tcs

Manufacturing costs. Amazing is the large numbers of cycles manufactured in Germany, not considered a low-cost country.

Note: the EU protects its native bicycle industry with tariffs.

Troul 

cant compete with Chinas output.

Eric F 

I love my Storck! However, I also love that there's not many of them around my parts. Tons of Canyons, though.

Koyote

Like dyno lighting systems and Rohloff hubs.

tcs

While I was impressed with Giant Bicycle's robotic layup of CAD-designed carbon fiber frames, bicycle manufacture is at its heart 1890s technology. Even China is getting too advanced for bicycle production (they've gone to the Moon and Mars, after all.) Large scale bicycle manufacture is moving to Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, & etc.

Troul 

I'd expect German quality to not be on the same expectations of those countries. German & China can spit out a consistent quality, but China just has the ability to be of higher production. Those other countries have a little work to do in order to achieve Chinas capability.

vane171

This has to do with the bicycle sport as such in the respective countries. If you look at the history of the sport, in movie documentaries, magazines, newspaper coverage of races, Germany simply doesn't figure.

I recall that in one of the last few TDF races, there was some talk about German riders, if they are successful, it might lead to having their own country team with German sponsor(s), which I take it, they don't have and didn't so far. It all has to do with overall German population enthusiasm for the bike sport.

Sure, some stellar performance of German riders in European races, best on home turf in Germany might or would lead to some rise of bicycling sport there, but all the same, it is doubtful that sporting base of a country could rest on such successes that of necessity come and go, are fleeting. In Italy, France, even if their riders sometimes don't figure in front positions too often, or even for extended period, it doesn't affect the general public enthusiasm for the sport. They are taken by the suffering, the heroism, no matter if the riders are not wining, they have respect for them all. It is simply not like that in Germany.

ClydeClydeson

Any Chinese trekking frame would be 100% better bike when fitted with a Rohloff Speedhub 14 speed IGH.

Germany_chris

You missing something, or many things

chaadster

“Bicycle sport as such” includes UCI sanctioned Artistic Cycling, which German men and women have absolutely owned since the 1960s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UCI_In..._Championships

Viola Brand, the reigning EU singles champ, has been blowing up on social media the past couple of years, too, and is legit celebrity enough to have been on the Ellen show!

Eric F 

Not at all true.

There are currently 12 pro cycling teams based in Germany (and have been many others over many years), including current World Tour teams Bora-Hansgrohe and Team DSM. There are currently 34 German riders on World Tour teams, including notable names like Andre Greipel, Tony Martin, and John Degenkolb. Jan Ulrich won the Tour de France while riding for Telekom - German rider on a German team.

topflightpro

Don't forget the most German brand of all: FES.

bruce19

Canyon, Focus, Storck, Cube .... pretty nice bikes IMO.

veganbikes

My newest bike which I ordered is mega German like super German. Riese and Müller with a Bosch motor(batteries and display...), Rohloff hub, Abus Locks, Supernova Lights, Ergon Grips, SKS fenders, Schwalbe Tires, Magura Brakes, Acros Headset, Ergotec Mirror and bars (though those are getting swapped to Koga Denham). I will also probably have a Topeak saddle bag on there. (Addendum: will still have the bag as they make great stuff but after looking it up for chaadster I am realizing not a German company which I had been told in the past by a few folks)

Germany has loads of cycle companies amongst stuff mentioned here and more stuff as well. Kettler, Rose Bikes, Bergamont, FIXIE Inc., Fahrradmanfaktur, Biria, Drössiger, Winora, Stevens, Rotwild, KHE Bikes, Diamant, Prophete, Ruff Cycles...

Plus a whole host of customer frame builders (taken from theframebuilders.com)

• Big Forest Frameworks
• Cicli Bonanno
• Crema Cycles
• Falkenjagd Titan Bikes
• Fern Bicycles
• Marschall Framework
• Mawis Bikes
• Monk Bicycle
• ROAMER CYCLES
• Unique Cycles

Also Tune components, Trick Stuff, Schmolke, Lightweight, Bike Ahead, Beast, THM, Continental and probably a bunch of others not mentioned.

Germany makes a ton of great parts and bikes. They are no slouches in that department

Darth Lefty 

The story of the US bike industry prior to 1971 was department store bikes and Schwinn, and after that is production moving to the cheapest place as fast as possible, with a slight peppering of brands that started here and moved offshore too. Germany doesn’t really figure in here. I’m sure they have their own story, but it doesn’t get told here.

chaadster

I didn’t realize Topeak is German!

veganbikes

You know I was double checking that because I had always heard it and am starting to realize maybe not so German. Shoot. Apparently a group of rouge Giant employees in Taiwan. Welp, If you don't know now you know, I guess.

sincos

They're good in, um, . That's got to count for something ...

Troul 

isn't WAHOO German as well?

Wahoo & Topeak might be related if that is true...

Dan Burkhart 

I recently did a build for a guy who wanted every component possible to be of German origin. He had inherited the bike from his father in law, and evidently he inherited a bunch of cash too, because cost was no object.
The parts list included, a Rohloff hub, SON dynohub, Magura brakes, Busch and Muller lighting, and Schwalbe tires. Had to go North American for crank and rims (Race Face and Velocity) due to availability, but he would have preferred those to be German as well.
Oh yeah, almost forgot, Connex chain.

chaadster

Ah, okay, but nonethless the point stands that Germany is no slouch in the bike department!

commo_soulja

Germans don't do bikes? Get your head out of the sand.

chaadster

it might even be said that when it comes to fixed-gear bicycle sport, the Germans rule the category!

tcs

As an American club rider in the late 1970s, I asked the same question. Where was the West German equivalent to Raleigh, Peugeot, Motobecane, Gitane, Puch, ALAN, Colnago, Panasonic, Fuji, Paramount?

chaadster

There are different types of questions mixed up here, starting with the OP and carrying through to responses. We’ve established that there is German cycling tradition, that there are German high-end brands and manufacturing, and that there are strongly German bike styles. The question you’re raising is something different, and I think largely has to do with the war, the division of Germany, and its post-war industrial development.

The war itself was crippling to companies; most industrial activity was deployed for the war effort, of course, but the loss of equipment and livelihoods meant some bike companies ceased during the war and never restarted. Many of the pre-war bike brands, like NSU, Wanderer, Express, and Steyr, were in what become Soviet controlled East Germany, and shut off from the western, capitalist inputs which drove the development of other EU and American brands. Germany’s economic recovery was not really in effect until the Wirtschaftwunder period of the 1960s, at which time those bike companies which did restart did so working in a country half the size it was, and were effectively decades behind other countries’ bike industries. The Marshall Plan was designed to rebuild European and West German industry, but there was not unfettered growth and some industries were not supported, or were restricted, and key supply industries were, in some cases, on the other side of the Iron Curtain creating crippling shortages.

In short, the WW2 was devastating, and the post-war development meant it was almost impossible for the German bike business to grow in the same way it did in the USA or other parts of Europe.