A8 • Friday, August 27, 2021 | Seaside Signal | SeasideSignal.com
Bike shops struggling to meet Business Directory
,
.
high demand during pandemic B M E c
CONSTRUCTION
oB
By ETHAN MYERS
The Astorian
Ivan Gonzalez gestured
to a brand new mountain
bike he was assembling.
“This thing right here will
be gone by what, Friday?” he
said to Scott Lee, the owner
of Bikes and Beyond.
“He builds this bike
today, it will be gone tomor-
row,” Lee said.
When the coronavirus
pandemic arrived last year
and lockdowns were put
into place, bike shops were
hit with an instant wave of
demand.
A year-and-a-half later,
many shops on the North
Coast and across the country
are still struggling to keep
up. On top of high demand,
supply chain issues have pre-
vented retailers from being
able to satisfy customers.
“I have been in the busi-
ness for 30 years and I have
never seen anything like it,”
Lee said.
Lee said he would often
spend time late at night
searching for bikes online
for his Astoria shop. Thanks
to good connections, he was
able to acquire a fair amount
of bikes, but they would sell
almost instantly.
“We sold every bike we
had and every bike we could
get our hands on,” he said.
Lee said he receives calls
from all over the country and
gets people driving down
from other states in order
to get their hands on a spe-
cifi c bike. When he isn’t able
to supply a customer with
the bike they are looking
for, he encourages them to
call around and hope to get
lucky.
National sales
The Oregonian reported
that national bikes sales
from May 2020 to this April
grew 57% and that March
bike sales were the highest
ever recorded, according to
Dirk Sorenson of The NPD
Group.
While demand has var-
ied over the past year, Lee
said it never fully died off
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Scott Lee of Bikes and Beyond in Astoria.
like it typically does in the
wintertime.
“It came early in spring
and it’s really never let up,”
Lee said. “It smoothed out
a bit in the summer and was
steady all through the winter,
more than any other winter.”
While the increase in sales
was slightly more gradual,
Prom Bike Shop in Seaside
had a similar experience.
“Everybody
decided
they wanted a bike, or they
wanted to fi x their bike that
had been sitting in their
garage, barn or whatever
for the last fi ve to 10 years
because — I’m assuming,
anyway — it was the only
thing you could really do,”
said Debbie Clark, the shop’s
co-owner. “As a group, you
were socially distanced and
it was outdoors and fun.
Everybody could do it.”
While Clark understood
why demand was so high
last year, she did not expect
it to continue into 2021.
“Demand has stayed
pretty good. We have been
fairly impressed with it,”
she said. “Honestly, we have
been somewhat surprised,
we thought it would drop
this year because everyone
bought bikes last year.”
As new and returning
customers come knocking
for new bikes and seeking
repairs on old ones, manu-
facturers are struggling to
ship deliveries on time, leav-
ing bike shops in a tough
spot.
Lee said the bikes arriv-
ing this month from man-
ufacturers were ordered in
May and June of last year.
Ed Jones, the owner of
Bike Envy in Warrenton,
said he isn’t expecting some
orders to arrive until the end
of 2022.
Clark said there is lit-
tle rhyme or reason to when
orders are arriving at Prom
Bike Shop.
“We don’t have a clue,”
she said. “The two suppli-
ers that we use are giving us
on-the-water, maybe dates
and that is it.”
“We just roll with the
punches,” she added.
Parts are a challenge
Since the availability of
new bikes dwindled during
the pandemic, Lee said many
people came in hoping to
repair old bikes.
But a shortage of parts has
made repairs slow and often
impossible without the right
pieces.
“People are repairing their
old bikes if they can, but parts
are a problem, too,” Lee said.
“We are two weeks out on
repairs right now because we
are so swamped.”
In addition to the dis-
rupted supply chain, Lee
said, there is a skilled labor
shortage.
“Staffi ng is always an
issue, but I have a good crew
and we have stuck together
and made it through it,” he
said. “We have good people
who are just thankful to have
jobs.”
Clark’s husband, Les,
who has owned Prom Bike
Shop since 1975, said they
loaded up on parts in antici-
pation of the shortage.
“If you had a good inven-
tory, which we had, it was
not really a big deal for us,”
he said. “Over the winter, I
had accumulated a backlog
in my parts inventory, so I
have not had a lot of short-
age problems when it comes
to repair work.”
But Debbie Clark said for
certain bikes, they are unable
to take care of chains, derail-
leurs or cassettes.
Although having to turn
interested customers away is
diffi cult, Lee and the Clarks
said people have been con-
siderate of the challenges.
“People understand what
is going on and they’re fairly
patient,” Lee said. “Every-
body has been inconve-
nienced and hassled and so
we are just used to having to
wait for things and have the
anxiety that goes along with
that.”
While they have not had
any issues with upset cus-
tomers, Clark said she rec-
ognizes there is some
frustration.
“I would say (there is) a
frustration level of not hav-
ing product, but even more
so, of not being able to give
you a two-month window of
when you might be able to
see that product,” she said.
“I would think that in this
day and age, you should be
able to have a better grasp on
when things are coming in.”
Bike shop owners are not
sure what to expect in the
next few months.
Lee, who moved his shop
from 11th Street and Marine
Drive to a smaller location
on 9th and Astor streets in
May, has ordered the same
amount of bikes as he did
last year in anticipation of
demand remaining high.
“I don’t know what is
going to happen,” he said. “It
is very fl uid. We don’t know
how the economy is holding.
It just depends on so many
factors, it is hard to predict.”
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onstruction inc
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Winners of ‘Break the Chain’ run
FLOORING
CCB# 205283
Seaside Signal
Luxury vinyl planks and tile.
Zander Moha, a mem-
ber of the Warrenton High
School cross-country team,
had the fastest time in com-
pleting the fourth annual
Seaside Run to Break the
Chain 5K, with a time of 19
minutes and 39 seconds.
The race was held Aug.
14, beginning at 12th Ave-
nue and Prom to Avenue U
and back at low tide to com-
plete the 5K.
The goal of the run was
to raise awareness and ben-
efi t the Sunset Empire Park
and Recreation District and
Operation
Underground
Railroad, an organization
to rescue children from sex
traffi cking.
Two winners in each age
group were selected:
Kids under 12: Tra-
vis Ahearn and Sylvia
Hamilton.
Youth, ages 12 to 17:
Zander Moha and James
Roehr.
Adult: Brett Duer and
Destiny Kastener.
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LANDSCAPING
Photos by Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District
LEFT: Kids under 12 winner Sylvia Hamilton. RIGHT: Adult winner Brett Duer.
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Kids under 12 runner Travis
Ahearn.
to discuss new and exciting ways to
promote your business on the North Coast
LEFT: Youth runners James Roehr and Zander Moha. RIGHT: Adult winner Destiny Kastener.