It’s Official – 2020/21 was a Record Year for Bicycle Imports

Canberra, ACT

In news that would hardly surprise anyone, we can now confirm that the 2020/21 financial year broke the all-time record for bicycle imports into Australia.

Unfortunately, we still don’t collect national bicycle sales data, but given that there’s very little local manufacture and that stock levels are still low, particularly at the importer/wholesaler level, then it’s reasonable to presume that bicycle sales also broke their all-time record.

In total, 1,690,635 bikes were imported for the 12 months from 1^st July 2020 to 30^th June 2021. This compares to 1,170,987 for 2019/20. That’s an increase of over half a million bicycles… 519,648 to be exact, which equals a 44.3% increase, year on year.

April, May and June finished the year strongly, but not spectacularly, probably because global supply is still constrained.

In April 2021, 92,690 bicycles were imported, more than double the April 2020 total of 38,367.

But by May 2020, imports were starting to reflect the covid induced bike boom that kicked off from late March / early April 2020. So the May and June import figures for 2021 were similar to those of one year earlier.

In May 2021 86,472 bikes were imported compared to 81,667 the previous May. June actually declined slightly with 98,146 bikes imported in June 2021 compared to 99,554 the previous year.

Thanks to BIA (Bicycle Industries Australia) for sharing this bicycle import data which is compiled by the ABS (Australian Bureau of Statistics) based upon Australian Customs import codes.