Shining Bikes & Things

You’re reviews are ridiculous, no one gives low prices like this old man, I don’t understand why he gets bad reviews for buying stolen bikes that he doesn’t know about. He’s tryna make a living for christ sakes. Back to the point, his prices for any labor like brakes, chains and other things are very cheap. Awesome guys!

Testing this bike shop with «integrity.» Major epic fail in fair pricing and customer service. Purchased a used Tektro RL721 «used» 1 brake lever $ 20 (New 2 pair $ 27.00) Second try and purchased «1» presta valve adapter $ 2.00 (Purchase anywhere else 5x for less than $ 2.00)
Please, buyers beware of their «Integrity» as a company. Pricing to upsell up to nearly 60−80% in comparison to other bike shop in the area.
Employee is another failure for the downfall of this company. Manipulative and foresees buyer as unknowing fools. To each buyers who visits this store keep an open mind and you definitely will draw your own conclusion.
No wonder they keep changing the «company» name. BBB should evaluate this store.

New name: it’s now called «5600 Bikes» after it address on Western Avenue.
I went there a couple of month ago to get a repair to a crank. They couldn’t repair it, showed me why, but had a replacement crank. I had to leave it overnight, there were very fast and complete in repairing it and called me the next morning when it was ready.
The price was very reasonable. I have no complaints.

The customer service was HORRID!!! the gentlemen who waited on me was rude and very short and acted like he had better things to do. a real JERK… I needed a new crank and peddle and I was told it would be ready the next morning. I go the next morning and he told me that they were still working on it and I look across the room and it was still sitting there. Nothing done and he had no answer for why it was not being worked on and just sitting there… I was told come back tomorrow afternoon and I did and it still was not ready. I told him I would be back in 2 hours and it better be done. I arrived 2 –½ hours later and it was ready… So far I have had no problems but I will NEVER go there again… Also, they advertised bike for $ 50 and up…
****.BIG SALE**** I asked to see anything under $ 100 and he had nothing… All the bikes looked like crap anyway, bent, dented, chipped paint, rust and he had prices of $ 250, $ 300…REALLY???

This place is horrible, If you are a serious biker this is not the place for you, If you are looking for a really good bike shop with good price and nice people and good service Chicago Bike Lane is the place.

Ok so here’s the deal. My husband bought a bike from here almost a year ago and they only accepted cash, he paid way lower than what I think he should have for it, etc. etc. which led me to the automatic assumption that the bike was stolen, like so many other people’s experience thus far. However, I checked the serial number on the stolen bike registry that the CPD runs, and it didn’t appear anywhere, so good news there.
I think this place is under new management/​ownership or something, because my experience was the opposite of most people’s who’ve reviewed it. They are no longer called Shining Bikes & Things, but rather have been reincarnated as the succinct, if not obvious, 5600 Bikes.
I’ve been riding my grandpa’s Fuji around for the past 3 years and have put it through its paces, most recently by having to store it outside for a full winter. This spring, the chain was rusted, the gears were rusted, and I alerted anyone in a 2 mile radius that I was coming through the raucous squeaking that came from the thing, not to mention the fact that it was stuck on one gear, the hardest one, which meant that I got some crazy workout whether I wanted it or not.
My husband «surprised» me by dropping my bike off at 5600 Bikes while I was out of town (and made me pay for it, the sweetheart). I just picked it up today, and basically demanded that I be allowed to ride it down to Petersen and back to make sure the gears shifted correctly, the brakes worked, and so on. The bike rode like I’d just bought it new — they did a fabulous job, from what I can tell from a 2 block bike ride. What’s more, they allowed me to pay in with a debit card and asked for my email for a receipt, so that’s good and legit of them.
My other option for a bike shop is On the Route on Lawrence, which wanted to charge me $ 200+ for a tune-​up, vs. the $ 92 these guys charged me, so that’s nice. Additionally, the guys at On the Route are basically the type of bike shop guys I can’t stand, which is to say, judgmental as hell, possibly because I’m a girl on a bike, possibly because I don’t have enough Critical Mass street cred, possibly because I’m not riding fixed gear. Here there was less of that, and the owner was cool as hell. I mentioned all this to said owner, and he said that they’re trying to market itself as a «community» bike shop, and that they have a different agenda overall than other more commercial places in the city. So take that as you will.
So yeah, some people have recovered their stolen bikes here, under weird circumstances. That said, it’s a new year, I haven’t personally seen the receipts that these people are dealing hot bikes, I don’t give a shit if they’re discussing drugs because let’s be real, they can be dealing meth in the basement as long as they know what they’re doing with bikes, and I am morally bankrupt enough to pay $ 92 to a guy that’s nice to me to fix my bike, as opposed to $ 200 to a bunch of douchebags who can’t stop talking about Pitchfork long enough to give me the time of day.

I’d give this place negative stars if I could. The people here are very unprofessional. I happened to have walked in one day when they were talking about drugs. Judging by looks and the service, the store is most likely ran by druggies also involved in other shady business. My bike was repaired here and not only did they not do a good job tightening up my wheel. It was lose after biking a few miles out on the street and I could have gotten into an accident. I definitely should have taken legal action against this place, at the same time they tried to rip me off by not giving a firm price. «How much will this cost?» The guy’s response was 10, 15 dollars. Okay is it ten or fifteen? Thank the lord I wasn’t in a bad mood that day. Otherwise it would be my pleasure to set out and gather information to have the law do its duty on these people.

If there was a way to give this place negative stars — I would.
Just recovered my friend’s stolen bike from this place yesterday. The bike was stolen from Skokie — looks like they’re branching out to the ‘burbs too…
We knew this place had the bike because they listed it on Craigslist. Went to the store, verified the serial number on the frame with the serial number listed on the bike registration. Sure enough, it was a match. What a surprise…
The man who seemed to be in charge of the place just kind of rolled his eyes when we brought it to his attention. I asked how he acquired this bike and all he would say was, «it was a trade in. you’re lucky you found your bike. most people don’t.» He was totally unapologetic about it — and even said that this seems impossible because he supposedly checks all the serial numbers on the bikes against the Chicago registry. Baloney, sir, baloney! When asked if he was going to follow up with whoever traded the bike in to him, he said it wasn’t worth it to him. Really? It’s not worth $ 600 (the going price of the bike) to make a phone call. Just one red flag of many. After examining the registration and a form from the Skokie police department, he said we could just take the bike and go. He handwrote a «receipt» for his records to say that he had given the bike back, and asked my friend’s husband to sign it. When we asked for a copy, he said he couldn’t because «his copy machine was broken» and pointed to a computer. Red flag number two. He eventually agreed to handwrite a copy of the receipt for my friend’s records. What a joke.
Honestly — be very wary of purchasing a bike here. This is not my first encounter with stolen bikes from this place. I’m sure that some of the bikes sold here are legally sold to the place, but make sure to do your homework and check serial numbers against the Chicago database before giving them any money.
Safe riding, everyone!

Cannot emphasize enough… if your bike was stolen on the Northside, it’s probably stripped down and resold here.
I live three blocks away from this place. My bike was stolen from my garage on Thursday. Old beat up Schwinn frame with a few hundred dollars worth of updates.
Monday morning, on my way to work, I decided to walk past, and sure enough, my bike frame was right there on the shop floor, visible through the window. Filed a police report, and the officers told me to go to the shop and call 911.
I get there as the shop is opening up, walk over to the remnants of my bike and tell the guy that here’s my police report for this stolen bike. He starts telling me about how some kid brought it on Thursday. I ask to see the sales ticket, since they had a sign that says «ID Required to sell bikes» He starts leafing through a stack of tickets before remembering that the kid just gave him this bike. Tells me to hold up and starts looking around and calling his son, who he says was around when they took the bike in and when they were working on it. Told me not to call the cops, because he didn’t want cops in there.
10 minutes of him on the phone, I call the cops. They show up, he tells them the story of some kid bringing it in, and him not wanting to buy it so the kid just left it.
Talking to the cops, lots of mixed stories… he’s able to describe the kid who brought him the bike, but doesn’t remember if it came in with wheels. He was able to dig out my fork from some parts bin.
He turned the frame over to me… missing were my $ 300 wheels, and hundreds of dollars of other parts like handle bars, breaks and levers.
Police mentioned they are aware of that this place is «off», but can’t do anything about it.
As other reviews mention, if you want a stolen bike, come right in here. If your bike was recently stolen, check this place.

To those who say they sell stolen bikes. I just sold my old bike there. They took my name and address and I had to prove it with my driver’s license. So I suppose if I was selling them a stolen bike they could trace it back to me. I know this doesn’t help you if your bike is stolen as that’s a tragedy in itself, but I honestly don’t think they’re the ones out there stealing bikes. Unfortunately us bike owners have other culprits out there that we have to fend against

UPDATE!!! Ok now this completely sucks. I was adjusting the seat on this bike and when I was lifting my leg over the rear fender someone had already put a self tapping screw with blades on two sides of the point, into the rear fender so that the point of the screw was pointing outside about ¾ long. My foot caught the screw when I was trying to get off and slit a 3 inch cut into my foot and I had to go to the ER and get stitches. NOT COOL

TODAY I visited this garbage hole after passing this place by everyday on my way to work for the first and last time. I went there with my wife and my 6 year old daughter because were planning to BUY 3 bikes for each of us in order to have a nice family ride and enjoy this summer. After putting $ 3.00 on the MFing parking meter I walked in this hell hole thinking we will be greeted and helped, On my Dead Father’s Grave not one Ahole greeted us, I even mistaken a customer as a worker, the place is a mess, the workers reminds me of Englewood area bums and gang bangers, go there and you will see, I swear the bikes for sale were either stolen or grabbed from the garbage they are all in bad shape! After 10 min of standing in there and outside, no one approached us or even say can I help you, I was so mad and left and took my business to some place else!

I’m going to start off by saying that if I’d seen the other reviews of Shining Bikes & Things, I probably wouldn’t have stopped in. But I did stop in before seeing any reviews, and I must say that I’m quite at a loss to reconcile my experience there with what some others have posted. But most of the reviews look to be more than 2 years old, so I might as well post a new one.
I stopped in one day after passing by the shop many times, as I was looking for a decent quality, used bicycle for my growing daughter. I didn’t have high hopes from what I saw outside the store, as it really doesn’t look like much more than a hole in the wall from outside, but once inside, I was greeted by two friendly people and two neatly arranged rows of bicycles, one just inside the door at the window facing Avenue and a longer one along the window facing Bryn Mawr. (The shop is on the northwest corner of Western and Bryn Mawr, a seemingly unlikely place for a bike shop.) The bicycles ranged from vintage antiques to brand new, freshly assembled models (one of which was on a stand in the final stages of assembly), and all appeared to be in good repair. The price range was better than I expected, starting at about $ 50 for something functional but well-​used. I found several good choices for my daughter and checked the store hours with the people there to decide on a good time to return with my daughter.
The second visit, with my daughter, went very well. Again, there were two employees in the store, both of whom were very helpful, not to mention thrilled to meet a 13-​year-​old girl who loves bicycles and knew exactly what she wanted. They quickly adjusted the candidate bikes to fit my daughter, enabling her to decide which seemed most comfortable, and they then let her take her favorite out solo for a test ride. Upon her return, they noticed that one of the shifters was damaged, and promised us a free replacement. The bike was a 15-​year-​old Raleigh MTB, obviously not top of the line, but good and solid and priced right at $ 75. (I had already done a fair amount of shopping around at yard sales, other used bike shops, eBay and CraigsList, and was happy to find a bike like this for $ 75.) They said it would be ready that Sunday. I wanted them to add fenders to it; they said that would cost another $ 25, installed free. So far so good. I offered them a deposit, but they declined, saying my word was good enough for them. I asked about acceptable payments, and was told they were having problems with their credit card machine (there was one next to the cash register) and could only take cash. Fair enough — I was fine paying cash.
The bike was ready on schedule, with a brand new shifter in place of the old, damaged one, but no fenders. They explained that they could not install those, citing difficulty installing a rear fender under the rear cantilever brake’s transverse cable. (To be fair, the only thing a regular bike shop might’ve done differently with regard to this would have been to offer a rear fender that would clip onto the seatpost. The transverse cable really was too close to the tire to allow for a conventional fender installation. I eventually bought full coverage fenders on my own and found creative, albeit laborious, means of installing them.) The original price of the bike without the fenders was honored.
After coming across this shop’s Unilocal listing and seeing some of the other reviews, I looked up the bike’s serial number and description in a couple of places that accept stolen bicycle reports. I won’t dispute Sam L’s experience; all I can say is that my daughter’s bike has not been reported stolen anywhere that I know of. Other reviewers’ allegations about stolen bikes are questionable — they don’t say what they mean by bikes that «look» stolen. It seems to me that if one wanted to build a business fencing stolen bikes, selling them from a permanent storefront would be an awfully foolish way to do it.
In the end, I’d have to say I had a good experience at Shining Bikes & Things. I give them 4 out of 5 stars, and the only reason I’m not giving them 5 is because the store is not equipped to handle the full range of services that a regular bike shop offers. But if all you want are routine repairs to your bicycle or a decent used bicycle at a good price, Shining Bikes & Things should be on your list of places to visit.

The owners comments are obvious lies. We were told to come in and we did within five minutes. We accepted the offer and were immediately told never mind because we probably stole it, no clue how that makes us have entitlement issues. It’s funny that everyone who says they have
biking experience rips this shop, but yet it’s me that has the issue.
By the way the bikes was sold the next day for the asking price of $ 200.

I stopped by the shop one evening to see the variety that they had to offer.
Nothing caught my eye as most of the bikes looks stolen. They definitely carry more rusty old bikes from what I saw. And anything worth a 2^nd look was way overpriced for the condition/​year.
As I was walking out the door, a sales guy walked up to me asking what I was looking for/​interested in. I explained to him what types/​price range. So I kept walking because the guy reeked of booze, and he said to me «I shouldn’t be doing this» but here’s a bike off his camera phone. To me, that’s shady business… and plus the bike he showed me was much cheaper at Walmart!
I don’t know anything about the labor they offer, but if your looking to purchase a bicycle… Spend the extra cash and buy NEW.

DO NOT COME HERE!
I got a bike here and have had nothing but problems. The frame cracked, they replaced it. The pedal fell off, they «fixed» it. This all took longer than they said it would. I finally took it to another bike shop and they were AMAZED at how poorly put together this bike was. Every bolt was either the wrong one, loose, or completely stripped. They re-​did so much and barely charged me because they felt bad I wasted my money on Shining Bikes & Things.
They do NOT care if you’re safe on their product. I wish this simple online review could cause them to shut down for the safety of chicago bikers.

They get 2 stars for cheap prices. I give zero stars for customer service. I dropped off my bike on a weekend. They said it would be done tuesday. I went back on thursday and it wasn’t done. It wasn’t anything complicated, just a new tire and stem. While I was there, the guy kept pacing around the store looking for something he needed, couldn’t find it, and asked me to come back another day. I came back the following week and found my bike to be fixed, but the tire wasn’t mounted straight and it was rubbing the frame. They had to swap out the tire again. Now being 2 weeks since I dropped off the bike, I thought they would finish this last fix somewhat quickly. A guy began finishing the tire and then just stopped to fix someone else’s bike who just walked in. This place is not even worth their cheaper prices.

My verdict is still out on this shop. The guys who work there are nice, and helpful. They try really hard to get you on a bike and out the door that day. The prices are much higher than other shops/​CL, both vintage and collective. A bit high pressure when you walk in, as was the first time I visited the shop. The one thing that I can’t help to take notice on is the hodgepodge in their array of bicycles. And, where do they get all their bikes… from the auction? Donations? Maxwell Street? Just an observation.

Extremely helpful, knowledgeable staff that immediately offered me some help picking out a bike after I grinned and announced «I’m a bike moron, I need some direction».
The gentleman who helped me out was extremely helpful without being overbearing, and was really in tune with what I wanted — even if I wasn’t sure what I wanted, ha. This was my first time buying a bike since childhood, and his skill and friendliness made me comfortable enough to trust his guidance.
After choosing a bike, this guy chatted up my husband and I while he graciously added a U-​lock mount, new seat pole thingy, and lights. I suddenly felt like we had known each other forever, as he went above and beyond the simple task of selling me a bike.
I’ll recommend this place to anyone looking for a fair-​priced bike with unbelievable service.

I feel it is worth mentioning that my last review prompted the owner of the shop in question to contact me privately via Unilocal.I moved the conversation to e-​mail and it ended with what may, or may not, have been a threat from the owner; while I do not feel threatened in the slightest I am pretty sure the guy is full on nuts.