Chris Smedley: The Bicycle Shack

“My dad went to southern California to study BMX racing. He came back and started one of the first BMX race tracks in the Kansas City area. It was in a field about 500 yards from where the Bicycle Shack is today. About 1976 he moved the track to Kernoodles Park where it operated for years.” Chris Smedley, owner of The Bicycle Shack, recalled the days when his father owned Gary’s Bike Mart. I was glad to get to know Chris because years earlier we had done some business together for a short time. I wanted to learn the why and how of his good business skills. I could tell from his first statement that I would discover his secret.

Smedley is a Grandview High School graduate who watched the building of Truman Corners from his bicycle. He used to stop by Jack Frost Donuts (now Holt’s) for a warm donut on his way to the junior high. And when he didn’t have a quarter for his donut, the owner let him pay later in the week.

“Dad to take us kids fishing and hunting a lot. He was an electrician by trade,” Chris reminisced. But when he was 12 years old, Dad had a stroke. Family life changed dramatically and Dad could not return to his field. About two years later was when he bought the bike shop on Blue Ridge Boulevard.

Chris was only 14 when he started working for Dad. “I’ll always remember Denny, a big muscular guy who always wore a cowboy hat. He was head mechanic and taught me everything about working on bikes.

“I quickly got real good at one of the hardest things which is straightening wheels,” he added. “I used to dig wheels out of the trash and fix them when everyone else thought they were hopeless.”

Business was going well but then, “Dad moved the shop to a bad neighborhood, which wasn’t a great idea, and eventually closed the business,” he continued.

“In 1981, my older brother Victor and I borrowed $13,000 from our mother and opened The Bicycle Shack on Hickman Mills Drive.”

Bike trends are constantly changing. Initially they specialized in BMX bikes. They created Berm Busters at Benjamin Ranch, the only official BMX track in the area. Eventually Berm Busters moved to Lee’s Summit. That’s when his brother started Parents Bicycle Motorcycle Association which kept parents very involved in their children’s activities and existed for over a decade.

The first few years were tough. Victor had a young family so he had to get paid. Chris was single. So Victor ran the shop while Chris painted houses for a year or two. Then Victor was offered his old job back and Chris ran the shop. Eventually Chris bought his brother’s share of the business.

“By 1985/86, everybody had to have a mountain bike. For a while it was easy to watch the trends because everything would start in southern California and make it’s way to the Midwest. These days, trends move so quickly, it’s hard to know how and when and what to change. But we keep up. Mountain bikes got a lot of people into riding. Then they shift back to road bikes. Now road bikes have the most growth in the industry.” Chris shared.

He met his wife Debra in 1985. By 1993, their son Jason was working at the shop. Chris stumbled upon the Blue Ridge space. “I remember walking in, how big it looked, and how it echoed when I walked through. It seemed perfect. But sales had to increase by 20% the first year in order to make it in the bigger space. The first year, they increased 50%. The second, another 50%.”

“We have a small road team with about 60 members that races all over the Midwest. Organizationally it’s laid back, probably because of the more or less accidental way it was formed,” Chris confided. A customer talked Chris into doing a triathlon with him. They wore Bicycle Shack shirts. Three of them did another, wearing Bicycle Shack shirts The Bicycle Shack Racing Team was officially formed around 2003/04.

He thought about what he likes best about his business.

“We can get out and do a little of what our business is about, too, so it’s not monotonous. We see a variety of people and that keeps it from being boring. And, I’ve seen many customers go from beginners to really good. In fact here’s a great story.

“We have one customer who was really heavy set. And he said, ‘I’m gonna be retiring soon and I want to ride across the country.’ I looked at him and thought, man, you are not gonna be able to ride across the country. But he was determined and he set a goal. And I got a bike for him and I started working with him and sure enough two years later he signed up with one of those tours, and he rode across the country. The next summer, he did the exact same thing except he did it alone on a custom touring bike. He sent us a post card from every city along the way. He sets and achieves goals like this every year since. This man is a real inspiration to me.”

It’s tough for bike shops to succeed today. I wanted to know Chris’s secret to continued success.

“The main thing is treating people right. Treat people like you’re thankful they came into your shop. Treat them like it’s a privilege to serve them. I don’t know if we would be in business if we didn’t treat people right. We might not be the biggest, fanciest shop. We have what we use personally and we’re into the sport. We support the sport where we can. We now have an MS 150 Team. Salesmen can’t believe we bother to fix what we do. We want to turn out quality and maintain it. We want to take care of our customers.”

Visit Chris and his team for sound advice, custom work and simple quality Monday thru Friday 10 to 7, Saturday 9 to 5, at 10415 Blue Ridge Blvd in Kansas City, MO. You’ll be glad I let you in on his secret.