Shipping instances for nearly all the things have been stretched to new limits thanks to pandemic associated provide chain constraints. While almost each business has been affected not directly, electric bicycles and different types of private mobility have been uniquely impacted.
The pandemic has affected the e-bike business in a myriad of the way.
Commuters have sought out e-bikes as a value efficient transportation different.
Recreational riders have turned to e-bikes as a method to get outside and again to exercising on a bike identical to throughout their youth.
And supply riders have adopted e-bikes en masse as a method to satiate the pandemic-induced skyrocketing demand for residence supply of meals and items.
The solely downside is that the majority e-bikes come from Asia, and transport instances to the US have been creeping up for over a yr now.
While there’s some native e-bike manufacturing within the US, the overwhelming majority of electric bikes are imported on container ships.
What used to be a four-week cruise from Asia to the US West Coast has typically was a greater than 10 week journey that includes lengthy strains of container ships waiting off the coast close to California’s busiest ports.
One current electric bicycle firm, Ride1Up, lately shared extra particulars than ever on why one in every of their fashionable new electric bike fashions gained’t be arriving in time for Christmas.
As the corporate defined in an electronic mail to clients obtained by Electrek:
Thank you for your help and curiosity in our new Roadster V2 – Gravel Edition. We need to first specific our sincerest apologies for the delay. It seems these won’t ship by December 31, 2021 and can possible ship by January 2022.
With the worldwide pandemic’s affect on our provide chain, what used to be a 4-week supply schedule from our producers has was 4-8+ weeks (and counting). The Port of Long Beach is extraordinarily backed up with no rhyme or purpose for how they’re accepting vessels. In reality, the vessel carrying these e-bikes left our producer in mid-October and has been circling across the the Port of Long seaside since mid-November.
As of this morning and for virtually a month, the vessel is at present exterior the port waiting to be unloaded for virtually a month. See photograph under as of 6:00AM PST on 12/17/21. We are hopeful that the container can be unloaded and can clear customs with none extra, important delays.
We actually believed that even with an additional 5+ week transport time as a buffer we might have the opportunity to get you all your bikes earlier than the tip of the yr. We needed to be proactive and share this info as quickly as we decided end-of-year transport will possible not be attainable given the vacations.
We might (and hope to) be mistaken and these might unload sooner however we needed to be life like with you all.
If you’ve deliberate to give this as Christmas or different Holiday current, please attain out to our Support Team and we will present a digital brochure of the Gravel Roadster to share with a cherished one on the vacation.
We respect your help of the model and hope you take part! As quickly as we get any updates, we are going to share them with all of you.
-The Ride1Up Team
![Still waiting on a delayed e-bike (or anything else?) It's probably stuck on one of these ships](https://electrek.co/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2021/12/ship-map.png?w=1000&is-pending-load=1)
The Ride1Up Roaster V2 Gravel Edition e-bike drew a considerable amount of curiosity upon its launch. Priced at simply $1,245 in an business that usually costs $3,000 or extra for electric gravel bikes, the Ride1Up Roadster V2 Gravel Edition is probably the most inexpensive method to get into the gravel recreation on an e-bike.
At the identical time, it nonetheless manages to pack in various good parts, such because the included Gates carbon belt drive and internally-mounted battery.
The bike’s sturdy response led to excessive gross sales, however now clients are waiting for these containers to lastly attain port and unload the bikes.
Ride1Up is way from the one e-bike firm affected by the transport crunch. But they’re probably the most clear thus far, exhibiting clients precisely where bikes are within the transport course of and why the usually shorter voyage is taking for much longer than standard.
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