Cycling Brands

Idea

Introduction

Cycling Brands sells premium road cycling apparel via eCommerce operations Shutt Velo Rapide and Prendas Ciclismo.

Shutt Velo Rapide makes premium and sustainable cycling garments, whilst Prendas Ciclismo is a marketplace for high quality European brands like Santini, Bianchi, Nalini, and Campagnolo. We also offer a large online collection of retro team designs from Santini and the Prendas house label.

Staffed entirely by passionate cyclists, we're obsessive about the sport of cycling and its rich heritage. Our backgrounds range from club cyclist, to former World Champion and Paralympian. Our experiences shape and drive the products we design, produce, test and sell and we believe this means we know the marketplace better than anyone else.

One of few growth industries during the pandemic, cycling has seen a huge increase in the past few years. The UK market alone was valued at £1.9 billion in 2022: a 19% increase from 2019.

Substantial accomplishments to date

Cycling Brands was formed to build on the success of Shutt Velo Rapide with an ambition to acquire and integrate additional brands to build a portfolio of complementary companies. In 2021 we acquired the 25-year established Prendas Ciclismo and made excellent progress rebuilding the site’s product range.

Both our eCommerce sites have been upgraded with Global-e to boost international sales, provide a localised experience for international customers and solves the Brexit related issues of selling to our many EU customers.

Both Shutt and Prendas operate a custom clothing service for teams, clubs and events. We have produced clothing for everything from groups of five to events with thousands of riders. The UK market for custom kit is vast, with more than 1,700 clubs affiliated to British Cycling alone. Our custom service is fast, efficient, hassle free and excellent value for money. We handle everything from design to production to delivery.

In a very competitive marketplace, our green credentials are an important differentiator. Since 2018 we’ve introduced garments made from recycled plastic waste and now most of the Shutt range is made from recycled materials.

We have grown organically with most investment from friends and family, and we are now at the point to offer you the opportunity to be part of our future and accelerate our next stage of growth.

Monetisation strategy

Our goal is to operate a lean and effective business that's ready to scale.

Premium products sourced direct from manufacturer and a competitive price point delivers good gross margins which enables us to compete with more established brands and retailers.

Sales are driven via a highly effective multi-channel digital marketing strategy, internet and social media advertising, as well as sponsorships and endorsements.

In April 2021, Shutt began working with its first retail partner in Dublin. We are targeting boutique cycle shops and cycling cafés with a view to offering them an attractive margin on a range of high end apparel that can differentiate them from their competitors and the larger online players.

Use of proceeds

50% of the proceeds will be used to restore the Prendas site to its former status as a go-to shop for Europe's best cycling brands. With a fully stocked Prendas website, we believe we can leverage its large marketing database and return revenues to pre-2020 levels and beyond.

We will continue to rebuild Prendas' range of retro team replica kits from the heyday of cycle racing to historic levels. Including many designs exclusive to Prendas made by a variety of manufacturers.

30% will help build the strength and exposure of the Shutt Velo Rapide brand and product offering by introducing new high-margin technical apparel.

20% will be invested in state-of-the-art inventory planning technology to predict future sales and make data-backed inventory purchasing decisions – so that you’ll always know exactly what, when and how much inventory you’ll need to purchase in order to always meet demand.