A London-based subscription bike firm which served 20,000 people will shut up shop citing “difficult economic circumstances”.
Vauxhall-based Buzzbike, which supplied bikes and e-bikes to commuters for a monthly fee, said it would close on November 15 due to “escalating costs and difficult economic conditions that have impacted the whole bike industry.”
The service had provided bikes for a monthly fee to commuters in London and Manchester alongside a maintenance service and insurance against thefts, vowing to replace stolen bikes within several days.
The company said any users would be charged a pro-rata rate until closure, and that they could also buy their bikes at “an extremely discounted price”.
Buzbike had faced a challenging market, with a plethora of other rental bike options such as Lime, Santander Bikes, Tier and Human Forest.
However, Buzzbike users had kept their cycles while paying the monthly fee.
It comes after a London council abandoned its threat of banning Lime after striking a deal to tackle the number of e-bikes that are abandoned on pavements.
Brent council had planned to become the first London borough to “evict” Lime, which dominates the bike hire market in the capital, by the end of October after accusing it of “causing havoc” on the streets.
But last Thursday the north London borough said that Lime had agreed to “invest hundreds of thousands of pounds” in creating 200 designated bike parking bays across Brent, as part of a “comprehensive plan to tackle residents’ safety concerns”.
Under the new plan, Lime will create the bays in a phased programme by July 2025 and immediately reduce the number of its battery-assisted e-bikes in Brent by a third, from 750 to 500.
The firm separately announced a £25m expansion bid in the capital earlier this year, particularly for e-bikes.
It hoped to expand its e-bike hire services to three further boroughs and open a new warehouse in north London.
