S&H Bikes’ Steve Hickey Rides To Success By Knowing His Audience.
Lifelong gearhead (and retired pro-BMX racer) Steve Hickey is a lesson in succeeding by putting it all on the line—and on his shelves. (Though his personality is a big drawn too.)
Know your audience. That’s Steve Hickey’s philosophy at his S&H Bicycle Store, Route 20, Sloansville, NY.
Steve Hickey was that kid.
If you were lucky enough to grow up in a neighborhood like his, you know the kind.
“My mom always said I just picked up a neighbor kid’s bike and took off. We skipped the whole training wheels thing. How old was I? Maybe 3?”
Forty-some years later, his S&H Bicycle Store is the Upstate New York go-to for all things bike, a one-stop stop for repairs and custom builds, advice, and conversations, where you never know who’ll walk in: Models in stilettos. PhD candidates. Doctors and lawyers from as far away as New York City and DC.
FBI agents…(All good.)
And locals who-knew-him-when.
Hickey’s not quite a boomeranger–a word we made up for kids who left us and then came home, missing the rural lifestyle, friends, and opportunities, mostly because even while he traveled the country, competing on the BMX circuit, he never really left.
Proving there's success waiting for you in Schoharie County–if you’re willing to put in the time.
The blood, sweat, and tears.
Because there have been days…
Before he was S & H Bicycles, Hickey, an admitted gearhead, ran an online store for classic and vintage bikes upstairs in his Route 20, Sloansville home, so successfully that after a while, he and his dad started shopping around for a storefront..
The prices floored them: $3,500 in Cobleskill, $5,000 in Rotterdam.
“You know how many bike tubes you have to sell to pay for that?”
S&H’s Steve Hickey, who earned his wheels on the pro-racing circuit, chats with a young customer.
Yes, Hickey’s pro-racing career was a “real” job. Until injuries made him re-think his plan—a win for local cyclists and Schoharie County.
They reassessed and he built what he needed, figuring worst come to worst, it could be a garage. And at least he’d own it.
But it worked.
Easily 100 people from all around the Capital District turned out for his soft opening. His reputation helped: “I was known in the bike world.” And he thought maybe it might work after all. It did. Until it almost didn’t.
In the spring of 2020, Hickey put it all on the line, maxing out his credit card to fill his shop.
Remember what happened next?
The. World. Shut. Down.
It’s a one-man shop where Hickey’s chatty personality and service keeps customers coming back.
And Hickey stood out back, wondering what he’d done, certain he was going to lose it all.
Until somehow, everyone needed a bike.
Again, they lined Route 20. And those bikes he’d bet it all on? “My dad came inside, asking for more bikes. He’d sold them all.”
He still hasn’t really slowed down, pivoting and pivoting again, adding group rides, tire changing and fitting workshops, and even a swap meet for gear heads and bike nerds where he picked up a lamp. (A lamp? At a bike swap? “It had a bike on it.”)
How did he get here from there? By working at a local bike shop (Harry’s Bicycles in Cobleskill for those who remember) and racing BMX at an old track in Duanesburg.
“Everyone said once I got my licenses, I’d be done.” But instead, it gave him four wheels to compete even farther away. He graduated a year early to race professionally–mountain bike and BMX–when everyone around him counseled it was a mistake.
But was it a job?
“I earned enough that it went on my W-2.” Think six figures to start So, yes. It was a job.
Until, after 15 years, an accident in a warm-up started him rethinking his priorities.
Hickey was near the top of his game when he crashed, breaking his wrist, collarbone, and three ribs. He got back, but the next year the stress from competing, training, and travel continued to wear him down and S&H Bikes was born.
That good, old Schoharie County resiliency. You’ve probably heard of it.
“I traveled around to many different places when I was racing. But I never really took the time to take them in…or the people. I always had other obligations, so time was an issue. My self-confidence wasn’t always the greatest. I was most confident when I was on two wheels and had my helmet on.”
Bikes. gear, accessories and more—all with a heaping dose of advice.
Look at him now.
Eleven years later, his personality (“Here’s some fun useless info”) brings in the cyclists almost as much as his intentionally-stocked shelves (True confession: Steve's our bike guy. Sales, tune-ups, upgrades, stories? Yep, yep, yep.)
Even as he keeps an eye on what’s trending.
Like…
Spiking gas prices. It might turn urban commuters to bikes, but here, what he’d really like to see is a local bike trail–something with legit economic development potential.
The fact that Big Box retailers like Target have cleared their shelves of kids’ bikes.
Not good news.“Kids’ bikes are the gateway to everything else. If you’re not walking by a wall of bikes…out of sight, out of mind.”
You succeed by knowing your audience.
99 bikes new and used, spread across 16 or 17 different lines side-by-side with gear that didn’t exist 10 years ago fill the shop.
Hickey does. He relies on his reputation, social media, and word of mouth to bring customers into a shop that’s jam-packed with 99 bikes new and used, gravel, mountain, mobility, e-, and a recumbent–spread across 16 or 17 different lines side-by-side with gear that didn’t exist 10 years ago: seats, pedals, grips. If you can imagine it, Hickey can custom-build it.
You succeed by knowing your audience. Better prices, better service. (Though he did sell that one $8,000 Look bike the guy from the Capital District asked him to get. Tour d’ France? They ride Looks. And if you’re super-nosey, sometimes the guy comes to group rides.)
“It’s the whole interaction.” Whether you’re that three-year-old or the guy looking to drop $8,000. They come in for a taste of that Schoharie County welcome. They leave with a friend.
