Affiliate Program | Products & Services

The Active Travel Market is growing rapidly (with 2010 statistics showing 80% of families in the German speaking market have at some stage undertaken a cycling holiday with the whole family - ttaking advantage of the fantastic cycle infrastructure their respective countries offer in this regard) and forward thinking property/establishment owners wishing to take advantage of the global trend toward a growing active healthy lifestyle market, sees the value of investing in infrastructure and product development geared towards this market. Building into your product offering not only provides a differentiating element in the current market here in Africa, but also positions you for the growing market interest over the next decades.

Bike & Saddle is the definitive market leader since 2007 and we have a number of successful property developments under the belt - from Southern Sun, The Mantis Group, The Meikles Group, Spier, Inverdoorn, Aquila, The Great Family Wine Estates, Village & Life Group and other brand name groups, to smaller guest house and backpack accommodation providers, with operations in the Western Cape, Durban, Victoria Falls, Mpumanlanga to countries further north of our borders, including the Indian Ocean Islands (Madagascar, etc.).

A partnership with Bike & Saddle automatically ensures your affiliation in our Eco-Active Travel Network, an association of properties 'Going Eco-Active with Bike & Saddle'. The www.ecoactive.travel platform allows us to promote our property partners to the active travel market venturing in the region and qualifies our affiliate members as offering a quality product.

Product & Services Overview

Hardware | Design & Development

• type of bicycle (MTB, Road, Electrical, Lifestyle)
• accessories and customization
• branding and design
• outright purchase or lease agreement
• maintenance plan
• emergency repair service
• accessory design (scarves, water bottles, helmets, locks, male/female seat preferences etc.)
• GPS fitment & tracking product.

Excursion & Route planning

• themed route & trail designs, starting and ending at the premises (heritage & culture, geography & geology, sunset or sunrise, scenic & art, etc.)
• trails transferred to self guided map format, for printed or GPS medium
• trails safety rating (consulting with relevant roads & traffic authorities).

Marketing & Sales

• in room brochure/pamphlet design (quantity printed)
• life-size ‘eco-active’ banner design for placement in lobby/reception/foyer (quantity printed)
• shop clothing and cycling accessories, branding and design (quantity included)
• day time bike placement & positioning
• web page design & GPS map download area
• Eco-Active label / Eco-affiliate membership.

Standard Operating Procedures

• staff orientation & training (product presentation)
• logistics & operational procedures (bike storage & security, care and use)
• equipment insurance plan / guest equipment & lock key deposits
• guest indemnity / limited liability forms.
  

Business Plan Formulation
Includes, start-up cost, sales & marketing plan, operational cost, sales forecast.

Bike & Saddle Guide Services
Bike & Saddle offers a professional, industry leading, expert guide service to our property partners, allowing them to sell fully supported, guided, short excursions on demand, from participating premises. Guides are Bike & Saddle trained, managed and employed.

Research Modules

Bike and Saddle has teamed-up with Soft Craft Research in providing our members a unique opportunity

Consumer insight research
The core of our research model is the planning, design and execution of a comprehensive research module into the opinions of your guests. The fully managed service offering includes appropriate target audience selection, the generation of random stratified samples, questionnaire design, data collection and statistical analysis and reporting.

We listen, consider and plan
We have designed research instruments such as questionnaires and the most effective and appropriate methodology (quantitative and qualitative) for the field work. The data collection can be managed via online electronic surveys (highly cost-effective), mobile phone (SMS), paper questionnaires, telephonic administration, focus groups, or a combination of these in a multi-modal research project.

We prepare and gather data
During survey administration we report on completion progress by monitoring response rates against preset quotas. This ensures not only high-level representativity, but that the views of specific segments the project wants to focus on are sampled adequately.

At the conclusion of the survey administration, we can generate a post-sample to correct for any self-selection bias that was exhibited by specific groups of respondents, to ensure that the overall sample is indistinguishable, and statistically representative of the overall population in respect of key demographic variables such as age, gender, geographic location or any other variable that is available and relevant.

We generate wisdom
The information from the various reports, together with the embedded statistical information is used to highlight key management insights. We prepare and present these findings, together with our recommendations to your executive management team.

Bike and Saddle | Research in a nutshell...
We have years of experience with helping our clients develop a detailed understanding of the needs and attitudes of the stakeholders in their business, by asking the right questions across practice areas that span employees, guests and prospective customers.

From a research design perspective, we are excellent at planning, administering and project managing the information gathering process.

In terms of analysis, we have an outstanding track record at data mining, interpreting and presenting the data in insightful and innovative ways.

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