AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) –While the pandemic put many retail stores in the red for months, bike shops across the Front Range are inundated with business right now.
“Ever since we have been labeled essential it has just been bikes coming in bikes going out,” Colorado Cycling Company manager Evan Trent said, adding, “For the last month, we’ve had more than 60 service bikes in here.”
Bike shops across the area are booked two to three weeks out on repair work.
“The employees have been working so many hours to get everything done,” Adventure Cycling owner Erik Swanson said.
To keep up with all the extra work, Adventure Cycling is closing up shop on all Wednesdays until further notice so they can focus just on repairs.
“We are the new toilet paper of the industry,” Swanson said.
Similar to what happened with the toilet paper industry, bikes are selling at high speeds and the unexpected demand is having a ripple effect on bike inventory.
“We have ordered 75 to 100 bikes in the last two months and we are completely out,” Trent said. “Two weeks ago we got an email from Cannondale saying there is a bike shortage and anything we are ordering is probably not going to be what we are fully getting.”
“We’re hard pressed to find bikes hard pressed to get bikes, everyone has found out they enjoy riding bikes again,” Swanson said.