I’m looking to gauge community interest in daily/weekly rental services for full suspension mountain bikes. I know I would love this service to get friends out on the trails who haven’t bought into the hobby.
provided positive community feedback I’m looking to have a small fleet available as early as July 1st and plan to offer delivery/pickup services to Macintosh run through the week and Railyard/Wentworth on weekends. Price target not including delivery ~100 a day or 300 weekly.
Would love your candid feedback before I fill my garage with more bikes.
Find updates on my Facebook page “Halifax Mountain Bike Rentals”
I would also fully support this. Mostly for friends/family who are visiting and who want to try out the trails here. I also enjoy the weekly option. I’ve rented bikes before while traveling, and they only had a daily option. If you wanted even just two rides, it becomes quite the hassle if they’re not consecutive days. Being able to get it for a week allows you to really get your money’s worth.
If you have 1 or 2 size Large bikes come the second week of August, you would definitely have some customers!
I get a few requests a season for bike rentals - We (TrailFlow) did have a bunch of kids / small adults bikes we would use as loaners at programs but we never pushed the service as an official rental offering.
I think there is a bit of market for it thou, one I think that will grow. Not sure how much business you’d do starting out but one could try!
Something I really wanted to do if I had remained in Truro.
For 100 bucks a day I’d expect at a minimum of a mid range bike.
It is a lot of capital to invest in I’d assume. Something like the Marin Rift zone/Norco fluid etc would likely work a treat as they can ride anywhere in NS.
Definitely support this idea. I can think of at least two customers you’d get this summer if there was a rental fleet available. Not sure how insurance would work for possible damages, etc. The granite can be a cruel mistress and cosmetic damage at the very least might be an issue, especially for riders unfamiliar with the trails, which I assume most renters would be.
When I worked at a Halifax shop in 2018 managing the email/IT and doing online orders, we would regularly get asked if we rented road or mountain bikes. Probably a couple times a week. There is definitely a need. How big of a need, who knows.
In most places I’ve lived bikes shops would have shop demos you could demo / rent for $100-150 for a mid level carbon bike, and then if you bought a bike the price of the demo / rental would credited towards the purchase. Surprised that is not a thing here.
One of the bike shops I used to frequent years ago went so far as to only had demos, if you wanted the bike you would have to order it (or buy the demo).
Thanks everyone for your feedback. After getting some insurance quotes and crunching the numbers I don’t think this is practical standalone business at the small scale that I would be interested in taking on.
for anyone interested in full suspension bike rentals I did stumble on a surf shop (surf donkey) that has a small fleet or Norco’s and Giants available to rent at very reasonable prices.
