CYCLES MOVE WITH THE TIMES Times have been hard for the UK cycle industry. Poor weather and competition from abroad have had a serious effect on sales. Manufacturers have had to cut back and last month more than 40 job losses were announced at Cycle World, one of the country's main bicycle factories in Leicester. But the company says it is fighting to win back customers, using such strategies as improved after-sales and bikes built to specific customer requirements. Two years ago, Cycle World sold off its bike-making machinery in an effort to cut costs and save money. The company's Leicester factory is now only an assembly plant as most of the parts are imported. The company produces half a million bikes a year across the full Cycle World range, with nearly all of these being sold in the UK. Production is largely done by hand. Workers use the batch production method - everyone making up to 600 bikes of a particular model at any one time. At the height of its success, Cycle World employed 7,000 people but, like many areas of manufacturing, it has since shrunk. Its 1950s purpose- built factory now employs just 470 permanent workers, with numbers rising to 700 as temporary staff are taken on to meet seasonal demands in sales. The weather has encouraged more people to buy bikes.