Peloton would like to remind everyone it’s more than a bike company

Peloton would like to remind everyone it’s more than a bike company

Peloton isn’t keen on the fact people mostly think of it as that bike company, which is why CEO Barry McCarthy says the company will “relaunch its brand” later this month so that more people are aware that it does other things, too. Part of that is relaunching the Peloton app with a new tiered subscription structure.

There’s no information on the pricing just yet, but on today’s Q3 2023 earnings call, CFO Liz Coddington said the “app tiers will have different amounts of content variances” depending on the price. Only users who have bought Peloton hardware and pay for All-Access membership will get everything Peloton has to offer.

McCarthy also noted on the call that unaided awareness for the Row is at 4 percent, while the Guide, its camera-based strength training product, sits at a measly 1 percent. The app is the most promising of Peloton’s non-bike products at 5 percent. Coddington also noted that the Row sales are “heavily skewed” toward existing Peloton users.

Looking at the numbers, it’s not surprising that Peloton is putting its bets on the app and growing subscriptions to reverse Peloton’s fortunes. Lululemon announced it was taking a similar tack for Mirror in its most recent earnings, saying it would release a digital-only subscription sometime this summer.

It makes sense, as a $13 monthly fee for access to Peloton’s classes — the company’s real cash cow — is more attractive to the average person than a $3,200 rower. Unsurprisingly, McCarthy said that revenue from subscriptions exceeded hardware by 30 million last quarter and 100 million this quarter.

“We faced many challenges in the past year, almost in every aspect of the business — except for content. Content is the golden goose,” McCarthy said on the call. “Is the bike a great experience from a hardware perspective and better than things that came before? Absolutely, but the magic and the glue that binds the community with almost religious fervor amongst our members is the content and the instructors.”

“Content is the golden goose.”

The company also said it saw strong growth in its bike leasing program and its decision to sell refurbished bikes at a discount. Other efforts, such as its partnership with Hilton and Amazon, have also done well.

That said, Peloton still has some challenges to overcome, even as it shows some signs that it's moving on from its dismal 2022. It reported a net loss of $275.9 million, which is its ninth straight quarter of losses and wider than expected. The company also announced today that it’s decided to settle a patent dispute with Dish for $75 million. The settlement adds financial pressure on Peloton going forward, though it means that Peloton avoids an import ban from the International Trade Commission. Unsurprisingly, Peloton’s stock price sank about 14 percent this morning.

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