Lay My Hat

Hi,
We have a self catered cottage in North Wales in between some very popular places for mountain biking and road biking. We are trying to make our holiday rental an attractive place for cyclists to stay.

So things like secure storage, bike stand pump, bike washing facilities, drying facilities for clothes, bike maintenance stand, basic tools, lube for chains etc. etc. Although we are mountain bikers ourselves - it is too easy to forget obvious things.

While most cyclists will probably pack this stuff anyway, people do forget and some arrive by bike so want to travel light.

Does anyone do a similar thing and if so what do you provide? Would be interested to know if you have done anything like this and how was it received?

Yes - very much so

We provide much of what you list and are part of the VisitWales Cycle friendly scheme which lists us in that niche.

Not sure it brings in any more bookings but it doesn't cost me any more!

We also actively promote being cycle friendly and in addition to most of the items you have listed we leave a compendium of velo routes which are numerous around our Tarn area of France. These we obtain from our local Touist office.
We also show information about bike hire in our area,where they will deliver and collect.
Finding at least one out of three guests nowdays bring road bikes with them.^

Thank you both for your comments. That is encouraging.

I think you have it covered! Maps are a great idea and maybe even better google map routes that could be followed?

A directory of local bike shops for any purchases or repairs needed, with info about which ones are better for road or MTB if needed.
Blogging with pics about your own cycling, with a link and pics to the cottage, will help a lot - people research where they are going to go first and it's relatively easy to get found this way.

Eg setting up a few posts with both a long weekend and a week's worth of rides, centring on your place, would be super popular I think. People really like having the planning already sorted out for them! And it's relatively easy.

I did a lot of blogging about MTB routes for quite a while here in Chamonix. Lots of traffic on the site but enquiries were always for smaller groups, I think we are just too big, we sleep ten and Chamonix is not as popular as Portes de Soleil mountain biking for good reasons. People do come here with their bikes but rarely in the big groups. It's much less forgiving for mixed abilities here. So I have not bothered for a while now, I let the bike blog lapse and repurposed some of the content onto the main site. But I think for a more normal sized property in North Wales it would be a winner.

Your place looks lovely!

I rent MTB in my holiday house and always I provide for free a PDF or printed small guide (in italian, english or french language) for recommended routes in my area!