Bye Bye Bike Shop

The "Goodbye" party at the community bike shop was a great success and since it was a fundraiser, I'm sure the organizers appreciated to $53.10 that patrons left as tips at the improvised bar set up on the display case which is used to hold expensive and rare bike parts.

Good times

My last shift as a mechanic at this shop was on Sunday and given the cold weather, not very many members came in to take advantage of our free services.  I fully expected that with the change of seasons we would be busy winterizing bikes - teaching members how to stud their tires or attach fenders to their bike frames.

Selling it cheap

Rather than move a lot of cycling merchandise, the co-op's idea was to sell off bikes and parts at a discounted rate and I thought for sure that members would be streaming into the shop to score a fine bike at a discount.  Even the crappier bikes would make good winter bikes.  Admittedly, the sale has been going on for several weeks so perhaps the eager bargain finders had already swooped in and found a satisfying deal.

Scrapped bikes with all the useable parts stripped off

I expected to feel sadness at the closing of the shop however, I'm looking forward with excitement to a new shop that has all the features that were built into BikeWorks North.  With all the lessons that were learned in building that relatively new facility, this next one should prove to be even better.