Tarck really making me wish I lived in Chicago lately. I was trying to think of any cool & quirky bike shops in MPLS and I couldn’t think of any.
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for what the overall scene is, i feel like we have a disappointing lack of quirk shops but that might be me spoiled talking
MPLS has the absolute lamest cool bike scene of any city known for being “bike friendly” I’ve been to
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This forum is full of examples and reasons why quirky bike shops don’t stay in business. The quirky shops in/around Minneapolis aren’t any different.
-one-on-one was very cool in their downtown location with the bike dungeon (next to sex world). Also had art showings, coffee bar, just overall cool and a fun place to hang out after hours. Of course increasing rents priced them out and I don’t think they’ve gotten their vibe back in the old nursery location.
-cars r coffins in uptown - did the coffee+bikes thing before catfish. I don’t know as many of the details but I’m guessing it got too expensive there too
-perennial is quirky in that they focus on all the weird bikes, but it’s uptown so they have to make rent too.
-varsity is right in dinkytown, which should be prime quirk but they have an Erik’s next door to compete with.
-behind bars in NE, don’t know much about them now but they seemed cool and nice back in the day
-GP in St. Paul is an institution, but in the “old road racer” sort of quirky way
-hollywood was a great shop for a lot of things, but it was a 1.5 person operation at peak staffing levels.
-there was another shop in south mpls around 2006 that was selling Rivendells and trying to be in the bikepacking market before it was a thing, not sure what became of it
-and of course all of the other newer tiny outfits I don’t know about that are hustling bikes on FB/CL.
I think part of the reason that shops trend lame is that a big chunk of the bike nerds here work for Q, so shops need to be able to sell to normal people.
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nice! the scene report is kind of a lost art.
If I were starting a bike shop today, I’d definitely start a coffee shop, contract with a local bakery for some fresh food, and sell small amounts of quirky bike stuff on the side, seeing if I could grow that part of the business.
in 2022 starting an IBD seems like it would be just a massive pain in the ass: either sell bikes that are good but have zero promotion, or get parasitized by a huge bike corporation that’s going to eventually run you out of business with an even more aggressive direct sales model.
Or do the cargo / family bike shop model if you’re in a city with a lot of middle class professionals who want something to take their kid to their alternative day school, I guess.
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This is almost exactly what angry catfish did, and they were able to grow it into a full-service bike shop at a second physical location. I think they had a pretty solid bankroll to get things going, but seems like the food/coffee/accessories model is more sustainable than just slinging bikes.
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Oh wait yeah another good model is to find a rich person and get them to pay for it as a lark. I suspect that this is what powering most cutesy Rivendell type shops.
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This is exactly what I’d do were I opening a shop. I’d open it in Andersonville just off Clark in a nondescript storefront and make fucking bank selling urban arrow an R&M to LakewoodBalmoral yuppies.
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Long live Tati!
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I think I know the guy who owned the south south MPLS shop. Hiawatha? I think his rent got too expensive and ended up in coops. I almost hired him to be my grocery manager but didn’t. Big mistake.
Also obviously I don’t go to many bike shops. Didn’t know about most of those. Agree that the new one-on-one has absolutely no vibe whatsoever but they are always really nice and friendly when I go there. I would go there often it was closer to me. As it stands I go to the new Erik’s in Richfield for most stuff which is a bummer but they always ogle my bikes which makes me feel specia and cool
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They’re my go to for most actual bike work I pay for but still, not my favorite
I literally take a ferry to vashon to go to the bike shop.
Yeah Catfish seems to have the most reliable/professional mechanics around. I’m sure they make mistakes, but they communicate and set expectations well which is like 80% of the battle. I truck in from the burbs to have them do stuff I can’t/won’t.
Hiawatha was the other shop I was thinking of. Guy had a pretty good blog going back in the blogger days, not surprised he got priced out but it’s a bummer 
That’s funny. He walked in the conference room for the interview and I was like, “HEY! I read your bike blog for years!”
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This boat didn’t belong here. Mods plz delete.
If we’re complaining about bike shops, I got a lot to say. The shop I liked got bought by the big shitty local chain, then a year later the big local chain sold to Trek so every location is now an even shittier Trek retail store. There’s just a couple shops left worth going to, one is a pain in the ass to get to and the other just never has anything. Everything else is a trail bro shop out in the suburbs that gets by on selling parts to their riding buddies or selling Retrospec stuff to parents.
edit: there’s one south side shop that might be decent, but it looks like they moved to internet sales due to covid and they never have what I’m looking for. IDK if they even have a physical location anymore
Whoa one on one moved into the Falls Nursery? That neighborhood has come up since we moved out in ‘92.
Feel bad because I have no idea what shops you are talking about except maybe BSS. The shops in my zone haven’t changed much but I’m not sure I’ve been in one in a couple years
Yeah, Ozone got bought by BSS which became Trek. Eastside Pedal Pushers is cool but way out of the way for me, and The Peddler never has anything.
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Ahhh Ozone is the one I forgot about, I went to the swap there with you that one time but have never been inside! If I needed something these days I’d probably just go to Clowndog since it is next to work lol
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