IN BRIEF
Germany’s bicycle industry employed 74,300 people in 2025 in its core trades — manufacturing, retail and services — against 76,700 a year earlier, according to the annual study by the T3 Transportation Think Tank carried out for the Zukunft Fahrrad association. Sector revenue came to around €25 billion. The decline mainly hits retail, where sales fall by 10%, while manufacturing loses 2% of its revenue and 5% of its workforce. Including indirect and induced effects, the study credits the industry with more than 198,000 jobs, and its director points the finger at price pressure coming from China.
| Direct jobs 2025 | 74,300 (76,700 in 2024) |
| Total jobs | More than 198,000, including indirect and induced effects |
| Revenue | Around €25 billion |
| Employment, manufacturing | − 5 % |
| Employment, retail | − 3 % |
| Revenue, manufacturing | − 2 % |
| Revenue, retail | − 10 % |
| Company bike leasing | − 10 % of revenue |
| Study | T3 Transportation Think Tank, for Zukunft Fahrrad |
The industry study on Germany’s bicycle sector has just been published in its 2026 edition. It covers the year 2025, and describes a sector shrinking for the second year running. Demand on the bicycle market nevertheless remained stable in 2025, according to the study as reported by Radmarkt: it is the companies that are suffering, hit by rising costs linked to geopolitical upheaval, by falling prices and by stocks that are still partly full.
74,300 jobs in Germany’s bicycle industry
The study’s central figure is employment. According to velobiz, “in 2025, 74,300 people worked in the core trades of the bicycle sector, that is manufacturing, retail and services. A year earlier, there were still 76,700”. The fall is not uniform: according to the same source, “in manufacturing, employment fell by five per cent, in retail by three per cent”. Velobiz notes that, while headcount and revenue are both down on 2024, these two figures still remained above the pre-Covid years.
The study then widens its scope beyond direct employment. Quoted by velobiz, it states that the industry “secures more than 198,000 jobs in total when indirect jobs — linked to supplies and services purchased — and induced jobs — linked to employees’ consumer spending — are counted”.
Retail takes the shock, the workshop cushions it
On the money side, the total holds up: velobiz writes that “the sector’s overall revenue came to around €25 billion”. But the split is shifting. Again according to velobiz, “revenues fell by two per cent in manufacturing, by ten per cent in retail”. The same article notes that “in the workshops, the growing share of servicing has cushioned the difficulties somewhat”.
Two underlying shifts are taking shape in services. Company bike leasing, which Zukunft Fahrrad describes as one of the main drivers of the bicycle market, is stalling: velobiz records “a ten per cent drop in revenues” for Dienstrad-Leasing, “while business in second-hand bikes has grown”. Radmarkt describes the same contrast, explicitly naming the refurbishing of second-hand bikes as the growing segment.
The industry points to Chinese competition
The association behind the study does not stop at the findings. Wasilis von Rauch, director of Zukunft Fahrrad, says: “Without political support, the market remains vulnerable.” He explicitly targets “the competitive pressure coming from China, which is pushing into the market with hidden subsidies, exchange-rate manipulation and offers below production cost, and which is dragging prices down”.
His demand fits into a single sentence, reported by Radmarkt: “What the sector needs is protection against unfair competition and infrastructure on which users can ride safely with the products.” A demand that reaches well beyond Germany’s borders, at a time when Europe’s bicycle manufacturers are lining up one restructuring plan after another.
