Charlie’s Bike Shop: Goodwill and Community

Charlie’s Bike Shop started with Charlie’s huge love of helping people. His first job out of high school was in a bike shop and in 2021 word of mouth promoting Charlie’s bike repairs launched a new business. Then in 2023, the couple officially opened their own shop in Antigo, Wisconsin.

Manda Morrison said, “Our shop offers bike services like tune ups and overhauls. We also order custom parts and offer custom bike builds. Our repair services extend to unicycles and tricycles as well.”

In 2022, the shop added ski and snowboard tuning and waxing services. “Charlie was a ski and snow board instructor for over 25 years and he loves to teach people how to do these things themselves as well,” Manda said.

Manda shares what she enjoys about being an entrepreneur

The Entrepreneurial Training Program (ETP) offered by the Wisconsin Small Business Development Center (SBDC) aided Manda with her marketing responsibilities for the business. She learned tips to build their website from scratch and even created a downloadable bike safety e-book that is available at no cost. Manda said, “ETP is such a valuable experience. It is the type of course you could take again and again, something that helps people just starting as well as people who have been in business for 20 years. It assisted us with networking, learning changing technology, and discovering new resources.”

Listen to the ETP’s benefits for small businesses

ETP also helped spur ideas for growth. “As part of ETP, I surveyed nearly 300 respondents and discovered there was a real need for bike pick-up and delivery services in our area. So, we added those, too!” The couple used a Kiva loan, which they obtained with the help of SBDC and Wisconsin Women’s Business Initiative Corporation (WWBIC), to purchase a seven-bike, hitch-mounted rack and hire a professional marketer for a short period of time.

Other support in the class came from the Langlade County Economic Development Corporation Executive Director, Angie Close. “Angie came to the ETP course every night. She answered all our questions and helped us establish a commercial business address which made it easier for us to capture wholesale buying power,” Manda said. “We were also awarded a grant from the Langlade County Economic Development Corporation which helped us to purchase specialty tools and bike stands and a dream list of things we needed.”

THE COMMUNITY

This small business loves to give back to its community that has supported them. “We realize the more small businesses help each other, the better we all do,” Manda said. “For example, we refer people to the Kettlebowl Ski Hill and they do the same for us. We are members of the Antigo Optimist Club and the Antigo Bike & Ski Club as well.”Charlie’s original love of helping people is still present in the Every Kid on a Bike program. He fixes donated bikes and offers them to local kids – and adults – in need. So far, Charlie’s Bike Shop has given away more than 60 bikes through the program.

In additional to the ETP class, this small business also obtained one-on-one consulting offered by the SBDC. “We worked with Jackson Burgau who helped me create our financial projections. It is really fun to look at the projections we put in our business plan and see how close our revenue is to those projections year after year,” Manda said.

“Zia Yang at the SBDC provided us with industry reports so we could do comparisons to other bike shops on things like pricing and sales volume. Andi Gretzinger, a consultant at the UW-Stevens Point SBDC, is a great cheerleader for us. She really wants to see us succeed and helped us enroll in free classes offered by the Main Street Bounceback program,” she said.