Repair shops are thriving in the city, with bike repair stands, bicycle shops and a bike shop in every block of the city.
The Biker Repair Stand is one of them, which opened in the old C.P. Ramachandran Hospital in Chennai.
The shop offers repairs and maintenance to the bicycles that were donated by people.
The shop was established in the hospital for the health of its patients.
“It was a relief that we had a place to repair bikes,” says Arun Rao, the owner of the shop.
The business has been running in the building since it opened on February 27.
“We got a lot of complaints and complaints about people not coming in for repairs.
So, we decided to reopen.
We have been receiving so many complaints, that we decided it was time to open the shop,” says Rao.
The shops, which have an area of around 10 acres, have been running for the past few years.
The owners were initially planning to set up another shop in the same building, but the demand was too great, and the space was sold to another firm.
Rao and his brother, Manjul, opened the shop in 2016.
They had been working on repairing bikes for the last few years, but it was only in 2018 that the shop opened.
“When we opened the first shop, we didn’t expect this demand.
The demand is now much bigger than we could have imagined.
The first day, the customers came from far and wide, and we got more than 5,000 people.
Now we have 20,000 bikes, which is more than we expected,” Rao says.
The business is also popular with other residents.
“They come here to repair their bikes, so we are also receiving customers from outside the city,” he adds.
Rajan and Manjuli are also hoping that the store will attract a bigger clientele in the future.
“Even though we were not expecting so much demand, we are looking forward to the day when we get the customers coming in to buy bikes.
This is the first time we have opened a shop where we get such a demand,” says Manjula.