The Amstelveen research bureau has been recording sales among Dutch specialist bike shops since 1997. In May sales of electric bikes for the first time surpassed those of standard city bikes. At an average price of approximately 2000 Euro compared to 650 Euro for an average city bike, the electric bike greatly contributes to turnover in bike trade. Despite - or maybe because of - the credit crunch sales of electric bikes increased by 45% in May in comparison to last year, resulting in a sales percentage of 37%, equal to that of city bikes. The electric bike competes with two other types of bike, resulting in an almost 10% fall in sales of city bikes and over 3% fall in sales of the third segment in bike trade, touring bikes.