'Airbnb' of mountain biking... crazy? stupid?

I would participate as a customer. There are a few riding areas I would like to check out but are either difficult to navigate because of poor or nonexistent trail signage, or they are too remote to safely ride solo. I'm thinking trails that are just a little too far for a day trip ( 2 to 3 hour drive) would be perfect. Sometimes it's just fun to follow someone who knows the trails without having to stop at every junction to check the map.

Posted by: brumos

So it's $3500/yr to join and, based on a per ride price of $175 (I used the Spokane offerings), that would mean just over 22 paid customers a year to break even on the fixed costs. Assume 2 riders per "tour", that's 11 days of paid service just to break even.

For the affiliates who have signed up already, how long does it take them to break even in the first year? How many leads do you generate for your affiliates, on average, per month?

Don't forget during the shoulder season (Nov - Mar) you'll more than likely have zero bookings. So realistically, you're operating 7 months of the year.

Btw, Taylor… next time i'm in Cumberland you can show me the goods ;)

To take the math a bit further, I work a 9-5 job so weekends would be the only days I could really dedicate to guided rides.  So I would need to dedicate 1.5 months to tours to break even, and that's assuming both days are booked every weekend. The prime riding season in the northeast is 4 months and you can count on a good handful of rained out weekends where riding is a no-go. 

I really like the concept, but the buy in is just way too steep for someone who would want to do this casually the way services like airbnb are intended to be used. If it was free with the service simply making money on fees for each tour or some sort of nominal buy in, I would be giving it a much harder look. 

There's also the insurance and public trail usage for profit topics, but that's a different discussion entirely.