Downtown will get another 'bike' shop

July 7, 2008
By Robert C. Burns

MUSKEGON -- In the unsettling new age of $4-a-gallon gasoline, Dave and Kristine Olsen are offering one more way to fight back.

The Grand Rapids couple will soon be setting up shop at 173 W. Clay near Terrace Street in downtown Muskegon with a line of Whizzer Motorbikes.

Their Grips N' Gears Bike Shop Co. is also licensed as a dealer of Cannondale bicycles and Bern helmets. And they hope to bring other bicycle brands, including Surly and Felt, to their showroom.

Once open for business, the Olsens will be complementing a downtown business that concerns itself with the other end of the motorized, two-wheeled spectrum -- the Hot Rod Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealership that opened last year.

The Whizzer NE5 Classic version is driven by a small 4-cycle engine that is said to get 120 miles per gallon at speeds of up to 25 mph. A more powerful model, the Ambassador, resembles a chopper motorcycle and can go 40 mph.

Whizzer U.S.A. traces its origins to 1939. It fell on hard times but was resurrected under new ownership in 1997 and is now based in Carrollton, Texas. Its Web site is www.whizzerusa.com.

Olsen recently decided it was time to branch out -- out of computer repairs, and out of Grand Rapids.

"I guess we just started driving around Muskegon," Olsen said. "We got downtown and saw a place for rent and everything that was going on, and it all sounded really, really good."

Their sales location still is undergoing remodeling and will have to pass city inspections. Until that work is done, the Olsens said they may have to set up shop temporarily in a building on Terrace Street, across from Muskegon City Hall -- hoping to at least get their doors open in time for the start of Muskegon Bike Time festival, July 18-20.