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Review: Rapha halves RCC club costs, reshaped & accessible to more cyclists

Written by Cory Benson Nov 28, 2019 11:59 a.m. ET

2020 RCC reduced member dues, Rapha Cycling Club international cycling community made local

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Rapha quietly rolled out a major overhaul to the RCC this past week, cutting annual dues in half and restructuring member benefits in a bid to make the club more accessible to a broader cycling audience. Rapha has held rider engagement and overall growth of cycling as their major goals since the founding of the clothing brand, so the idea of the Rapha Cycling Club has always been close to the heart. By significantly lowering the cost of entry into the RCC, Rapha hopes to reach out to more riders and build even stronger local & international communities of cyclists.

Rapha Cycling Club, international cycling community made local

To cyclists who have never joined, RCC has always seemed like an odd step to make – why would more than 13,000 cyclists pay a clothing maker to join their club to be allowed to buy more of their clothing? And there’s no debate, Rapha clothing is expensive, making it the choice of an elite class of consumer cyclists. Surely RCC is going to be packed with cyclists riding super expensive bikes who think they are better that everyone, right?

Well, that actually doesn’t seem to be the case.

I’ve ridden with a number of RCC members at Rapha organized rides in Berlin, Munich, Mallorca, the Dolomites, and my home Czech Republic, and it has always been a super communal & welcoming vibe. Don’t get me wrong (and I’m not trying to #humblebrag), I am clearly privileged to be working in the cycling industry and to live in a beautiful place in Central Europe with tons of great riding a reasonable drive or short plane ride away. But I don’t ride the distance on the road of many cycling friends, and I’ll almost always take a slow off-road detour over a fast-paced road group ride. Yet every RCC ride I’ve hopped in on felt like I was being welcomed with open arms into a friendly group ride.

On the last RCC ride I did, a cyclist from South Korea realized before the start of a descent that she had under tightened and lost 2 of 3 bolts that held her cleat on. Two riders she had never met, from different continents, each took a bolt out of their own shoe, so she could finish her ride safely. She didn’t ask. They just offered. That pretty much seems to be the vibe.

Oh yeah, that and a lot of super nice, expensive road bikes.

So what does RCC cost now?

Annual RCC membership dues have gone up and down over the years as Rapha tried to find the sweet spot of matching costs to benefits for the cycling members. It settled to a pretty high figure that last year was £135 / 160€ / $200. For that you got a present when you join (something like a cap & an essentials case, etc.) plus a bunch of some VIP deals like one free coffee a day, low-cost premium bike rental, access to member-only RCC kit & early Rapha sales, and of course the weekly club rides & special member-only events.

So why would you join RCC?

Beyond just building a community of like-minded, welcoming bike riders, RCC is about bridging the global & the local. I’m an expat living in the Czech Republic and it took a long time to find road & gravel cyclists I enjoyed riding with. The local club team scene here isn’t really my bag, so a more international group seems to make a better fit. Prague doesn’t have a local chapter or clubhouse, so rides are a bit less regular with around 10 local RCC members. But Rapha still has 200 ride leaders organizing regular rides around the globe in more than 60 locales. Sometimes this happen close to me, sometime I would have to travel to join in on the fun.

Cory Benson

4,481 articles

Cory Benson is the EU Tech Editor of Bikerumor.com.

Cory has been writing about mountain bikes, enduro, cyclocross, all-road, gravel bikes & bikepacking for over 25 years, even before the industry created some of these names. Prior to Bikerumor, Cory was a practicing Architect specializing in environmental sustainability, has designed bike shops & bike components, and worked as a bike shop mechanic.

Based in the Czech Republic for 15+ years, he is a technical mountain biker, adventurous gravel rider, and short & medium-haul bikepacker. Cory travels extensively across Europe riding bikes, meeting with key European product developers, industry experts & tastemakers for an in-depth review of what’s new, and what’s coming next.

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Philo Betto

5 years ago

So, I guess the question is, is half of too much still too much? Personally, my answer is yes. I’d much rather spend my $100 on an entry fee and feel the rush of passing and eventually beating the tar out of every pink handkerchief I can.

Crash Bandicoot

5 years ago

So the brands loyalty club now costs only double what local clubs in my area costs? Terrible value prop in comparison with local cycling clubs that actually do things for the local cycling community at large consisting of putting on bike races, rider and junior skills clinics, junior races, Leveraging their membership to volunteer at charity rides etc, advocating for cyclist at city hall. You’re better off joining 2 local clubs than Rapha, in their entire existence I’ve seen the club do little to nothing for cycling in the cities/towns they exist in.

Elpataron

5 years ago

Here’s the thing. Half of too much is still too much. I’d rather spend that $100 (or whatever) on a race entry and find a pink handkerchief to out-sprint to the line. Rapha is occasionally (always) ridiculous.

Jeff

5 years ago

Are the clubs still populated by snobbish, superficial, shallow, fake people that think having a RCC membership makes them less of a douche? Cause that the real problem. And it is a rip off, but even if you ignore the horrible value proposition you still deal with the people.

-1

blahblahblah

5 years ago

Reply to Jeff

” snobbish, superficial, shallow, fake people” is what a snobbish, superficial, shallow, fake person would say

Crash Bandicoot

5 years ago

Reply to blahblahblah

Normally I would have agreed with you but in my experience RCC racers are douchey-er than other clubs racers (and we’re talking road racing so that’s a high bar) maybe it’s because they take anyone into their club/team so it’s sort of last chance saloon for guys who have ticked off everyone else in town.

Jeff

5 years ago

Reply to blahblahblah

They are like the clique in high school the calls themselves the “popular kids” and then tells every one how everybody wants to be in their group but just are not cool enough or don’t have enough money. Then when someone calls this “popular group” out on it, the “popular” kids just say it’s cause they are jealous. These are the people that will tell you about a place they road and then also tell you how they were riding their Di2 equipped whatever bike with lightweight wheels. Like that has any reason to be talked about I context to the story. Kind of like vegans and cross fitters.

Rapha should start a vegan cross fit club. It would be a match made in heaven!!!

-1

Eggs Benedict

5 years ago

Reply to Jeff

Or possibly hell, depending what angle you’re coming from.

-1

Greg

5 years ago

I wonder if they’ll increase the bike rental cost to offset it. For a traveler (not me unfortunately), it seems like a crazy deal. Pay $100 up front, and then if you travel to some area with a Rapha store, you can rent a very nice bike for something like $25.

O. Tan

5 years ago

Hmm, to me RCC only makes sense if you have a Rapha Clubhouse in the area

Mark Studnicki

5 years ago

Isnt the whole idea of an expensive club, cloths, ect that its intentionally elitist so that only those that can afford it are in it and wearing it?

kwcmau

5 years ago

Oh and guess what, they also charge you a delivery fee if you try to sign up for their membership online!

adkjfaljdf

4 years ago

I used to be a member a few years back (Taiwan) the lack of camaraderie was a shock, you have to be keep up or be left out. I spent my first ride with them…riding alone. When I got to the finish stop, everyone had left (crickets). A disappointment. My local bike club, FOC btw, even the top riders will hang back to wait for slower riders. THAT is basic manners and decency. Rapha will just keel over sooner or later as they are only interested in supporting the front runners. But they forget its the middlings and rear that make up the “meat” of the revenue bottom line. I dont hear many “Rapha” happenings locally now, everyone has left to form their own groups.

Rohit Konathala

4 years ago

I have seen all the comments so far, its very unfortunate you guys have a negative opinion. To me, Rapha adds great value to the customer. I started my cycling watching Team Sky, which was quintessentially Rapha at the helm of marketing. Every year in December, I gear up and brave the cold to ride the Festive 500. In effect I have been introduced to endurance cycling on doing my first Festive 500 in 2016. It was surreal to receive my roundel ! While at college, I modeled my college club’s branding on Rapha’s style. We stood out to other sports clubs, people were more dedicated and took ownership of the club. Which is very odd in college club’s because you dont get paid. Good branding makes you work more, relate better.

Look, I live in India and am a student, there are very few indie clubhouses here much less the Rapha Cycling Club. To order something from Rapha is a distant though, given the exchange rate and inherent high cost. So I can’t really argue on that, they are expensive and they make no apologies for it. But, its very hard to find companies that care so deeply about our sport. Their photographs and editorial inspire many like me, they romanticize the sport for everyone, even for people who are not their customers. They put a lot of thought into their products – Downsizing, crash warranty etc. They don’t want to see you multiple times of the same product, they’d rather charge higher for better quality, support and repair. Which I believe is very noble, fast fashion contributed to a huge portion of the carbon emission.

Rapha is not for everyone, agreed. If you really dont buy into their ideology, your overpaying them – absolutely. But having them around is important, they force the competitors to up their game in design and branding. Think of Starbucks, you pay $5 a coffee ! Why ? aren’t you being ripped off ? …

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