Professional Mountain Biker Pay
- Thread starter boogenman
- Start date
I hang out with a bunch of the Asheville YouTubers, and they tend to be a lot of fun to ride with!so where's your uTūb channel?
Spend time talking to Seth or Bobo, etc. on the climb up at Kanuga and you get a feel for just how much work(and SEO optimization) is involved with running a successful channel.
It was still impossible not to shout “like and Subscribe” at people while navigating the crowds of Youtubers signing autographs from the hundreds of fans that showed up on Berm Peak opening day.
I don’t watch any of that youtube nonsense, because it’s easy enough to watch Earthed 2 for the 832nd time.
So people want the bikes to be cheaper, the wages for the staff to be way higher, and they want the athletes/ambassadors to be paid way more...
The only way this works is with less bike brands.
The only way this works is with less bike brands.
How many actual bike manufacturers are there, not decal appliers?
Over a scale-able volume, very few. Importers don't need to have the same ecosystem around them as an actual manufacturer, as much as that will break some hearts.
@buckoW probably makes more bikes than some big manufacturers.
A little birdy told me that some of the Canadian made Chromags are welded in a few dudes garages who have full time non bike industry jobs. Gig economy eh?
I think a lot of professional athletes outside of the major sports leagues come from wealth. Just having the time to get good at the sport and not grind away at a 9-5 to pay the bills takes money. There certainly are the folks who do it sleeping in their cars and scratching gear together but the path is a hell of a lot easier if you can globe trot to resorts around the world and ride nice bikes year round.
These surveys need to have a corresponding second column with the replies, specifically "What would your lifestyle be otherwise? Trustafarian, normal job like everyone else, or homeless."
Nobody cares if the trust fund baby is only getting paid $15k a year to fuck off and ride a bicycle.
Similarly, if someone is capable of making self-sustaining income on their own but chooses to ride a bicycle full-time instead....well, that's a choice.
And if they would otherwise be homeless and riding bikes anyway without the racing income.....well, again....choices.
Strava should also have similar stats on leaderboards.
Nobody cares if the trust fund baby is only getting paid $15k a year to fuck off and ride a bicycle.
Similarly, if someone is capable of making self-sustaining income on their own but chooses to ride a bicycle full-time instead....well, that's a choice.
And if they would otherwise be homeless and riding bikes anyway without the racing income.....well, again....choices.
Strava should also have similar stats on leaderboards.
Guerilla Gravity
BTR
That's all you need.
Unless you need a dh bike, then you're fucked.
Last I knew santa cruz made their own stuff. But that was a few years ago and I'm not going to look, because everything good always goes to shit. Nothing called Pom Holdings could ever lead to good.
Believe it or not, the Dutch royal family does not really care about expanding manufacturing capability of one of it's acquisitions...would not be the least bit surprised to see the manufacturing outsourced and the existing assets sold.
Well technically it also works if the industry grows a lot and scale lowers cost and scale increases marketing and wage budgets.
Unless you're in yurp since then you are paying import taxes.
Eh no I'd prefer kids did not make my high-dollar hobby parts with whips behind them under environmentally dangerous conditions in a country that China effectively owns. I know it's a lot to ask. Hope and a few others seem to do it.....Also, advertising $$$ is how you pay athletes, not the nickels and dimes the Cycling community pulls in each quarter. I would suggest USA Tobacco, Pfizer, PornHub and any of the 3 significant Cartels to start.
So, as someone who has evaluated a ton of professional athlete proposals, here is the thing.
Just like in the real world, you are only going to get compensated for the value you bring. And the problem, more often than not, is that Athletes are TERRIBLE are articulating and/or delivering value!
These days, companies are willing to pay for, essentially, three things:
(1) results at the highest level (ie podiums at world cups)
(2) traffic to their website (ie social media integrations)
(3) content marketing campaigns (ie videos and pictures the brand can repurpose)
Conceptually, It isn't super hard really. Deliver value on one or more of those three things. Articulate what you did and how well you did it. Those that can do this can earn a living wage. And those that can't aren't really doing the job, so why should they get paid a FT salary?
What is the difference between a Hobby and a job? For a job, you are good enough at the activity for someone to pay enough to support your self.
Just like in the real world, you are only going to get compensated for the value you bring. And the problem, more often than not, is that Athletes are TERRIBLE are articulating and/or delivering value!
These days, companies are willing to pay for, essentially, three things:
(1) results at the highest level (ie podiums at world cups)
(2) traffic to their website (ie social media integrations)
(3) content marketing campaigns (ie videos and pictures the brand can repurpose)
Conceptually, It isn't super hard really. Deliver value on one or more of those three things. Articulate what you did and how well you did it. Those that can do this can earn a living wage. And those that can't aren't really doing the job, so why should they get paid a FT salary?
What is the difference between a Hobby and a job? For a job, you are good enough at the activity for someone to pay enough to support your self.
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How much of a premium are you willing to pay for that?
At some point, the wallet will talk back, foreign youth be damned.
While what you say is true it doesn't adress the key issue here.
One thing is how good athletes are at delivering value, another one is how bigis the sponsorship money pool and how it's distributed among athletes. Sure we don't have full data so we may be biased here but it seems like the industry is fairly top heavy.
there is plenty of money in marketing budgets. It’s just that nobody in their right mind is going to distribute it to areas that can’t be shown to create value (ie can’t be justified). Otherwise, that marketing director will be fired.
athletes are collectively competing against Google, Meta, Endemic campaigns, PR, etc for overall budget allocation and value justification. If and when they can show commensurate value, they can access Google/FB/etc budgets and not just get a free bike and a few appearance fees.
It is top heavy like every performance industry. in A big company sales organization, there are many Jr SDR’s making peanuts, and a couple sales execs making exponentially more. Compensation in a performance industry is proportionate to the value you create.
the top tip-earners at a fancy restaurant do it by playing the game: pushing the $85 steak dinner and several bottles of wine. Pinkbike’s pay scale report is a referendum on how well athlete's know how to play the game.
As Shannon sharpe says, professional athletes have to keep updating their resume.
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I 100% understand why athletes don't get paid more. Doesn't change the fact I want them to get paid more. I used to run marketing strategy and generally I agree with what you are saying. It often makes way more sense to go with other options of reacing your customers.
Though I would not agree it's top heavy like every performance industry. Hell even old timey DH during Grundig/Eurosport days used to be more even, at least that's what the riders claimed. Not to mention different sports have different spreads though usually the ones with the most equitable pay are either unionized or old sports. New sports usually are more top heavy (MMA is a great example)
So you're telling me if I submit one to GG, you're the one who has to read it?
yeah now you dunnit, you fucked
for sure. We are definitely agreeing.
I would just add that marketing looks a lot different now (social media) vs the 90s (tv and print) + the sport itself isn’t in a hyper growth phase trying to be the next skateboarding/snowboarding mainstream action sport, trying to figure out who the next Sean Palmer/missi giove is going to be, so the budgets and access to dumb-money venture capital just aren’t the same.
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Haha!
I actually do more on the other side of the table (helping athletes prepare pitches) these days, lol
Yeah that's true. It's a bit sad we won't see dumb money here since the sport would benefit with no downsides instead of my industry which resulted with shit movies (and quibis...) being made because there is a limit on the number of talented creative people and more money doesn't mean they can produce more.
It would be dope if that 4 billion that went into Quibi went into athlete pay and events. Then again Quibi was really just a ploy to avoid paying union rates since union regulations did not apply for short form content.
A fun job. My GF did it for 1 athlete for a while while she was preparing to beat a freediving world record, essentially acting as a manager. Kinda jelly I have to say. I know RB has some nice jobs on the aplication reading front.