Start a Bicycle Repair Business
By Eric Hammer
Look around any urban center in Europe and you’ll find
thousands of bicycles on the road; in fact, in many cities, bicycles
can be rented or even borrowed for free if you are resident.
Here in the United States, we’re not quite as sophisticated
about it, but we still have a tremendous "bike culture"
and as such there is a tremendous amount of room for building
a new bicycle repair business in your town or city, even if one
or more already exists.
Bicycle repair technicians need to know more than just how
to take the tires off of a bike and put them back on. They also
need to know more than just filling up the tires or patching
holes. They need to know bicycles inside and out. They need to
be organized as there are thousands of tiny parts of which to
keep track. One site on building a bicycle repair service even
suggests that you actually learn to build a tire from scratch
before you hang out a shingle.
Whatever the case may be though, if you know what you’re
doing and you are good, the money can be extremely lucrative,
especially if you work in a dense urban area like New York City
where more bicycles are used by adults (who have more disposable
income to spend for expensive repairs and who are more likely
to rush to repair a bike they depend on for getting to and from
work).
How Much Can You Make?
Most people who run a bicycle repair business maintain a list
of prices for various services, including basic tune ups and
even "clean and polish" services, however the basic
charge per hour for labor should work as a good guide to how
much you can earn – most shops charge a labor fee of $60
per hour. Mind you, that does not include parts, which you can
charge for separately so your $60 is mostly profit (you still
have to pay taxes and pay to repair or replace worn out tools
and equipment).
Ways to Make More | Related Opportunities
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One of the more interesting bicycle repair businesses out
there is a new concept called a mobile bicycle repair technician.
In essence, instead of telling people that they need to come
to you and you will repair their bicycle in your own garage,
these kinds of services off (for a premium of course) to come
out to where someone is and do the repair on the road. It does
entail keeping all your tools in a truck and being on call, but
it’s a great alternative to the more traditional bicycle
repair shop.
Another thing that many bicycle repair businesses do in order
to earn extra income is to sell new and used bikes and accessories.
This will depend on the size of your shop of course and on how
much demand there is in your area for such facilities.
Qualifications / Requirements
Needless to say, you need to know how to repair bicycles.
Some states and municipalities may have formal licensing requirements
(check with the city or state chamber of commerce), however even
if they do not have such requirements, you need to know everything
there is to know about repairing bicycles. You should be able
to strip a bike bare and then put it back together again if you
seriously expect to work in this business.
First Steps
Start by learning. Ideally, go to school and take a course
in bicycle repair. If you can’t find such a course, then
read lots of books and start by stripping your own bicycle down
to the bare bones. You need to be able to strip off every part
of your own bike, including the gears, the wheels, everything,
and be left with nothing but a bare frame and then reassemble
the whole thing from scratch. Once you are able to do that and
your bicycle is still road worthy and safe, you are ready to
start taking on work for others.
Resources
HowtoFixBikes.ca
– This is an excellent resource in that it offers more than
just the usual platitudes about how you can make a good living
fixing bikes. It provides practical information that you’ll
need to know in order to start your own bicycle repair service.
Cycle
Tech: Start Your Own Mobile Bicycle Repair Business –
This is where we got the idea for a mobile service. They have
some great information here and they may offer franchise opportunities
as well.
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