The bike store where you can earn $120k a year: How 99 Bikes grew out of Flight Centre

Daniel Gallagher, general manager of 99 Bikes NZ. Photo / Alex Burton

One of the country’s fastest-growing bike chains is falling back on a familiar playbook for its next move.

Australia-based 99 Bikes has been operating in New Zealand since 2019 and has grown to nine stores, building on the backing of A$4.1 billion ($4.4 b) half owner Flight Centre and its shareholding staff.

Now, the company is building up to listing on the Australian sharemarket, aimed at mirroring the successful float of Flight Centre in 1995.

That’s when staff, known as ‘’Flighties,’’ took up 25 per cent of shares on offer and saw their value surge from an opening day closing price of A$1.23 to a pre-pandemic peak of $A69 in 2018.

New Zealand manager for 99 Bikes Dan Gallagher said work was underway for an ASX listing within the next two years.

The company wants to capitalise on the boom in bike riding in this country, Australia where it has 65 shops, and in other countries where is has expansion plans. Like Flight Centre, it has moved into Britain with one store and has plans to open in Canada.

It aims to have 100 stores within four years.

‘’It’s two years of work, paying a pretty big fee up front and we’ve just employed a new CFO to get us float-ready’'

Gallagher said Flight Centre owns 50 per cent of 99 Bikes, the family of Flight Centre Graham ‘Skroo’ Turner own 15 per cent, and the 1200 staff (including 70 in New Zealand) who are gifted shares own the remainder.

The bike store – which promotes itself as the world’s most approachable chain – first opened in 2007.

“Matt Turner, Graham’s son, said he was looking at getting out of physiotherapy and said to his dad, ‘I wouldn’t mind opening the bike store.’ And Skroo with his love of bikes said why not? Let’s do it’.’’

The philosophies and systems of Flight Centre Group have moved into bike store retail.

This includes daily huddles, weekly business meetings, daily targets, and weekly targets. The company is organised into family, village and tribe to foster better coherence and introduced by Flight Centre as it moved from being a small business to a big corporation.

And like the travel firm, staff are heavily incentivised with bonuses.

‘’The way we pay our people is performance-based, so the better you perform, the more pay you can take home. And there’s a structure around that and we give our staff members free shares every year.’’

Gallagher said a top-earning sales consultant can earn $120,000 a year.

‘’It’s very driven by performance and rewarding the work [that] gets done. If you’re good at your job, and you’re having success then you can succeed financially.’’

The ‘’most approachable bike shop’' was born from a sense that other stores were increasingly dismissive of some customers wanting to buy bikes or have them repaired, especially as cycling has boomed.

‘’Matt’s vision was we didn’t want to be the bike snobs. We wanted to have everyone that could come into our store could find a bike that they were happy with.’’

That meant providing value bikes for kids, families as well as high-end buyers who could be fussy about their cycle and equipment.

Bike riding has boomed, helped by new mountain bike trails and city infrastructure. Photo / Supplied

Gallagher, 55, is an enthusiastic bike rider himself who doesn’t have a car and has ridden (for recreation) legs of some of the world’s most challenging tour events.

He said the workshop was the heart of every bike shop and the chain was very motivated to look after its mechanics who, unlike many other stores, provide a seven-day service.

While the pandemic was devastating for the parent company as travel was halted, the clamour to get on a bike during lockdowns and when borders were close meant a boom for 99 Bikes.

‘’We went from thinking we’re going to have to lay everyone off to where we had lines outside every store.’’

Profit soared from $A7 million in 2019 to $A50m within a year, said Gallagher. That contrasted sharply with the Flight Centre Group which plunged to its first loss since listing.

The big surge in bike buying has paused though and it’s now a buyers’ market.

Sales had fallen from about 1200 bike a week to 400 as those who had bought bikes during the pandemic didn’t need a new one, the threat of recession was having a big impact on discretionary spending and bike retailers were now sitting on excess stock.

‘’Right now it’s in a bit of a flat stage. But we’re confident once get through this winter it’ll bounce back in spring and summer again.’’

Gallagher started as a travel consultant for Flight Centre in 1996, becoming a state manager in Australia and area manager in Vancouver during a 16-year career with the firm.

After a four year stint at Bupa as a regional general manager the lure of indulging his passion for bikes and his ‘’Flightie’' blood drew him to 99 Bikes.

He opened a store in home town Adelaide before setting up the New Zealand operation remotely, as he was unable to work here because of closed borders.

‘’I jumped in and I said I’d love to live in work in New Zealand. It’s a great place to ride a bike, a great place to live – but the weather’s been challenging at times.’’

And the name 99 Bikes? That was the number of bikes Matt Turner could fit into the first store in Brisbane.