Since we often get the question why we believe bike-as-a-service is better for you than buying a bike, we have made some calculations for you. We’ve put a lot of time in it, it took us hours to write some random formulas on the board. It’s seems a long read but bear with us!
First of all, we need to make some assumptions. We compare our eBike subscription, with a similar quality model “retail” electric bicycle of which the price is somewhere between the €1,500-€1,900. We can already hear you thinking “but I saw an electric bike on Alibaba for €900 + shipping”. Of course, there are cheaper bikes in the market but the difference in quality will be huge. That means your costs for maintenance, part replacement and electronic replacements (battery, motor) will increase significantly the worse the quality of the bike. We would never recommend buying cheap, as in the long run it will only become more expensive. When you purchase an electric bicycle, always make sure to check the warranty on the battery and try to read some reviews in terms of their customer service. It can take weeks or months if you send the battery back to the manufacturer that is under warranty. Otherwise, you will need to purchase a replacement. For a decent quality battery with some capacity, the cost will already be around the €300 retail.
