Mountain Biking; Research

fergarino

Hello All,

My name is Fergus and I am currently a student of Industrial Design and Technology at Loughborough University. As part of our latest work my team and I are conducting research into Mountain Biking as a hobby/ lifestyle to the keen enthusiast.

We have assembled a simple, brief and anonymous questionnaire and would be grateful to all who take the time to fill one out for us.

The research is in the interest of creating a new product aimed specifically at the mountain biking community to be supported by a major brand.

The Questionnaire can be found here:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/NMW7FWF

Thank you for your time.

Fergus

submityournentries

hi, just some feedback from the survey, it seems really rather a frivolous survey, and the last question in particular is really badly worded. might be an idea to reword it abit better so you'll get some better feedback for it.

Chunkers1980

I'd like to know exactly what you're expecting to get from this survey in the way of data.

Lucky you're doing the course you're doing and not anything stats related, as this survey would bearly pass for a C at GCSE level.

I'd have a read about creating surveys.

njee20

The final question particularly is very badly worded, why would you have a least memorable experience?!

andyrm

njee20 wrote:

The final question particularly is very badly worded, why would you have a least memorable experience?!

....and more to the point, would you remember it?!?!

supersonic

I have no idea how that can relate specifically to a product, I cannot possibly see how you can glean any specifics from that.

Can you shed more light on what you are trying to achieve? I would say most of us put the same things.

jonnyc2420

+1 what Sonic said........ :?

slowslowslow

You really need to ask yourself what you are trying to achieve, and what type of information you want. This is far too general.
I would pop down to London and join the student riots. For 9 grand or so a year you are not getting a very good service from your university course.

RevellRider

I think he's trying to make a bike rack bbq, hence the questions about storage, transit and what foods we like.

slowslowslow

I think he's trying to make a bike rack bbq, hence the questions about storage, transit and what foods we like.

That would make sense-he wants to know what our worst experience is in the expectation of burning hands on a normal one so that he can design a more user/biker friendly one?

RevellRider

Means we can use this - http://www.parktool.com/product/barbeque-tool-set

specialized989

im 17, so that had me stumped at the first question.

bluechair84

RevellRider wrote:

I think he's trying to make a bike rack bbq, hence the questions about storage, transit and what foods we like.

Well, surely that has been catered for? Bikers are used to carrying sacks on their backs, and having drinking tubes knocking about. Just replace camelback with one of these babies, ride out to the highlands, sniff out some deer, killed and cooked at the same time:

fergarino

Thank you for responding to the thread so soon, and for the feedback on the survey, I'm currently unable to edit it as the login details i was given by my group mate don't seem to work.

I understand the last question has caused confusion, I actually questioned whether the wording was correct or getting at what wanted but was convinced otherwise, we also had a limit on the number of questions we could post and were trying to make the most use of them but may have ended up being counter productive.

Hopefully it will be rectified to a higher standard soon.

I find some of the comments on this thread to be quite hurtful, I admit this survey wont be ticking all the boxes for a leading statician however it is just to provide us with some preliminary information to help us think of questions for our main research, which will not be conducted on the internet; for all I know no one on this site can even balance on a mountain bike let alone ride one with a relative degree of compitence.

The questions are not supposed to relate specifically to a product this is part of the persona development stage for this assignment.

I will not be joining the riots in london because i am here trying to do well in the course that I am apparently wasting £9000 per year on as was so tactfully put. I best start learning to say "do you want fries with that" and practice spitting in your burgers.

Thank you for participating.

Fergus

cooldad

Touchy touchy. I'm a mediocre rider, but can assure you I ride better than you can spell. Always be extra careful with words like 'competence'.
My results are the ones that mention hunting yetis and eating dogs so best disregard them.

RupertWarries

Hello Everyone.

Firstly, my name is Rupert, I'm a member of the team conducting the survey and it's clear a few things need to be cleared up.

I thank anyone who's input has been collected, and to those being rude and/or unpleasant, please understand nobody is forcing you to take the survey, but thankyou for the suggestions on question clarity, we will look into making this clearer for you

For the time being, for the first question, if you are under 18 please tick the 18 box, but we will try to rectify this problem.

Questions were asked about the data collection. The primary goal of this survey is to gain a deeper understanding into your riding experiences and help gather information regarding both these experiences and the related use of food during them.

In terms of the last few questions, we will revise the wording, but the gist is:

Q7. What kind of foods do you usually eat whilst cycling, if any, and what foods would you like to be able to eat that you maybe cannot now due to equipment/baggage limitations

Q8. What brands do you relate to your experience of cycling, is there any equipment brands that you feel have enhanced your riding and/or you feel are dependable or reliable.

Q9. In terms of memorable experiences, are there any times you particularly remember positively, for example; sensing achievement maybe, or a time that made a difference to your cycling career. And for least memorable, we mean any times that left you feeling bitter or dissatisfied with cycling in general or your own performance, if not don't worry.

I hope that has cleared up the intention of those questions, our survey takes no names and logs no identifying details, so all answers are confidential and anonymous the answers are purely for research purposes.

The time taken to answer our survey is greatly appreciated, so thankyou to all that have and please feel free to take it again to revise your answers in light of the above.

For those suggesting the barbeque concept, well spotted, you're along the right lines. Although we have not begun conceptual work yet, we are in the process of researching mountain biking and food/drink products related to it.

If there is anything else you'd like to know, please don't hesitate to post!

Thanks guys.
Rupert.

RupertWarries

Oh yes and also.

I hope you can understand why Fergus got touchy, but there is no point in getting at each other's throats and becoming unnecessarily offensive, both sides of the bickering

If you would like to participate, it would be greatly appreciated

If not, no problem.

Rupert.

slowslowslow

In the name of good relations, i apologies if my comments caused offence. Must look bad when you go on something for a first time and get such responses.

If it is related to food, it might be worth loking at what food riders consume before/after riding. Distance for me plays a part too. My nutritional needs and hence what I take in my bag will vary greatly according to whether I am on a quick hour blast, or out for 4-5 hours.

RupertWarries

Apology accepted Slowslowslow, and I apologise if we were offensive in return, it was a little discomforting but no worries!

Thanks for the before/after suggestion, thats something we will definitely take into consideration and I imagine quite important! So cheers for that!

Also, what you said about distance is a very important factor and we'll definitely focus some more research on that as well.

Would you mind if I asked for a brief expansion of that? Just about the differences in food for longer and shorter cycles. If not, again, its up to you, so dont worry if your not comfortable discussing it or don't have the time

Cheers again for the heads up!

slowslowslow

no worries, I can take it as well as give it, and can see why offence was caused.

With regard to distance, if I'm out for an hour or so on the local trail then I will just take a bum bag and bottle of water with maybe some boiled sweets/flapjack for emergancies. If I'm out for the day i will use 2L hydration pack, more bars and think I have some carbo-gels tucked away somewhere. when I last rode somewhere like Dartmoor where there is no real acces to refreshments then sarnies for lunch go in as well.

whilst i am not that much of a fitness freak anymore i remember when I was running, and doing races, then things like carb loading beforehand and recovery food after were part of the routine. I am sure there wil be plenty of more competitive/enthusiastic riders who would have the same considerations.

bennett_346

I admit, i may have put peanut butter jelly time in the food question.

RupertWarries

Thanks man, you've identified some really key stuff that will help our research along so it's great to have it first hand!

Cheers for the help Slowslowslow!

Rupert.

RupertWarries

Ha, Bennett, if it's what you eat when your cycling so be it, it's still a foodstuff so still research.

You should try looped dancing bananas I hear they're in season.

But seriously, all answers are welcomed!

bennett_346

I like to keep them in a cage:

http://www.bananaguard.com/

wordnumb

fergarino wrote:

I find some of the comments on this thread to be quite hurtful

Ok, here's how it works:

If you are a member of a forum / online community, with a few posts under you belt, maybe having got to know a few other users, people will tend to give you a little leeway.

If you register with a forum specifically to undertake market research your have to be professional about it, because the forum users have no other reason to take you seriously. A university student who doesn't understand the difference between the words you and your is going to be laughed at.

supersonic

I still think the survey is very vague: the reader needs some idea what they are responding to. The follow up posts, at least to me, do not seem to have cleared up much here. I have to be honest, and hopefully to you constructive: the questions seem random, unspecific and not relating to any particular area in MTB and I found answering them was like a lottery. I almost quit halfway through as it seemed so poorly constructed.

If that is your tactic then fair enough But as it stands, and I am not alone, it needs work.

slowslowslow

I have have just re-done, and agree with Supersonic. If, as you say, you are aiming at nutrition, you need to forget questions about favourite brands and how bikes are stored/ transported and focus on the food.

What is the purpose? Is it to be able to advise about nutrition? Are you trying to come up with a new type of food? Are you looking at packaging and ease of use on a bike? Sure there are many other peramiters as well.

When you are clear what you are trying to do, then you can put in more specific questions. The general questions on your survey just have too few peramiters to get usefull data.

Neil Fat man on a bike

Terrible survey.
Poor questions.

llamafarmer

I did Product Design at Loughborough lads, so I promise I'm not here to insult you, but as others have said, the survey is really, really vague. It seems as though you've decided to design an mtb product, but are fishing for ideas as to what that might be. If that's unfair, I apologise, but it comes across as a little lazy if you rock up on a forum and ask people to fill out a scattergun survey.

It's been a while since I did any market research, but surveys like this are much better used later on, when you know what you're designing and have very specific questions with quantifiable feedback. If you present the results from this to your lecturers (even if all the answers were serious) they'll probably be more scathing than we are.

Please take this as it's intended - constructive criticism

sheepsteeth

i answered the survey, i wonder if you can guess which answers were mine.

Teifiterror

Out of interest did you even ask the Loughborough Students Cycling Club at all for their viewpoints? Considering you want feedback you could have contacted them and got one to one interviews or other forms of information or at least got some better ideas for your project.

Rather poor to not take advantage of the knowledge you may already have nearby to improve the questionnaire/idea before getting further viewpoints from a broader range of people.