Simon Brooke said:

People who don't intend to ride bikes don't buy bikes. Everyone of those
bikes was bought because the purchaser expected it to be ridden.

Agreed.

The
fact that the bikes aren't being ridden means the people aren't getting
the value they expected for their money.

But they may well have only expected to ride it on a couple of
weekends. If that's the value they expected, that's the value they've
got.

We may be of the opinion that cycling is a fun activity that everyone
would enjoy if only they could be bothered and/or had the right
equipment. But some people just aren't interested and only want a
vehicle for the 2 nice weekends in the year when they have the time and
the inclination.

Those people rent bikes.

Not necessarily. Making the decision to rent implies that 1) you know
bike hire is available at all and 2) your rides will be in places and
at times when rental is viable.

Why tie up a lot of capital in an occasional play thing?

Why tie up /any/ money (and shed space) on an occasional play thing, when
renting gets you better playthings at lower cost?

Because for many people there is no perception at all of this. Why
spend fifteen quid a day on a hire bike, when for seventy quid you can
get a perfectly good one (or, sometimes, two) from Sterling House, or
Cycle King, or innumerable other places, and have it available whenever
you want to use it? Better bike? It can't be that much better, surely?

A good friend of mine went through exactly this 'logic' process a while
ago, getting two bikes for the price of one - where one was well under
a hundred quid. I suggested renting, I suggested secondhand, I told him
he'd regret any new bike under a couple of hundred pounds, and he
wasn't having any of it.

And, having ridden one of the bikes, I was forced to eat my words. It's
not a good bike, but he had taken on board my advice about avoiding
suspension and any glitzy bits, and it is an astonishingly good value
bike.

Spending fifteen quid on slick tyres and twenty minutes truing the
wheels were worthwhile but made less difference than I expected. The
brakes work, the gears work, and for towpaths, or cycle trails, or for
gentle pottering around town it is actually very capable.

In fact, because it was too big for his wife but just the right size
for my girlfriend, I took it off his hands ...

John