NORFOLK -- Cleveland Bike & Sport owner Nic Meyer has a warning for new customers.

"If you are interested in looking for a bike, and you come in to look we will not have a whole lot to show you," said Meyer.

When the pandemic hit most businesses fell on hard times and Meyer's shop prepared for an inevitable loss of sales and walk-in customers.

"I was expecting a slow year, and it has been the exact opposite of that. It has been one of the busiest years since we opened," said Meyer. 

According to NPD, a market research company, bike and bike accessory sales grew 75-percent in April and reached $1 billion in sales compared to last year. The market growth can be attributed to people looking for a new family friendly activity during the national quarantine. 

This rise in demand created a problem when production overseas halted, and could no longer keep up with the new consumer base. 

"Off of the top of my head I have at least 25 back orders. Worst case scenario I think it will be March of next year before those orders get filled,"  said Meyer.

It is not just bikes that were no longer being made; the newest challenge for the bike shop is parts.

Without new bikes in stock people found old ones, and brought them in for repairs. 

"The difficulty in getting parts for a lot stuff now is starting to make things frustrating," Meyer continued, "We have a lot of people bringing in for repairs and our hands are tied if we do not have parts to fix them. I have had some [bikes] come in that are from the '50s that were being brought in to be fixed up so that they could ride them again."

With unprecedented times Meyer and his bike shop are working hard to solve the problem, "Our future for a little while will be pre-orders only. As far as excess and open inventory that we can order as we need it. It could be the end of next summer." 

Those interested in purchasing a new bike may have to wait longer than they think.