Scooters Gain Ground in Mobility Race

Attention, everyone entrenched in the fierce debate over the finer points of scooter sales and production: Take note of the comeback scooters are making in the mobility segment of the home medical equipment industry. Notice, too, that the influx of imports is slowing, and that scooter manufacturers are moving past the heated rivalry with power wheelchair manufacturers to serve a new population of seniors.

Power Wheelchair or Scooter?

A decade ago, bulky scooters served a limited population of rehab users, specifically those with “less complex needs,” says Simon Margolis, vice president for clinical and professional services at National Seating and Mobility and president of the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America. “But we’re finding out that [those patients] are more complex than we thought. They need to receive a piece of equipment that will be adaptable to their needs.”

According to Margolis, for some end users with progressive disabilities, this may ultimately require moving from a scooter to a wheelchair.

However, where once manufacturers may have been jaded by the rivalry between power wheelchairs and scooters, experts say today’s market is different. “The [scooter] market was stagnant before because the focus was on the moneymaking machines: the power chairs,” says Juan Carlos Rivera, president of IMC Heartway.

But leading manufacturers contend that the focus has moved away from the equipment and toward the user — namely, senior citizens — earning scooters a place in the mainstream mobility market.

The populations served by scooters and power wheelchairs today are “two very different groups of individuals,” according to Cy Corgan, national sales manager for retail mobility at Pride Mobility Products. Scooters serve seniors who want to maintain active lifestyles as they grow older, so that despite frailty from aging or minor injury, scooters can provide what Corgan calls “the gift of independence.”

“It’s not about rehab anymore like 10 or 20 years ago,” says Randy Riecks, national sales manager for Ranger All Season. “Seniors drive this market. They’ve been active all their lives, so mobility is important to them.”

Given this positive trend, confidence among scooter manufacturers is building. “It’s a numbers game,” states Norman Stein, director of marketing for No Boundaries. “There are millions of people turning 70-plus each day. The senior market is going to take over the whole medical market in the next 10 to 15 years.”

Big or Small?

Most manufacturers say seniors demand small, portable scooters to support their independent lifestyles. “They don’t want to be seen on big, cumbersome scooters, especially if they don’t need [the big scooters],” Stein says.

“They want to keep it simple, so that instead of using walkers and canes, they can use portable, small, inexpensive scooters to go to the mall, go to the boardwalk and go to the zoo.”

“People gravitate toward smaller, more compact scooters because they want the portability,” explains Cheryl Gwiazda, product manager for Invacare. “They want to be able to fold up their scooter and put it in the trunk of their car.”

Small scooters may serve as either a primary or secondary mode of transportation, depending on the population, experts say. In the disability market — as opposed to the senior citizen market — end users have a standard scooter or a power wheelchair as their primary mode of transportation. But “now, because the small scooters are so cheap, people buy ‘the little guy,’ too,” says Jack Sheehan, director of sales and marketing at Bruno Independent Living Aids. They purchase small scooters as a second mode of transportation for quick trips, to avoid having to use a vehicle lift or disassemble a larger unit.

“They need one to go on park trails or in the hills. But they also need a decent three- or four-wheel unit with some muscle,” Sheehan says.

Seniors, however, buy smaller scooters as their primary mode of transportation since they are not spending all day on their scooter, Stein says. “They are walking and using their scooter both, or have orders from their doctor to continue to try and walk,” he says.

The market for small scooters has grown tremendously, experts say, and has attracted “people just beginning to experience mobility problems,” adds Rivera.

No matter where you look, smaller scooters are gaining ground, according to some manufacturers. Scooters have become a cash product, dropping to an affordable price for end users who don’t rely on funding sources. “This is clearly where the growth in the market is. When all is said and done, smaller scooters have multiple uses and serve people with limited income,” Sheehan points out.

But not all manufacturers are pleased by the rise of smaller scooters. While some market leaders say the trend will stick (“Every company has now jumped on the bandwagon with smaller scooters,” Stein notes), others doubt the merits of the smaller units as a mobility device.

“Small ‘skateboard’-type scooters are a liability nightmare for the dealers in terms of product reliability and longevity,” says DuWayne Kramer, president of Leisure Lift. “When sold to the average scooter users, [small scooters] quickly prove unsatisfactory. They also stand to decrease reimbursements by low-balling the product line with inferior goods.”

Other manufacturers recognize faults among smaller scooters but believe they serve a purpose in the marketplace. “There’s good and bad to it,” Riecks says. “We’ve found through dealers that because of the price, smaller scooters are a reasonable purchase but they don’t always serve the end users’ needs. [However], our company likes the attitude of the product because it’s lightweight and portable and easy to disassemble.”

“I’ve always sold the [micro-scooter] as somebody’s second scooter,” says Tom Jones, owner of Black Bear Medical, a DME provider. “The big scooter is [kept] at home.”

But Jones says his sales of smaller scooters have declined. “We used to sell a lot of micro-scooters. We [carried] three brands last year, but now we’re down to one.”

Import or Domestic?

Competing against the price market created by offshore competitors has been tough for domestic scooter manufacturers, experts say. “In the last two years, the price has just kept going down and down and down. It’s really gotten competitive with everything coming from offshore,” Riecks says.

As in many other home care markets, some scooter manufacturers are concerned about the quality of foreign-made products. However, manufacturers say the rate of new overseas competitors has slowed, and see this as a promising sign for consumers. “The price point in [the scooter] market has moved down because of imports, but this [trend] is reaching maturity,” Sheehan says.

Providers want satisfied customers and play a vital role in selecting high-quality products for the showroom floor, manufacturers say.

“After several years of low cost imports flooding the market, dealers are looking for units that will last longer for the consumer,” Kramer explains.

Manufacturers that import scooters say they make moves to ensure the reliability and quality of their overseas products.

“The reliability of imported scooters is not as good as American-made unless the manufacturer takes special care,” Sheehan says. “We do import one scooter, but we take special care to open every box.”

And, as a result of the recent war between the United States and Iraq, many manufacturers have seen an upsurge in requests for American-made products. “That seems to hit a nerve with older Americans,” Kramer says.

Ultimately, manufacturers depend on informed providers to ensure that end users are purchasing the product most appropriate for their needs. “It’s up to the retailer to address that issue,” Sheehan says.

Regardless of whether or not small scooters will prove their case among competition in the growing market, if manufacturers can make their products “stand out in the sea of ‘me, too’ scooters,” says Kramer, the future is promising.

Experts Interviewed:

Cy Corgan, national sales manager for retail mobility, Pride Mobility Products, Exeter, Pa.; Cheryl Gwiazda, product manager, Invacare, Elyria, Ohio; Tom Jones, owner, Black Bear Medical, Portland, Maine; Simon Margolis, vice president for clinical and professional services, National Seating & Mobility, Nashville; Randy Riecks, national sales manager, Ranger All Season, George, Iowa; Juan Carlos Rivera, president, IMC Heartway, Fort Meyers, Fla.; Jack Sheehan, director of sales and marketing, Bruno Independent Living Aids, Oconomowoc, Wis.; Norman Stein, director of marketing, No Boundaries, Garden Grove, Calif.

Expanding Waistlines = Expanding Bottom Line

“Obesity is a problem among [scooter] users; it’s why they are users,” says Simon Margolis, vice president for clinical and professional services at National Seating & Mobility and president of the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America. “This is why we’ve seen an explosion of the bariatric market.”

The bariatric market has a strong influence on scooter manufacturers. Smaller scooters are being manufactured for seniors, but the bariatric population — which needs larger, standard scooters — remains a solid niche market, experts say.

“Bariatrics is a huge market for us because of the huge percentage of overweight people in the United States,” according to Randy Riecks, national sales manager for Ranger All Season. “We have dealers who dedicate an entire section of their floor to bariatrics. I get calls all the time for [chairs that will accommodate patients] over 500 pounds.”

But the demands in the bariatric market are intense, according to DuWayne Kramer, president of Leisure Lift. “In our testing we see most bariatric users are younger, more active and harder on their products than are mainstream scooter users.

“Just making things thicker does not solve all the problems,” Kramer adds. “You must start with the usage in mind and then deal with the weight factors.”