk fast to exercise but could never ride a regular bike. This being said he has lost a decent amount of weight.
Part of it is the instructors, they do a good job of making you feel connected to the Peloton community. You see their friendly faces (who of course are all good looking) every day encouraging you . The instructors get followed on social platforms and there are active FB groups where users talk about their own lives and trade/sell Peloton gear. I half joke it is like a good cult.
He has a few friends with accounts and they use his bike and chip in for the monthly fee. This lead to one couple to eventually buy their own.
As a side note, the music lawsuit they are facing is a big deal, it is a major part the experience. It doesn't work without the music. So they have to settle that.
Would I buy the bike for $2k+? No. but I can see why people do.
This isn't Juiceroo.
$2k isn't absurt for an exercise bike once you think about it. These are the same people who buy a $10,000 bike for recreational riding, remember.
You are dead on with the point about the instructors. My wife hated biking but they have Pelotons in her work gym, and she loves them, and talks about the instructors like they are real people.
People are fitness crazy right now. Crossfit gyms are $100-200 a month, Rogue has whole website of fitness equipment, you could easily spend $4,000 outfitting your house. And how many of us own a $600 blender?
talks about the instructors like they are real people
That’s because they are real people! Working people who are doing a job, not actual friends of course. But still: real living, breathing, actual human beings.
Although I do wonder if buried somewhere in the business plan is the expectation of replacing them with AI-equivalents that don’t cost as much & don’t require pesky things like holidays or sick pay.
Probably what they mean is that she has a parasocial relationship[0] with the instructors i.e. she knows the instructor but the instructor does not know her.
the first time i heard about the vitamix was when someone emailed the company for-fun mailing list asking for blender recommendations and immediately got 5 replies suggesting vitamix. its better than any other blender. it will change your life. buy them, they're a customer (of the company we were working at).
i seriously thought everyone was pulling an inside joke and i just didnt get it. i looked at the website, a $600 blender??
They're real in the sense that the dude in the P90X videos is real. There's a difference between a personal trainer who works with you, and a remote team of drill sergeants relaying instructions to an indeterminate number of strangers following them online.
Have you ever tried a spin class at a gym? No one goes in with the expectation that it should be an experience like working with a personal trainer. So many absurd comments here, my head is starting to spin. (pun intended)
The whole point of the instructor is to instruct you and encourage you to work harder. They are there to keep you focused on the task. Never once felt like these people are virtual drill instructors, which insinuates a demeaning, impersonal experience.
I’m a huge fan and recently bought a second one so my wife and I don’t have to share.
The bike itself is well made - heavy, easily adjustable, zero wobble even with a heavy guy on it.
The classes are superb - I had never done a spinning class before and I was quickly hooked. The combination of music synced to the workout cadence and a live human (and leaderboard) make me want to compete and thus push a lot harder than if I was solo.
I had one, and I sold it. The music is abysmal and the video streams are low res. The classes and subscription offer nothing over free YouTube videos.
All the bike’s electronics do is detect the resistance level (you have to set the resistance yourself, mind you) and the RPM. Combined with a bluetooth heart rate monitor, they give you some charts and graphs. You can do this all yourself with an app and a bike that costs a third as much.
It’s mostly just an overpriced android tablet. Kudos to them to following the Dyson and Beats by Dre model of margin-building to the letter.
Their greyhat astroturfing campaigns on social media are second to none, though. I might buy their IPO, although I staunchly advise my friends and associates to avoid their products.
I'm doing just that (using a bike that costs a third as much), and I'm really happy to have saved like $1500. All you need is any decent bike ($200-$600), a bluetooth cadence and heart rate sensor ($70), plus their cheaper $20/mo app and you get most of the experience at a reasonable cost. I don't get the output number and can't compete on the leaderboard, but that's fine. If they keep supporting things non-Peloton bikes like this, I can see them making a ton of money. I wouldn't be surprised to see an entry level bike in the next year or two.
I personally love the music (classic rock and EDM for most of my classes) but that's personal preference, and haven't had any issue with video stream.
I wish this comment was higher. Not because it's Boing Boing, but because literally the entire rest of this comment thread focused on the bike part and not the subscription part. What people need to know is that the subscription via the bike is $40/mo, but the iPad/mobile app is only $15/mo. With the app, you get access to all the same training programs, but you miss out on the metrics. But, you also get access to Peloton's running workouts as a positive trade-off.
Peloton has better legs than most, but the reality is that every fitness craze has eventually died whether it’s equipment (eg Bowflex) or method (eg Tae Bo). It’s just human nature, this and diet (eh Atkins) aren’t sustainable things with how most people are wired. Peloton will fade one day just like all the others before it as people inevitably get bored with it and doing it becomes a drag.
I'm sure there's a few people for whom this makes sense, but mostly people are either:
1) disciplined and/or organized enough to just exercise, or
2) not disciplined and/or organized enough to keep doing Peloton
But, I suppose the real question is, how many do they actually need in order to be profitable? If 1 person in 1,000 is enough, which would be 300,000+ people in the U.S., then maybe they could do all right.
Now, if some VC fund threw 50 billion dollars at them and insisted they try to grow to Facebook size, then this will never work.
The LCHF diet is not only sustainable, it has changed the lives of many people I know, including people who claim
it has improved their mental states, emotional states, chronic pain, and weight gain.
I myself was pre-diabetic from the standard western diet of 2000kcal+ daily refined carbohydrates, and have pulled back from the brink by going LCHF.
Don’t dismiss it without a little bit of experience. It’s a growing movement, and it isn’t a fad. It has provided real results and real improvement to many, many people, and has spawned dozens or hundreds of successful small businesses.
I read "How Not to Die" recently. By LCHF, are you referring to an "Atkins" diet of sorts? High meat/animal fats, vegetables, low carb, low fruit?
I'd be interested in any sources that support that diet for anything other than weight loss - I was under the impression it led to pretty poor health outcomes (apart from bmi/diabetes management)
I recommend taking a look at how ketosis, and the utilization of ketones as an energy source for the brain, affects cognition for more on potential benefits.
Incredible marketing from Peloton and they builds on the Spinning/Indoor cycling trend that SoulCycle and FlyWheel started.
But I can't help but think a lot of people would be better off with a real bike, a smart turbo trainer and an iPad to access a variety of training programs (i.e. Zwift TrainerRoad). Less lock in, the ability to ride outside, and all possible for a similar price to Peloton bike.
As a cyclist I've also heard the power-meter readings from Peloton aren't as accurate as those from a Wahoo or Tacx turbo trainer.
Still congratulations to Peloton on the success and getting so many people exercising at home.
Yes, probably, but getting setup on Zwift/TrainerRoad/SmartTrainer is a more complex experience, and the class aspect isn't the same.
You've got to set up your bike, pair your Bluetooth accessories and get the app running. Something that often takes a few tries on my setup.
Additionally, now that it's summer and my bike lives in the garage, there are times when I would have gotten in a workout on Zwift, but I didn't want to deal with the hassle of bringing my bike in and setting it up again.
Nevermind the cost. By the time you've got a wheel-off smart trainer, HR sensor and cadence meter, plus some kind of stand for your iPad or laptop, you're probably pretty close to the price of a Peloton.
Right now, the market seems to be pretty divided, where cyclists looking to train indoors are gravitating towards Zwift/Smart Trainers, while people looking for spin classes at home, or just an easy at home cardio workout are gravitating towards Peloton.
I'm not likely to switch platforms, but I definitely understand the unique appeal of the Peloton.
As a shut in and professional hobbyist, this is far more valuable if it is engaging enough to get me to use it. I don't want to go get all sweaty and dirty riding a bike outside, and I'm clumsy so I would be terrified of seriously injuring myself (also I live in the middle of a city). This bike works in my climate controlled house, I can make it work with my schedule regardless of the weather, and the ease and availability makes it easier to work out every day without cutting into the few precious hours I get to devote to creative work each day.
I agree. So much so that I built a website to support that same theory - that you are better off with your own equipment selection and an internet-connected screen.
The website, Slipstream https://slpstream.com is a human-curated (high quality only) aggregator/reviewer of the best content for treadmill/indoor bike workouts.
Inspiring documentaries, guided workouts (I've used the GCN ones for several years and love them), podcasts...
There's a filter so you can find what you need fast and if you register (free, username + password) you can bookmark your favorites and save them to a playlist.
My goal is to reduce the friction between wanting to workout and getting it done. To flip the switch from a chore to something you are excited to get to.
I'm trying to prove product market fit right now so would love any feedback :)
Agree regarding preferring Zwift and a turbo but the sort of setup you describe seems to appeal to cyclists whereas the Peloton seems to appeal to the spin class crowd, many of who would never consider riding outside. The market is weirdly bifurcated between the two without a ton of overlap.
This is the reason I don't see this as a good long term investment. The market seems to be people who are already really into spin classes and pay the premiums they demand. To them, having their own equipment and a lower monthly fee will seem like a good deal. But your average gym-goer won't be willing to drop thousands upfront and more per month just on a nice exercise bike.
We have a Peloton bike. We used to be Flywheel members, at $300/mo, and that's pretty pricy. The bike pays for itself quickly if that's what you're replacing.
The class content is good. It's available anytime. Our friends have one so we can do rides together. And we're not paying $300/mo to Flywheel anymore.
Unfortunately we don't have a solarium to put it in, so we are really rubes.
They've executed so we'll on selling a $2000 exercise bike that locks you into their subscription content.
Anyone who has bought one can comment on what the alternatives we're when you purchased? The way they position the financing makes it feel like a monthly membership fee to a gym or something.
I'm using the Peloton iPad app without their bike and loving it so far. All you need is any decent spin bike ($200-$600)[0], a bluetooth cadence [1] and heart rate sensor ($90)[2], plus their cheaper $20/mo app and you get most of the experience at a reasonable cost. You don't get the output number and can't compete on the leaderboard, but that's fine for me.
I use a high-quality spin bike at the gym with my iPhone clipped on. I kick my own ass quite fine without cadence or heart rate info. And I don’t pay Peloton b/c I recorded a dozen or so classes when I had a subscription and stream them from my own server.
I’m not their target customer but I do really enjoy the product.
Honestly, my wife got me into the SoulCycle style spin classes before our wedding a few years ago. I dug the workout, music, joint activity,group class a lot, but it gets really expensive. Typical class is $32 a piece. With my doctor wanting me to get at least 4, >45 min workouts a week, this added up really quickly.
However, after 6 months of consistently going before the wedding I can say I have never had a better doctors visit, essentially "Keep up what your doing"
Peloton allowed me to purchase the bike (yes it's in my apartment living room, facing a window) for essentially 2-3 classes a month (around $100). Its a bit easier to wakeup, cycle, shower, head to work during the week. Then my wife and myself still splurge on a group class during the weekend as a shared activity.
Bonus points: The Peloton also casts to our SmartTV for Core/Yoga classes. We don't use it as much, but its pretty cool.
If you have a road bike already look into buying a trainer (I have a Cycle Ops Hammer) and use it with a program called Zwift. You can ride around a virtual world while watching Netflix or something.
I got hit by a car training for triathlon outdoors and now I do basically all my cycling indoors.
I never considered getting a peleton but we bought this [1] cheapish spin bike on amazon and the quality has been surprisingly good. Makes it really easy to get 30mins of exercise each morning and with the tablet holder I can watch a lecture while doing it.
I like doing spin for my cardio. My gym membership has some spin classes, but the bikes are not very good. Still, they are not bad for being included in my membership. I occasionally visit some spin 'studios' in town, but the price is high.
I was at hotel not long ago that some Peletons in the fitness room and I was blown away. The bikes are super nice. The classes felt like I was in a spin studio. I debated purchasing one, but decided I'm already spending enough on fitness at the moment.
I did not buy a bike, but for a while I used the app on a spin bike at the gym. I can attest to the experience being pretty great.
I wound up recording a dozen or so of the workouts so I can watch them on my phone without a subscription. The bells and whistles of heart rate and pace are meaningless to me.
I don’t think it’s a split so much as Peleton appealing to different users with the same product. There are quite a few ways to get hooked: a teacher you really like (I only found one I could stand but he is great), a class you really like (I’m sure the country music classes have their devotees), live interaction with the instructor, and performance tracking (aiming for calories or watts or whatever).
disclaimer: I used to work for Peloton and still own some equity.
The company was started with the insight that working out at home is a much more pleasant and effective activity than going to the gym.
Pelotons business model is what I think Apple will eventually be forced to adopt. They sell a very expensive, thin-ish margin hardware product and up-sell you on their software + content + some merchandise. The hardware lock-in is real!! They also have a scarily obsessive, loyal and rich fan-base.
Would highly suggest listening to the "How I built This" podcast[1] with the peleton founder John Foley, really great story with usual tech themes like doing things that don't scale and finding a niche but loyal customer base and expanding organically.
I was shocked at how successful he described their mall marketing!
Rough quote from when I listened a week or two ago:
"If I could get someone to ride the bike, there was about a 50% chance I could get them to buy it"
Also rough quote:
"People would ask what would happen if we went out of business. Since it was a subscription, there was an annuity value in keeping the platform going. Whoever ended up with our assets after a bankruptcy could use those revenues to spin up an instance of AWS to host the videos. I had a whole line ready to go about it."
Peloton's business model is breathtakingly good, but I wonder about the size of their TAM and their ability to have sustained, multiplicative growth in the future.
First, the business model. They sell you a $2000+ bike, which includes a year of live classes with some of the best spin instructors in the world. Afterwards, you pay for a $40/month subscription in perpetuity to make your $2000 investment more than a boring (although very high quality) stationary bike. Whether you're hooked on the (excellent) service or not, if you're the kind of person who's willing to drop $2000 on a bike, you're very, very likely to be the kind of person who's willing to pay just $40/month to make sure your bike retains its value (i.e., access to live classes), even if you're not using it that much. Doesn't hurt that in-person spin classes regularly cost $30-40 for a single class.
I imagine Peloton's subscription churn is extremely low. This is excellent, and I'm jealous.
But, growth.
How big is the market of people who are willing to spend $2000 on and have space for an indoor bike? What happens when Peloton captures nearly all the market? What happens when a lower-priced version of Peloton comes in and eats their lunch at the "bottom end" (so to speak) of it?
Once you've effectively exhausted the market for selling new bikes (when new customer acquisition slows), you've got three options: find a new market, sell new things to your existing customers, or charge them more for the same things.
Peloton's already doing the first two. They're trying to show investors that they can cross-sell and/or establish new markets: they sell a $4000 treadmill. (My theory about the treadmill is that nearly 100% of its purpose is to show the market that cross-sell is possible — I have doubts about whether they're selling). I have extreme doubts about the viability of this. I mean, how many workout machines are you going to put in your house? Rough estimate: this segment is no more than 10% of Peloton's existing customer base.
In addition to all this, they could (obviously) also raise prices, but at $50-60/month for the subscription, you start to put those great churn numbers at risk.
Either way, really interested to see what they do.
I am asking this in earnest: what makes a spin instructor a "best-in-the-world" instructor? I can see how an instructor for e.g. one of those classes where you do workouts with a weighted bar might have better techniques or routines than another, but from my naive perspective, it seems like a spin instructor can just tell you to pedal faster or slower. But I'm not just trying to dig at them! I really am curious. I'm more of a "get outside" type of person, so I don't know a lot about this sort of thing.
They know exactly what to say and when to say it to help you push hard at times when you're feeling ready to give up (at scale — they can't see you if you're not in the studio). They choose fun, energetic songs to keep you motivated throughout. They order their playlists in such a way that you push yourself just past your limit and have just enough time to rest.
Being a good instructor is like being a good comedian or even stage actor, where you're feeling the energy of the audience and optimizing for a given outcome. In comedy, it's laughs. In fitness, it's energy. In either case, people come back wanting more.
It's dead, sorry. They will need to pivot to something else.
My wife and her girlfriends used to be Peloton bunnies - one of the ones that you see in a studio in some of the ads. Two years ago classes were super hard to get into. They had the best instructors ( Peloton would overpay to steal the ones with following from Soul Cycle and FlyWheel ). The home invasion week got housewives from Midwest show up in classes with fifteen outfits because they thought they were going to be on TV or at least seen by the people at home. It was buzzing. Bikes were selling like hotcakes -- no discounts, no promos no anything.
Two years later, she barely goes there once a month. Classes now are meh. The studio is losing its luster. Home invasion week has classes available. There are discounts and specials on bikes, not to mention a talk of a bring your own bike option. Her friends that had the bikes at home sold them.
And competitors. Mirror showed up. Rumble showed up. FlyWheel and Soul Cycle are nibbling at its feet. Instagram is full of Pilates and Barre at home channels.
I hear you. Hard to disagree with that assessment. I didn't paint quite as bleak a picture because so far they've shown that they can execute really well, but I tend to lean in your direction when I think about their future.
Investors, founders, and early employees will make a bunch, but it's hard to see Peloton as a company that'll be with us in the long term.
We haven't bought the $2k bike yet, but did roll our own Peloton with a lower-end bike and their $11/month streaming subscription watched on an iPad. It gets you most of the value without the pricey bike, though you miss out on the gamification part of their platform. Both my wife and I are users - and may eventually jump in for the integrated solution. It's a pretty well done offering, particularly once you find a trainer you like with a good mix of music and class structure.
I'm a bike owner, but I've done this as an alternative to the $4k (!) treadmill. I have a ~$900 treadmill with a tablet in place of the screen. It's not anywhere near as nice and you miss out on the leaderboard (a great motivator to push yourself), but I find it's a "good enough" option for my non-riding workouts.
I picked up a lightly used one from my friend when he was moving across the country (<50% retail). I spin 3-4 times a week and so far (12 weeks in) have been loving it. The bike is nice, but it’s really the instructors that seal the deal imo. My girlfriend has also been using it a lot and she hates working out, so that’s a big plus for her. I know that now I wouldn’t hesitate at the price because I like it so much (will probably need to pick a new one up or at least a new screen as my current one is a gen 1. I assume at some point that might start to be a problem but so far so good)
I really struggle as a potential investor in this (after IPO).
The business is real and lucrative and profitable.
This is already so much better than say Uber.
But the equities market demands perpetual growth and I'm not seeing enough audience for this in the future, who have not already bought it.
In other words I feel it would be a very nice private company but it might struggle a bit as a public one.
What if the plan includes expanding to new markets, say China or Europe or even West coast? When I used Peloton in a hotel at late night pacific time, it did not have anything live going on until 2am or something. That made it less attractive as an owl type person.
Not to shill for Peloton (I don't have one), but the success of SoulCycle and Barry's Bootcamp show that there's appetite for $32-$35/class "boutique" fitness classes. If you would otherwise go to either/or 1x-2x/week then the math does work in Peloton's favor when you factor in the class + transportation to/from + removing temptation of buying a $10 smoothie too + any "add-ons" you'd otherwise buy (e.g. water).
These types of companies are really interesting to me, I had no idea they've raised close to $1B over 5 rounds/7 years though[1]! Curious what they've needed that for, I would presume they've sold quite a few of these plus the whole subscription model.
https://twitter.com/clueheywood/status/1089699762331217920